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Some Dark Patterns Now Illegal in UK

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Re: Some Dark Patterns Now Illegal in UK

#241

Post by harrybr »

epaga wrote: post #3

Sounds like an excellent law to stop the horrid practices in so many online shops. Let's hope a form of this law spreads throughout Europe and the U.S. This caught my eye, however: "A failure to comply cancels the transaction. You can get your money back and keep the goods. If the sale was for a service or a digital download, the contract is cancelled and no further payments are due." Wow. Seems like it would make a…

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Re: Some Dark Patterns Now Illegal in UK

#242

Post by hellodevnull »

idlewords wrote: post #8

A good example of beneficial government regulation, for people who refuse to believe such a thing exists. (Another good example is the Internet itself, but it's best to start small)

To me this isn't additional regulation to standard contract law. A transaction is a contract between two parties, if the contract is intentionally deceitful you have the right to dispute it. So this it's great that they're putting it in print, because nobody's going to sue over a couple of items being added to your basket.

Re: Some Dark Patterns Now Illegal in UK

#243

Post by rmc »

fr11 wrote: post #180
reitanqild wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "you should have printed the PDF at home" Just remember that with Ryanair, simple is not an option unless you pay and pay and pay and pay. Example: Printing boarding passes a few days ahead: not possible. Oh, unless you pay for reserved seats. Otherwise feel free to wait until a few days ahead of departure, remember to check in, or you'll be hit with another charge at checkin. Source: Traveled w/Ryanair this summer…

Is there a Dealing-With-Ryanair-As-A-Service company out there? It would be hilarious for someone to figure out all the tricks of Ryanair and then offer, for €5 or something, that they will make the plane reservation and text you the moment you need to do the things you need to do, and otherwise clarify the process.

I took ~100 Ryanair flights for a while, and I can't see the benefit of this. You learn quick enough how to avoid all the charges and you don't pay more. Why would I pay €5, when I know how to get the flight for €30?

Re: Some Dark Patterns Now Illegal in UK

#244

Post by SEMW »

mrweasel wrote: post #185
spindritf wrote: post #12

Financial services are exempt under the Directive Great. Let's take all the downside of heavy regulation but give up most of the upside.

Makes you wonder why financial services are exempt. Do they simply have better lawyers and lobbyist or is there an actual good reason. Yes, ordering from Ryanair is pretty complicated if you don't want to end up paying all sorts of fees, but financial services can be even harder to understand and have more long lasting consequences. If anything financial services should be the first to be targeted.

PeterisP explains it above. Financial services are already very heavily regulated in the EU through legislation specific to financial services.

Re: Some Dark Patterns Now Illegal in UK

#245

Post by Nursie »

krisdol wrote: post #209
TeMPOraL wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Then people are "increasingly" using it incorrectly. Europe is a continent, the EU is a political alliance. Well, it's exactly the same as with America (the continent) and United States (a country). You can either argue that both calling EU Europe and USA America is wrong and we should stop, or accept that in both cases, people can figure things out from the context.

USA has always been called "America". Europe the continent has been Europe the continent far longer than the EU has existed. Both are incorrect, and thankfully "The Americas" has caught on to fix one of these wrong labels. Besides, the continent has always been called North America, not America. There is no other label of Europe the continent than "Europe", so it's a flat out wrong label of the EU at best, and at wor…

Define 'always' ?

IIRC the USA hasn't really bee around all that long...

Re: Some Dark Patterns Now Illegal in UK

#246

Post by gambiting »

lorddoig wrote: post #211
ZoFreX wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's my Amazon challenge: Find a phone charger on Amazon that: * Isn't one of Amazon's own * Doesn't have a single review saying it caught fire or exploded Amazon is completely happy selling poor quality or even counterfeit goods, phone chargers are a particularly bad area of the site but others exist as well. There is no way Amazon could claim ignorance of this - there are 100s of reviews on some products such as…

Can you even begin to imagine what hell it would cause Amazon, at their scale, to be burdened with policing that? It would require a whole building full of Amazon compliance officers who won't always get it right - and when they don't they'd be liable which would cost more even more money and create ill feeling between Amazon and its customers as they'd be making assurances that they could not possibly keep (the stor…

Well, they are obliged by law to make sure whatever they are selling is not counterfeit and is safe to use. And no, the law does not care how that is enforced - but I imagine that when they order a batch of chargers from China, someone could take a look at one and see if it's genuine or not?

Re: Some Dark Patterns Now Illegal in UK

#247

Post by Dylan16807 »

V-2 wrote: post #181
TeMPOraL wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Then people are "increasingly" using it incorrectly. Europe is a continent, the EU is a political alliance. Well, it's exactly the same as with America (the continent) and United States (a country). You can either argue that both calling EU Europe and USA America is wrong and we should stop, or accept that in both cases, people can figure things out from the context.

Yes, it's a common metonymy, but whether its use is valid or misleading for no good reason depends on the context in my opinion. If somebody said "let's hope this law spreads throughout America", you wouldn't assume they meant just the US, would you? Calling the United States "America" is often handy, but it's sort of a sloppy language all in all. Personally I rather avoid it if ambiguity is likely. People are also o…

>If somebody said "let's hope this law spreads throughout America", you wouldn't assume they meant just the US, would you?

That depends on whether the law is federal or not.

But devoid of context I would expect someone to use 'the Americas' if they're talking about both continents, not 'America'.

Re: Some Dark Patterns Now Illegal in UK

#248

Post by oldmanjay »

Nursie wrote: post #245
krisdol wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

USA has always been called "America". Europe the continent has been Europe the continent far longer than the EU has existed. Both are incorrect, and thankfully "The Americas" has caught on to fix one of these wrong labels. Besides, the continent has always been called North America, not America. There is no other label of Europe the continent than "Europe", so it's a flat out wrong label of the EU at best, and at wor…

Define 'always' ? IIRC the USA hasn't really bee around all that long...

let's go with a practical definition like "within all living memory" which most people, I'm sure, presumed from context. very few people need their conversations to include the mental state of those dead for 200+ years simply to achieve some stringent ideal of correctness.

Re: Some Dark Patterns Now Illegal in UK

#250

Post by tobylane »

orblivion wrote: post #177
idlewords wrote: post #8

A good example of beneficial government regulation, for people who refuse to believe such a thing exists. (Another good example is the Internet itself, but it's best to start small)

Actually as one of the people I think you're talking about (though as someone else noted I don't know if your description of radical free-market types is perfectly accurate, it's really about net benefit) this concerns me. In principle it seems to be banning fraud, and if that's all it does then I can't really complain. But to say "you can't structure your site in such a way" I think it's rather heavy handed. I guess…

> In principle it seems to be banning fraud, and if that's all it does then I can't really complain. But to say "you can't structure your site in such a way" I think it's rather heavy handed.

What if the only way to ban fraud is to say you can't structure it this way? Pyramid schemes seem like a good example.

>some sort of government agency with an official review process for websites

My understanding of the article was that customers complain to their local council, get their money back, and the company changes after loosing too much money.

>it's the job of a consumer to decide if they've been defrauded

The EU doesn't like doing that, there's too many vulnerable people, too much to do in the day for the less vulnerable.

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