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Every Fucking Website (2020)

lxe.github.io

351–360 of 529 posts

Re: Every Fucking Website (2020)

#351
post #18

The cookie thing, I assume it's EU-only, is an example of the EU policy making process being fundamentally broken in some way. If you create a flawed policy and don't fix it many years after it's very visibly obvious that it's a bad policy, something is really wrong.

it's an example of malicious compliance by some, and herd mentality by others. I had a discussion with my CFO about removing the cookie banner from our website (because we don't set any tracking cookies, and cookies for things like login are exempted) and he said "yeah, but it makes the site seem less legitimate.

You may float an idea to describe what you've just said in the banner, and have just a "close" button.

E.g. "we don't set any tracking cookies, so we're already compliant with the law even without banner, so there's nothing to decline or agree to".

Re: Every Fucking Website (2020)

#352
post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the real problem. Being aggressively annoying works . Dark patterns work. Popups that grab your attention work. Flashing text conveying urgency works. Thumbnails with open-mouth YouTube-face work. Moving buttons around so people mis-click works. Tiny [X] buttons that make people accidentally click an ad work. You're never going to convince someone to stop doing something that is making them money.

Yes, but on whom does it work? Does it work because you're taking advantage of a group of people who are extremely vulnerable to manipulation? People who already struggle with impulse control, who are prone to making bad financial decisions? The elderly, kids? We have to escape this mentality that anything that makes money is valid, that the money itself is the validation of "rightness". Some of us, just some think t…

Well, if you own an online casino, I guess your moral compass is already so skewed that you simple don't care. On the other hand, if you own an online mom & pop store that sells clothes for puppies, you rationalize that the impact of those manipulations is not that big of a deal. You're not ruining anyone's live by the single act of persuading them to purchase $100 worth of apparel for mr. pancake.

Re: Every Fucking Website (2020)

#353
post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can try to put the blame on the grunts, like trying to focus on the engineers in the VW Dieselgate, etc, but that is very weak leverage. You have to intervene at the root cause of the incentive. But of course the higher you go, the more there is a blur between legislators and business owners and they won't be harsh to themselves.

So morals are good at a certain pay level? Thank god I am just a minion who now can go home worry free. Yay!

[deleted]

Re: Every Fucking Website (2020)

#354

I started an e-commerce brand on a Shopify site. I swore to myself I would never put up one of those stupid things that pops up "Someone bought X product an hour ago!" messages in the corner of the screen. I ended up trying it. Boosted conversion rate meaningfully. Worth the price I pay in mild self-loathing. Chesterton's popup, I guess.

That's the real problem. Being aggressively annoying works . Dark patterns work. Popups that grab your attention work. Flashing text conveying urgency works. Thumbnails with open-mouth YouTube-face work. Moving buttons around so people mis-click works. Tiny [X] buttons that make people accidentally click an ad work. You're never going to convince someone to stop doing something that is making them money.

Spamming image based penny stocks emails also worked; doesn't make it right.

Advertising should.be illegal.

Re: Every Fucking Website (2020)

#355
post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

eBay stops me from typing in the thing I want to search for so they can try to persuade me to use the app that I have expressed zero interest in for a decade or so. Guys, I'm trying to press money into your thieving little hands - why are you trying to stop me?

They see it as a win because you've still been using their site for a decade now, and every time they advertise their app there's still a non-zero chance you'll relent, but if they stop pushing their app, that chance drops to zero. The only winning move is not to play.

Ah yes, I shall use that other auction site. Which was it again?

Re: Every Fucking Website (2020)

#356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The EU doesn't require banners. Companies could stop selling and storing your data. They could only use cookies when absolutely essential. They could use lots of kinds of UX. This is the equivalent of businesses who put a big visible "20% the state says we have to give our employees healthcare" fee on their bill to throw a hissy fit and hope customers get angry at the government for protecting them instead of the bus…

Banners exist to eliminate EU regulatory risk. You can try to convince people they aren’t required but its not going to remove any banners.

This is misinformed.

As many have said before:

  it's basically malicious compliance. They're supposed to be super annoying ... Instead of complying, they choose this obnoxious practice so they could continue ... monitoring every action a visitor does.

  You don't need a cookie banner to be allowed to create Cookies. You only need them if you're using them for something like tracking. [1]

  Regulators didn't enforce cookie banners. Cookie banners are a form of malicious compliance. When you complain about them, you are doing the lobbying work of ad companies for free. The correct solution is to just not spy on people, and the problem is that the EU didn't go far enough and just ban the behavior altogether. [2]

  Cookie pops are malicious compliance to regulations that legitimately protect consumers. You’ve cherry picked one bad side effect to throw out all the ways the EU is way ahead of anyone else in protecting consumers [3]
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29529148

[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38299135

[3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46552795

Re: Every Fucking Website (2020)

#357

Serious answer: Bootstrap. That framework did more damage to web design than any other framework. Yeah, its nice that you can spin up a page in a second that looks like every other page on the internet, wait a minute... Technical answer: CSS It was a nice idea, and it sure beat hand-designing each and every page (wait a second, weren't/aren't we doing that all over again?). It did/does too much, and was mostly in lie…

There's some alternate timeline where browsers kept competing on widgets and every website now looks like a native application.

I don't know if it would be better or worse.

Re: Every Fucking Website (2020)

#358
post #95

Should load much slower. Also, where is the unrelated autoplaying video that will unmute if you actually click it, that follows your scrolling and only becomes smaller when you dismiss it? Plus, it should probably have text that cuts off letting you know you can have access for just $10/month. Plus, isn't this website undissmissably "better in the app" after a few minutes of attempting to use it on a phone? Where's t…

> Plus, isn't this website undissmissably "better in the app" after a few minutes of attempting to use it on a phone? Where's that at? This is the most annoying thing on the internet. There’s a site I’d like to use, but “try the app” takes up the entire page (and appears to be impossible to dismiss?). Actually, is there a way to permanently request the desktop site for all future visits to a domain on iOS? There is n…

How is the Reddit mobile site worse than this obvious satirical site? I ended up using ublock to zap the annoying Reddit thing because it was annoying to keep going to old.reddit when people sent me links.

Re: Every Fucking Website (2020)

#359
post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They see it as a win because you've still been using their site for a decade now, and every time they advertise their app there's still a non-zero chance you'll relent, but if they stop pushing their app, that chance drops to zero. The only winning move is not to play.

Ah yes, I shall use that other auction site. Which was it again?

whitehouse.gov

Re: Every Fucking Website (2020)

#360
post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Plus, isn't this website undissmissably "better in the app" after a few minutes of attempting to use it on a phone? Where's that at? This is the most annoying thing on the internet. There’s a site I’d like to use, but “try the app” takes up the entire page (and appears to be impossible to dismiss?). Actually, is there a way to permanently request the desktop site for all future visits to a domain on iOS? There is n…

I have Firefox setup to not launch apps on android with permission. I don't have Instagram/Facebook/etc installed. Attempting to view a Instagram link on mobile is the most hostile thing in existence. You essentially can't, but it so aggressively routes you to the website based Google play store it's horrifying.

You can have Firefox and struggle with apps BUT you visit Instagram? This is actually possible both in one person? Wow.
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