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Ask HN: Why is today's Internet experience so user hostile?

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Re: Ask HN: Why is today's Internet experience so user hostile?

#231

Post by [deleted] »

antocv wrote: post #221
bayindirh wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I never had to justify it, nobody forced me or expected me to be using Office... You had it easy it seems. When someone sends you a document which contains convoluted structures and only renders in a very recent version of Microsoft Word, and you have to fill it for work purposes, you have no other choice (We're a Linux shop, but not everyone we interact uses Libre Office, so yeah). > Whats ease is what you have le…

> you have no other choice You always, always have a choice. Throw away the victim and obey mentality. Freedom is taken, not served to you. When someone send you a trojan horse.virus.exe you do not have to open it. Neither do you have to open a convoluted proprietary binary format requiring you to buy a license to read said binary. Politely decline, reject. You have that power.

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: Why is today's Internet experience so user hostile?

#232

Post by edanm »

I think we software developers tend to overstate the impact that the inner world of software developement has on this kind of thing. It wouldn't even occur to me that "release often KPIs" has anything to do with it.

The reason the web looks like it does today is because it mostly works, for the value of works that the people building the web care about. Most things on the web are there because someone wants to make money from them. And apparently they do. Things being "hostile" are a side effect of them being effective at making money. That's mostly the whole story.

Re: Ask HN: Why is today's Internet experience so user hostile?

#233

Post by noduerme »

brightstep wrote: post #193
noduerme wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Parent's point is that you'd be a lot less likely complain about even worse data collection if you lived in China, and it was done in the name of the "people" - but you wouldn't be quieter because you really believed it was for the people. You'd be quieter because you were scared to say things about the System. You're lucky to live in a System that pays you to have a public opinion about it.

The alternatives being worse doesn't make a critique of a system less valid. Yes, it's good that we have free political speech and yes, it's true that capitalism's incentives drive decisions like invasive data collection.

Breath of fresh air to read that in one perfect paragraph.

I only set up straw men when I'm bored. So ok. It's interesting how capitalist and authoritarian motives converge when it comes to violating individuals' privacy. You're leaving me hanging. Under the current system in America I can use VPNs and all kinds of ways to hide my identity, even if it does get harder to buy a Roku. There's no such ability in China, let alone a right to pursue your ability to protect your identity. Identity and individuality are simply not a thing.

Capitalism does, because is sells individualism (Chevy trucks, Coors Beer, the Green Bay Packers) - it does have to grudgingly allow individual people to, you know, act as individuals. From time to time.

This is a difference that a lot of people gloss over, but it's the reason all those assholes voted for Trump, which just proves that it can be harnessed. But moreover, rank obstinacy isn't necessarily a bad thing when the alternative is totalitarianism.

Re: Ask HN: Why is today's Internet experience so user hostile?

#234

Post by pydry »

kortilla wrote: post #202
Ensorceled wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't think anyone is directly blaming the users here. The comment I'm replying to is LITERALLY blaming "normal users" for these problems.

It’s pointing out that it’s a side effect of user market forces. The point is that users keep using these sites despite all of these annoying patterns.

It's blaming users for market forces though. It's kind of a lazy invocation of the just world fallacy: the users must be ok with it because otherwise they would have revolted if they werent.

I've accepted many a dark pattern because of sunk costs and a lack of energy, time or options. I dont always have the energy to fight and punish.

Ultimately market forces are about collective power, not a collective representation of "what people want". A lot of people would like us to blur the two but they are distinct.

Re: Ask HN: Why is today's Internet experience so user hostile?

#236

Post by croes »

bayindirh wrote: post #120
antocv wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> normal users have no choice on the matter. The choice to not use shit software is easier than going on a strike and demanding 8h work day instead of 14h. Which our ancestors also did, some died for the cause. I for one, do not use and have not used and especially not payed for user-hostile software, beginning since 2000. It is possible, you dont really have to accept shit or keep on using shit. Everytime that click…

Let's consider a basic example: How can you justify not using Microsoft Office? Yes LibreOffice is there and works 95% of the time, but the remaining 5% are not completely useless parts of the software. It's same for most of the user-hostile software. Alternatives are not as intuitive, easy to use, or easy to find. Also, free software is not guaranteed to be sustained or be in front of the pack. I use Linux, and free…

How many people use that "remaining 5%"?

Most people I know still use spacebar to right aline the date in a word document.

Re: Ask HN: Why is today's Internet experience so user hostile?

#237

Post by galimaufry »

gjsman-1000 wrote: post #196
antocv wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The government services dont show me any ads or dark patterns. How is it where you live? Does the IRS really try to trick you?

Heck yes they do! Of course not “intentionally” but if you manage to have an even slightly complex tax situation and not get tricked and report something wrong, props to you!

Sure, but then they just send you a letter correcting your mistake, you OK it if it looks right, and either they send you a check or you send them a check. You don't have to pay a fine and you don't get audited.

(I am not a tax lawyer nor an accountant, but I have done this 4 out of the last 6 years.)

Re: Ask HN: Why is today's Internet experience so user hostile?

#238

Post by shmatt »

deepstack wrote: post #125
tluyben2 wrote: post #7

Not a main factor but a factor is 'always the latest tech' issue. Most banks and airlines I use rewrote their perfectly fine and fast sites and apps to reactjs and now they seriously suck. This is not the fault of react but more of this idea of tech people that everything has to be new which means we don't have 10+ year experience in it and the results just take more work to get right (despite what everyone says here…

> Not a main factor but a factor is 'always the latest tech' issue. Most banks and airlines I use rewrote their perfectly fine and fast sites and apps to reactjs and now they seriously suck. overusage of SPA of SPA framework (Next.js etc) has caused a lot of problem for users who are used using browser, which is most of web users. It breaks open the link in another tab, back/forward flow. It is not SPA is bad, howeve…

From my experience its CTO/CIO's wanting better more stable and fest tech, but not willing to pay for good engineers

Next.js is amazing, and it could make any airline/bank website blazing fast. Are said banks hiring the same devs from Google that are building the newer version of Next? Nope, they're hiring 3rd party companies in Romania.

React et al is far from plug and play. Quality of implementation means a lot more than it used to in terms of performance

Re: Ask HN: Why is today's Internet experience so user hostile?

#240

Post by shadowgovt »

The main ones are adversarial space and the destruction of location.

- The Internet makes every location logically adjacent; if you know the domain name or IP, you can access it

- Some users are malicious and will leverage that logical adjacency to harm users

Every user is therefore stuck playing a measure / countermeasure game against a perpetual threat, no matter what they're trying to do.

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