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The 'fuck you' pattern (2021)

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Re: The 'fuck you' pattern (2021)

#161

Post by iamleppert »

jitix wrote: post #145
janandonly wrote: post #70

I feel the same burning hate like a thousand suns for FB/Meta, Google/YT and other platforms that monetize their users. But, let's be frank here: They monetize you and me, us, the users because 1 they can and, 2, they have to. Yes, they have to. Imagine they provided access to their platforms for free. How would the shareholders (your retirement funds included) respond when less profit was made? You see, we view them…

Great point, in the 90s people used to spend a fortune (relatively speaking) on taking, sharing and discovering pictures, consuming media and getting their news. Now everyone wants everything for free, but won’t give anything in return. And they also want market returns on their stocks, 401ks, etc at the same time. That being said, Meta/Google could implement a guaranteed privacy-first, ad-free option for something l…

If giving people the choice of an ad-free premium subscription was more profitable, they would do it. The issue with doing that is the users who pay are also the most desirable audience for advertisers.

A premium model also eventually creates two separate products. The free product is (at first) built for the needs of the users to attract them and get enough volume to support an advertisement model. Then, it is gradually built and focused toward the needs of the advertisers. That gradually shifts over time once the company has captured the market on both sides (this is a two-sided marketplace after all) to optimizing for the needs of the company. It’s harder to achieve this final end goal if you have a product that is optimized for the needs of the user, because you don’t have a two-sided marketplace anymore that can be exploited on both sides. Collecting money from businesses (advertisers) in bulk and providing them support can be easier and less costly than managing millions of premium users and supporting them.

Re: The 'fuck you' pattern (2021)

#162

Post by DMell »

jitix wrote: post #134
guestbest wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a Trojan Horse pattern, really. They give away the service for free membership with billions of VC until their competitors collapse or fade away, then they start becoming more aggressive with ads and/or charging for premium access which used to be free.

This is not new, Gillette used to give out free razors to get people used to their ecosystem and get recurring revenue. It’s just more “in your face” now.

I noticed this same thing recently with Arcoss golf sensors which are now essentially free everywhere.

Re: The 'fuck you' pattern (2021)

#163

Post by moritzwarhier »

Instagram was like that for me ever since I know it, couldn't bother creating an account though. If it's important, there are scraping sites to visit Instagram profiles by name without an account.

Regarding the block/redirect: technically they could have used the MutationObserver API to track your usage of the DevTools to remove the modal. Have had the same experience a while ago if I'm not misremembering. But I'd also assume they're just counting requests without login per IP, much simpler.

Re: The 'fuck you' pattern (2021)

#164

Post by rrobukef »

gavinray wrote: post #69
macNchz wrote: post #61

Reddit’s mobile web experience really embraces this–even as a logged in user there is a frequent “Use our app!” popup that has been made progressively more obnoxious. Once upon a time there was a preference option to disable the popup, though it would periodically become unchecked on its own. Then the option to disable it disappeared. Then the popup started appearing not just on page load, but after a period of time…

Recently on mobile it's stopped giving me the option to even view the page anonymously, at least for adult content. It gives me: "This is mature content and may not be appropriate for certain viewers. To continue, use the app to confirm you're over 18 and browse anonymously."

If you open any post with a lot of comments and you want to load more comments you must create an account - no option to disable. They really want to smother all mobile but the app.

Re: The 'fuck you' pattern (2021)

#165

Post by AeroNotix »

mcpackieh wrote: post #81
arrowsmith wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't even make it this far, I'm not scanning their QR. Give me a paper menu or gtfo.

This. I've never scanned a QR code and I don't intend to learn how. And because the premise of a restaurant not having printed menus available is so absurd, I think I'd be compelled to stick around for a few minutes loudly insulting their business acumen before leaving (as I have done before at bars that didn't accept cash!) I consider this a service done for those who think like me but aren't brave enough to speak o…

The sad part is that practically all patrons that could hear you will just label you as a "Karen". The owners will not change their ways. It works for them, their client base and the vast majority of potential clients.

People do not care at all whatsoever about their privacy being invaded, generally.

Re: The 'fuck you' pattern (2021)

#166

Post by weaksauce »

spondylosaurus wrote: post #89
janandonly wrote: post #70

I feel the same burning hate like a thousand suns for FB/Meta, Google/YT and other platforms that monetize their users. But, let's be frank here: They monetize you and me, us, the users because 1 they can and, 2, they have to. Yes, they have to. Imagine they provided access to their platforms for free. How would the shareholders (your retirement funds included) respond when less profit was made? You see, we view them…

Yep, and Reddit in particular is the culmination of over a billion dollars' worth of VC funding. The changes we're seeing are unsurprising when you take that into account—even though Reddit has never been profitable, those investors are still expecting their return, which forces Reddit to either start bringing in serious revenue or have a promising IPO (or both). None of this has ever been for users; we're merely a d…

> even though Reddit has never been profitable

they sure had a good trajectory before huffman fucked that up and bought moonshot projects and hired 2,000 employees and did everything possible to mess up that trajectory so they could pump and dump for an ipo.

Re: The 'fuck you' pattern (2021)

#168

Post by dasil003 »

OJFord wrote: post #150
lamontcg wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which every for-profit company seems to wind up doing these days.

Every for-profit public company. And so they should/have to.

Why should they? Why does there need to be a dichotomy between doing something good and living in poverty, or else do everything possible to squeeze out the next short-term dollar. It strikes me as a profound failure of imagination to think there's no possible way to structure our economy where more companies could pursue profit in balance with other goals that can not directly be translated into next quarter's P&L statement.

Re: The 'fuck you' pattern (2021)

#169

Post by siliconc0w »

Really what needs to happen is like a non profit SAAS movement to create minimal modern versions of these services that runs at minimal cost. Then they can basically be feature compete and like run off an endowment. More like roads or highways that just need maintenance.

I guess more like signal.

The alternative will always be enshitification.

Re: The 'fuck you' pattern (2021)

#170

Post by naikrovek »

janandonly wrote: post #70

I feel the same burning hate like a thousand suns for FB/Meta, Google/YT and other platforms that monetize their users. But, let's be frank here: They monetize you and me, us, the users because 1 they can and, 2, they have to. Yes, they have to. Imagine they provided access to their platforms for free. How would the shareholders (your retirement funds included) respond when less profit was made? You see, we view them…

> Yes, they have to.

you say that like we don't all know it already. Most readers of this site likely work at these places.

No kidding they have to do this, if they exist. Their existence is the problem, whatever the cause.

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