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The rise of user-hostile software

den.dev

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Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#211

Post by thewebcount »

Oh man, I just ran into this. I work on a product that has a 3rd party API so other people can write plug-ins to extend the functionality of the app. It's great for users and developers. We received a bug report related to a particular plug-in, so I went to download their demo to see if the problem was on our end or theirs before contacting them. Here's how the process went:

1) Go to their website and click "Download" 2) Prompted to enter email address with no way to opt out. Shit. Go to mailinator.com and create a fake email address to enter. Enter it. 3) Wait for them to send the real download link to my fake email. 4) It came in almost instantly. Great! Click on the link. 5) Click to download the installer package. Wait a few minutes. 6) Run the installer package. 7) It needs the same email address and password so it knows I'm a "legitimate user" just to install the thing. 8) After entering it, it kicks me back to the web page for some reason. No idea what it's looking for or what I'm supposed to do on the web site, so I go back to the installer. Oh it's not an installer. It's an installer installer. It's going to download the installer I want from a list of dozens of possible installers. Download the real installer. 9) Run the real installer - It lists dozens of products. Find the one I want. Install it. 10) Prompted for email and password again.

And keep in mind this is all before I'm actually a customer. I haven't paid anything and am trying to evaluate the software to determine if it fits my needs. (Or I would be if I were an end user.) Honestly, if this weren't for my job, I would have given up on step 2. Fuck these people. I'm trying to save them time by seeing whether the bug is ours or theirs, but they're actively wasting mine and everyone else's who downloads this crap.

Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#213

Post by read_if_gay_ »

ryandrake wrote: post #160
greatgib wrote: post #44

This article is globally so true, but there is a major error: It is not "needs of developers" the problem, but the "needs of product manager, marketing, c-level asshole". Like for telemetry, most of the time the business side "can", so they do. And again, for specific app and co, most developer would complain and not like release such user-hostile software but they are forced by business to do it. Like this stupid pr…

> And again, for specific app and co, most developer would complain and not like release such user-hostile software but they are forced by business to do it For every dark pattern, invasive analytics package, adware, malware, spyware that gets added to a product, there is an actual software developer sitting in a chair, voluntarily adding it. Maybe someone here on HN, reading this very thread! Nobody is putting a gun…

At the end of the day even if all devs collectively decide they won’t implement these features (which already is utopian), there will be someone in a more desparate position who would just be too glad to take the job. You may have to go looking in other countries. Or raise wages. But it will get done.

Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#214

Post by ZoomZoomZoom »

This is a really serious problem and a nice set of principles to go by. There's a big "but", however: Most of us here are hired employees and aren't really making the products for the end users. What really could be helpful are not some "oaths" but the strategies for dealing with our managers and employers and ways to uphold the ethics (and in some cases, aesthetics) of our work.

The mere market clearly don't work here, as the demand for these values is overshadowed by user's convenience, network effect and marketing brainwash.

Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#215

Post by dasil003 »

selfhoster11 wrote: post #154
dasil003 wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is too much money came into tech. Even 10 years ago software companies had only a fraction of today's representation among blue chip companies. Once the industry is recognized as a top place to make money then the wrong sort of people start worming their way in slowly but surely undermining whatever integrity came out of the early engineering culture and values that built the foundation.

I'm not sure what you mean. Blue chips like IBM and Microsoft were making bank even in the late 90s. Lots of money in tech isn't new.

Up until web 2.0 and the smart phone revolution it was mostly hardware, and mostly business. What changed was once the majority of the consumer market and attention span was tapped via ubiquitous web and mobile penetration which opened up the possibility for software companies to extract maximum value from every single consumer.

Consider this:

https://www.visualcapitalist.com/a-visual-history-of-the-lar...

In 1999 (dotcom peak!) there were 5 companies in the top 10 (1 software, 4 hardware). In 2019 it was 7 out of 10, including the top 5 spots.

Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#216

Post by thewebcount »

city41 wrote: post #105
ajsnigrutin wrote: post #29

This flowchart is true for many things... even webpages: How many users actually wanted to subrscribe to your newsletter the first time they visited your page, before they even read the first article there? How many first-time visitors actually want to donate money? ...

I don't understand this. I visit a site I've never been to before and immediately a popup takes over along these lines. Do those really convert? I can't imagine they do, but they are also everywhere so they must be effective to some degree? I feel like The Guardian's approach is better, after a while they bring up a banner down at the bottom that says (paraphrased) "hey you've read x articles, we want to stay indepen…

> they are also everywhere so they must be effective to some degree?

I wouldn't assume that. I would bet most people enter a fake email address just to make the thing go away because they don't know you can just close most of them, or don't realize the passive aggressive "No I don't want great deals sent to my inbox every day because I hate great deals" text link is a button they can press to dismiss the dialog because they don't read it and it intentionally doesn't look like a button to discourage users from pressing (or reading) it.

Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#217

Post by thewebcount »

quickthrower2 wrote: post #33
ajsnigrutin wrote: post #29

This flowchart is true for many things... even webpages: How many users actually wanted to subrscribe to your newsletter the first time they visited your page, before they even read the first article there? How many first-time visitors actually want to donate money? ...

How many users want to have to have the inconvenience of paying for the software too!

I do. I would much rather pay than see ads or be required to give up personal information. I can understand that not everyone wants that, but I do. I also have been very disappointed with usability of FOSS to the point that I rarely consider using it anymore. So yeah, I'm happy to pay (once per version I actually use).

Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#218

Post by dkarl »

michaelcampbell wrote: post #99
TeMPOraL wrote: post #26

Agreed on all points. Interesting to see this: > You can argue that all of this has existed for a very long time, back from the days of all kinds of toolbars and extensions that created multiple levels of address bar nesting in your web browser and taskbar. What I find ironic about the whole situation is, back then it was universally known that those toolbars and extensions are distributed by assholes. The whole soft…

> back then it was universally known that those toolbars and extensions are distributed by assholes. Clearly not the case or they wouldn't have been as ubiquitous as they were.

Yeah, I think they fall into the same category as fad diets, MLM schemes, and those cold calls to buy real estate for less than market rate: incredibly popular despite "everybody" knowing better.

Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#219

Post by thewebcount »

literallyaduck wrote: post #79

“If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said a faster horse.” – Henry Ford If you have the users design a car you end up with a Homer bubble car. A better strategy is don't be an asshole. You know telemetry on by default is wrong. Putting sane defaults that the users must opt in instead of opt out is right. No one wants to make an account for your product, other login choices are usually available, b…

The author didn't say, "Let the user design the software." They said, "Would the user benefit from this feature?" That's a big difference.

Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#220

Post by mixmastamyk »

zelon88 wrote: post #141
zksmk wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Something weird happened over the past decade. I blame it on social media monopolies, or at least effective monopolies, oligopolies, and the network effect. Once everyone was sucked into these silos and unable to leave they could do whatever they wanted with the user experience without repercussions. And once everyone was used to it and took it as a given it was only a matter of time before it leaked even into deskt…

> which means the rise of Linux desktop or Fediverse platforms, and that's gonna be a while, but not impossible. I like to hope you're right, but I don't believe you are. Most people don't want to learn more about tech. They just want tech to be intuitive enough to pick up and use. The mobile market appeared because Windows is too big and cumbersome. That's why people advertised it as a skill on their resume. It isn'…

A little too literal IMHO. No reason a floss mobile os can’t exist. Android proves Linux is technically capable.
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