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How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds

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Re: How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds

#21

Post by 6stringmerc »

bikamonki wrote: post #18

Does anyone else feel the slot machine effect here on HN is the karma displayed on the top-right? After a submission or comment, is that number the first thing you check when you come back to the site?

Often, yep. Sometimes watching it go down is quite a trip too.

It's something an article I came across used as a conclusion while looking into how commenting communities can become friendly, turn into cliques, and then into "Join the Consensus or Die" cesspools:

>Numerous comment sections and message boards and forums probably have ups and downs between Community, Clique, and Cesspool outside of this example — I know I’ve seen it on Ars Technica as well. It looks to me like a general extension of human social habits, like an evolutionary necessity where feeling part of a group is comforting. Experience makes me believe getting upvote currency is a pathway to the pleasure center of the brain.

https://medium.com/@LongTimeLurker1stTimePoster/the-av-club-...

Re: How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds

#22

Post by Jtsummers »

nerdponx wrote: post #16
wslh wrote: post #2

I was really interested in the article until I read: "I spent the last three years as Google’s Design Ethicist...". In the article he is focusing at the application level but the issue is at the form factor level. One simple example: if you give to a child a Simon game app based on the original Simon game [1] he/she will probably end up switching to YouTube and watching stupid videos but if you give him/her the "limi…

Limited how?

I had to reread the OP a couple times but I finally got it.

Give a child a smartphone with Simon, even opened to the app, and they'll wander off to YouTube or something else.

Give a child the game Simon which only functions as the game, and they'll be enthralled.

Re: How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds

#23

Post by JoeAltmaier »

bikamonki wrote: post #18

Does anyone else feel the slot machine effect here on HN is the karma displayed on the top-right? After a submission or comment, is that number the first thing you check when you come back to the site?

Only looking for a change - which means somebody may have replied, and I'll want to be polite and check that out. I don't remember anything but the last 2 digits short-term.

Re: How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds

#25

Post by tsunamifury »

It's called "railroading" and it's been around forever. The only new trick is to add more options that still railroad you in the same general direction.

The problem is human minds are smarter than you think and they tend to disengage when they sense this and they strongly want to get off the rails. The user does this by quitting and/or deleting the service. Over time you realize it's best to give the user all their options and they are more likely to stay using your product.

Re: How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds

#26

Post by notduncansmith »

Jtsummers wrote: post #4

Kind of interesting idea about how our tools (generic) present us with limited menus, and effectively restrict our options. Facebook has expanded (barely) the options for basic responses to posts (no longer just like, but also a handful of emoticons to express laughter, anger, sadness, etc.). Not as full an option as when using the comment box, but for quick responses it allows for greater expressiveness. At least pe…

George Orwell felt similarly. https://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/orwell46.htm

Re: How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds

#27

Post by pessimizer »

imgabe wrote: post #11

The bit about choices reminds about the soda cup debacle from when Bloomberg proposed limiting the size of soda containers that some venues could sell. Everyone griped about how it limited their "freedom of choice", but nobody asked about why those particular sizes were the choices available in the first place. 7-11 and others decided that they could add a $0.05 more soda and charge $0.25 more and make more money. Pe…

> Meanwhile the choice of buying less was never presented as an option.

What do you mean here? There were always multiple sizes of soda. Bloomberg was the one who was introducing the restriction, requiring someone who wanted more than a particular size to buy it in two separate cups. I must be parsing this incorrectly.

Re: How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds

#28

Post by rcfox »

imgabe wrote: post #11

The bit about choices reminds about the soda cup debacle from when Bloomberg proposed limiting the size of soda containers that some venues could sell. Everyone griped about how it limited their "freedom of choice", but nobody asked about why those particular sizes were the choices available in the first place. 7-11 and others decided that they could add a $0.05 more soda and charge $0.25 more and make more money. Pe…

There was an amusing parody of that in an episode of Parks and Rec: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wNLUwBot8B0#t=13s

Re: How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds

#29

Post by Jtsummers »

notduncansmith wrote: post #26
Jtsummers wrote: post #4

Kind of interesting idea about how our tools (generic) present us with limited menus, and effectively restrict our options. Facebook has expanded (barely) the options for basic responses to posts (no longer just like, but also a handful of emoticons to express laughter, anger, sadness, etc.). Not as full an option as when using the comment box, but for quick responses it allows for greater expressiveness. At least pe…

George Orwell felt similarly. https://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/orwell46.htm

Really good essay, thanks for reminding me of that one. I believe it's been posted to HN before (I read it from a link here), but it may have been another comment suggesting it.

  But if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought.
(about 3/4 down)

Re: How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds

#30

Post by lars »

Wow, I'm glad this was posted.

I think the way we use technology today will be looked back on the same way we look back at naive cigarette smoking in the 1950s.

Modern app design isn't about creating things that are good for the user, but about creating want in the user. This is a problem.

For example, there are several studies showing that using Facebook in general makes people less happy. User happiness just happens to not be be necessary for Facebook to be a successful business.

Go to a developer conference by one of the big tech companies, and speakers generally aren't talking about doing good things for the user. They'll use euphemisms like "increasing engagement". There's concepts like "permission priming", psychological tricks to get the user to do what you want. There's books written about how to maximize app addictiveness. It's stuff that mildly screws over the user, and it guides the product designs that affect the lives of billions of people. It's not good.

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