Recommendations from Pocket Users
Casey Newton
Great overview of some dark patterns in product design.
For example, in the physical world of grocery stories, the #1 and #2 most popular reasons to visit are pharmacy refills and buying milk. But grocery stores want to maximize how much people buy, so they put the pharmacy and the milk at the back of the store.
Manoush Zomorodi
Techie friend of our Note to Self podcast on what happens inside your head
Josh Constine
Why social networks are built to be addictive and need to change
Tiffany Zhong
Must-read.
Guillaume Laforge
Very interesting article on how most websites and businesses steal our time and force us to consume more. What if there were some ethical label that favors sites / businesses that respect our valuable time and true agenda?
Kushan
What a Brilliant, Brilliant article is this!
tomas Bella
For example, NYTimes.com lets you “make a free choice” to cancel your digital subscription. But instead of just doing it when you hit “Cancel Subscription,” they send you an email with information on how to cancel your account by calling a phone number that’s only open at certain times.
Maxime Thirouin
How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds — from a Magician and Google’s Design Ethicist
Rodrigo Franco
Spot on.
Sar Haribhakti
BRILLIANT.
Herval Freire
Interesting thoughts on how software is designed to hook us in
Nicolas Fallourd
This medium is really essential when it comes to understand user behavior 👍🏻
Andy Stevens
Over de psychologische trukendoos die technologiebedrijven gebruikenom ons bij hen te houden.
Marco Frattola
Deviazioni mentali di origine digitale #fb
Akhil Unnikrishnan
Everything about this post seems familiar on reading and you start realizing just how much work goes into making tech products addictive.
Paul Brody
Fantastic must-read for people thinking about design and everyone using it.
Christopher Penn
A vitally important read.
Ryan Wilkins
The more choices technology gives us in nearly every domain of our lives (information, events, places to go, friends, dating, jobs) — the more we assume that our phone is always the most empowering and useful menu to pick from. Is it?
The “most empowering” menu is different than the menu that has the most choices. But when we blindly surrender to the menus we’re given, it’s easy to lose track of the difference
Micah Daigle
This is very good.
Nikhil Joseph
If you’ve ever been concerned about how you consume technology and why it’s so hard to change, read this.
Rex Arul
Where does technology exploit our minds’ weaknesses?
Rex Arul
Once you know how to push people’s buttons, you can play them like a piano
Rex Arul
By shaping the menus we pick from, technology hijacks the way we perceive our choices and replaces them new ones
Rex Arul
average person checks their phone 150 times a day. Why do we do this? Are we making 150 conscious choices?
Rex Arul
If you want to maximize addictiveness, all tech designers need to do is link a user’s action (like pulling a lever) with a variable reward.
Rex Arul
Slot machines make more money in the United States than baseball, movies, and theme parks combined
Rex Arul
now companies like Apple and Google have a responsibility to reduce these effects by converting intermittent variable rewards into less addictive, more predictable ones with better design
Rex Arul
But living moment to moment with the fear of missing something isn’t how we’re built to live
Rex Arul
Like Facebook, LinkedIn exploits an asymmetry in perception. When you receive an invitation from someone to connect, you imagine that person making a conscious choice to invite you, when in reality, they likely unconsciously responded to LinkedIn’s list of suggested contacts. In other words, LinkedIn turns your unconscious impulses (to “add” a person) into new social obligations that millions of people feel obligated to repay. All while they profit from the time people spend doing it
Rex Arul
The problem is, maximizing interruptions in the name of business creates a tragedy of the commons, ruining global attention spans and causing billions of unnecessary interruptions each day
Rex Arul
ultimate freedom is a free mind, and we need technology that’s on our team to help us live, feel, think and act freely
Jochen Lillich
Eye-opening article about how Facebook, YouTube & Co. manipulate us into spending time on their websites.
rahul .poruri
Stop everything you’re doing and read this! Right now!
Shreeniwas Iyer
Eye Opening:
Vsevolod Solovyov
How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds – в общем-то, все это знают, но хорошо просуммировано.
eve massacre
When we pull our phone out of our pocket, we’re playing a slot machine to see what notifications we got.
Saager Mhatre
Of course, Tristan Harris left put how he slighted you to provide his shiny new service a boatload of traffic by using his ex-Googler credentials, the hook of being a magician as well as how he wants to help you ensure your time on The Internet is ‘Time Well Spent’®™
Santiago Alonso
If you want to maximize addictiveness, all tech designers need to do is link a user’s action (like pulling a lever) with a variable reward. You pull a lever and immediately receive either an enticing reward (a match, a prize!) or nothing. Addictiveness is maximized when the rate of reward is most variable.
Martin Soler
Some very good points on how tech is stealing our time. I’ve already mentioned how I don’t think tech companies should measure their success based on how much of our time they have taken. That metric will backfire. It can’t do anything else.
The article lacks some concrete recommendations. Especially on the menu section. Yes we aren’t shown what isn’t there but do we really want unlimited choice?
Enjoy the read.
Elad
Fascinating.
Norbert Fernandes
The ultimate freedom is a free mind, and we need technology that’s on our team to help us live, feel, think and act freely.
We need our smartphones, notifications screens and web browsers to be exoskeletons for our minds and interpersonal relationships that put our values, not our impulses, first. People’s time is valuable. And we should protect it with the same rigor as privacy and other digital rights.
Gary-Yau Chan
This keeps us subscribed to newsletters even after they haven’t delivered recent benefits (“what if I miss a future announcement?”)
This keeps us “friended” to people with whom we haven’t spoke in ages (“what if I miss something important from them?”)
This keeps us swiping faces on dating apps, even when we haven’t even met up with anyone in a while (“what if I miss that one hot match who likes me?”)
This keeps us using social media (“what if I miss that important news story or fall behind what my friends are talking about?”)
Anton Gorodetsky
Как технологии пользуются нашими слабостями, автор — человек, 3 года отвечавший в Гугл за этику продукта. Здесь — все основные техники давления: грубые нотификации, бесконечные ленты, auto play, «страх пропустить», неполные меню и т.п. Будет полезно и тем, кто реально ощущает переизбыток соцсетей и медиа в своей жизни, и тем, кто намерен делать на этом деньги
Marcin Puś
ciekawe i dobrze podane
Jérémie Pottier
maximizing interruptions in the name of business creates a tragedy of the commons, ruining global attention spans and causing billions of unnecessary interruptions each day.
Kenny Meyers
There are very few articles that later my perception of tech. I love this one.
Kenny Meyers
There are very few articles that alter my perception of technology. This is a great one.
Josh Cunningham
Very important read for consumers and creators of the web. A contrast to the book Hooked, which I liked but made me uneasy thinking about implementing features to unconsciously draw people in.
Keya Madhvani
Cannot recommend this more — working at a Tech company, I know most of these things to be true, but seeing it listed out here in this way, really draws out the challenge we’re facing as a society.
Wietse Van Ransbeeck
imagine if technology companies empowered you to consciously bound your experience to align with what would be “time well spent” for you. Not just bounding the quantity of time you spend, but the qualities of what would be “time well spent
Nils Öhman
The more choices technology gives us in nearly every domain of our lives (information, events, places to go, friends, dating, jobs) — the more we assume that our phone is always the most empowering and useful menu to pick from. Is it?
The more choices technology gives us in nearly every domain of our lives (information, events, places to go, friends, dating, jobs) — the more we assume that our phone is always the most empowering and useful menu to pick from. Is it?
Viktor Voronin
Brilliant analogies on intermittent variable rewards we get online
Mourad DACHRAOUI
Social media, in a nutshell.
Imagine millions of people getting interrupted like this throughout their day, running around like chickens with their heads cut off, reciprocating each other — all designed by companies who profit from it.
Welcome to social media.
Jai Vipra
Excellent
Cheryl Hsu
They give people the illusion of free choice while architecting the menu so that they win, no matter what you choose.
Cheryl Hsu
The “most empowering” menu is different than the menu that has the most choices
Andrew Eisenberg
There is a fine line between tech that we want to use and tech that hijacks us
Mathieu D
a must read
Christophe Pasquier
Imagine if technology companies had a responsibility to minimize social reciprocity. Or if there was an independent organization that represented the public’s interests — an industry consortium or an FDA for tech — that monitored when technology companies abused these biases?
Daniel Hopkins
Time well spent sounds like a worthy goal to me
Akshay Ratan
Brilliant read to consider how we spend our day immersed in technology. Think again!
We need our smartphones, notifications screens and web browsers to be exoskeletons for our minds and interpersonal relationships that put our values, not our impulses, first. People’s time is valuable. And we should protect it with the same rigor as privacy and other digital rights.
Neal McQuaid
An amazing article
Jason Siegel
Whoa
Lukas
Well formulated fallout of attention economy.
Marat
This is great.
Ker Metanoia Oliva
No such thing as free lunch; no such thing as free mind.
Kimberli Zhong
The ultimate freedom is a free mind, and we need technology that’s on our team to help us live, feel, think and act freely.
Jose Menor
The Wizard of Oz is a drug dealer, do yourself a favor and read this
Jonathan Cohen
But the closer we pay attention to the options we’re given, the more we’ll notice when they don’t actually align with our true needs.
Jonathan Cohen
Imagine millions of people getting interrupted like this throughout their day, running around like chickens with their heads cut off, reciprocating each other — all designed by companies who profit from it.
Jonathan Cohen
That’s why I add “Estimated reading time” to the top of my posts. When you put the “true cost” of a choice in front of people, you’re treating your users or audience with dignity and respect
David Burns
Amazing read
Daniel Noll
Last piece of dystopia for the day. I find it worthwhile (for the purposes of my own sanity and productivity) to be aware of how easily my buttons can be pressed by technology. Upshot lesson = embrace the useful, ditch the distraction.
When using technology, we often focus optimistically on all the things it does for us. But I want to show you where it might do the opposite.
Bill Wanjohi
Technology companies definitely need more “design ethicists” in the conversation.
Nadir Sidi
Cell phones are basically slot machines.
Derek Coatney
Excellent read. Interesting both as a consumer and a PM.
Matt Chamberlain
Very interesting.
Bran Dolicki
For example, in the physical world of grocery stories, the #1 and #2 most popular reasons to visit are pharmacy refills and buying milk. But grocery stores want to maximize how much people buy, so they put the pharmacy and the milk at the back of the store.
In other words, they make the thing customers want (milk, pharmacy) inseparable from what the business wants. If stores were truly organized to support people, they would put the most popular items in the front.
Tech companies design their websites the same way. For example, when you you want to look up a Facebook event happening tonight (your reason) the Facebook app doesn’t allow you to access it without first landing on the news feed (their reasons), and that’s on purpose. Facebook wants to convert every reason you have for using Facebook, into their reason which is to maximize the time you spend consuming things.
Bran Dolicki
incidentally, this is what assistant bots do.
In an ideal world, apps would always give you a direct way to get what you want separately from what they want.
Bran Dolicki
We need our smartphones, notifications screens and web browsers to be exoskeletons for our minds and interpersonal relationships that put our values, not our impulses, first. People’s time is valuable. And we should protect it with the same rigor as privacy and other digital rights.
Holly Dowell
As a UX designer, I cringe at the cynicism of the article (may technologists are truly trying to create a helpful experience for you), but fully acknowledge the psychological aspect. It’s an important side of technology to consider.
Holly Dowell
Fascinating read. As a UX designer, I can say not all design is malicious, but this is an important side of technology to be aware of.
Justin Matich
Great piece
Vitor Capela
A lot to chew on. This is a topic I think about constantly, and struggle with just as frequently. A free mind is a privilege we should guard dutifully.
Nikhil Somaru
Required reading if you care about the direction technology is going in
Pranav Rao
Things get really interesting from Hijack #2 .
Cristen Jones
A must-read!!
Thomas van der Straten
“It’s easier to fool people than to convince them that they’ve been fooled.”
The Rambling Teapot
Google’s Design Ethicist (and a former magician) reflects on how social media apps use dark patterns to hijack our agency, and what “freedom” in choice we have left.
“Magicians start by looking for blind spots, edges, vulnerabilities and limits of people’s perception, so they can influence what people do without them even realizing it. Once you know how to push people’s buttons, you can play them like a piano.
And this is exactly what product designers do to your mind. They play your psychological vulnerabilities (consciously and unconsciously) against you in the race to grab your attention.
“People don’t intuitively forecast the true cost of a click when it’s presented to them.
“We need our smartphones, notifications screens and web browsers to be exoskeletons for our minds and interpersonal relationships that put our values, not our impulses, first. People’s time is valuable. And we should protect it with the same rigor as privacy and other digital rights.”
More like advices to make addictive service
Lowell Bander
The thought, “what if I miss something important?” is generated in advance of unplugging, unsubscribing, or turning off — not after.
Joe Owens
They’re inside your mind!
Amazing review of how facebook et al use UX design to make you do what they want. #MustRead
Pallavi Thampi
We don’t miss what we don’t see.
Pallavi Thampi
Imagine millions of people getting interrupted like this throughout their day, running around like chickens with their heads cut off, reciprocating each other — all designed by companies who profit from it.
Welcome to social media.
Joakim Ejenstam
Spend a thought about why you respond to services suggestions. Is this what I/my friends want me to do?
Facebook, Instagram or SnapChat can manipulate how often people get tagged in photos by automatically suggesting all the faces people should tag (e.g. by showing a box with a 1-click confirmation, “Tag Tristan in this photo?”).
Pere Monguio Montells
Imagine millions of people getting interrupted like this throughout their day, running around like chickens with their heads cut off, reciprocating each other — all designed by companies who profit from it.
Welcome to social media.
Rin Raj
❤ the new light
Tobias Kehl
Perfect read to think about the whole weekend. And spend your time well next week 😉
Dan Blănaru
a must read
pablo apiolazza
For those who think that we live in the age of free will.
Antoine Lizée
This is an awesome read on current aggressive PM trends and their deleterious side-effects on our lives.
Radoslav Šonský
totally worth the 12 minutes 😉
Jason Pearson
“Millions of us fiercely defend our right to make “free” choices, while we ignore how those choices are manipulated upstream by menus we didn’t choose in the first place.”
Western Culture is built around ideals of individual choice and freedom. Millions of us fiercely defend our right to make “free” choices, while we ignore how those choices are manipulated upstream by menus we didn’t choose in the first place
Craig Rowe
Insightful discussion of the ethics of UX
Ed Hammerton
The more choices technology gives us in nearly every domain of our lives (information, events, places to go, friends, dating, jobs) — the more we assume that our phone is always the most empowering and useful menu to pick from.
Joël Costamagna
it’s that Yelp substituted the group’s original question (“where can we go to keep talking?”) with a different question (“what’s a bar with good photos of cocktails?”)
Aditya Chincholi
Design Ethics are truly needed in order to ensure a world that is governed by people and not tech companies
Clive Richards
Superb read. Very insightful #recommended
Trenten Babcock
brilliant and quite unnerving
Julie Leary
New angle on the war against technology
Pavel Shut
Пра механізмы сацыяльных сетак як змарнаваць як мага больш вашага часу. Well worth a read
Chris Le
Snares everywhere to indulge impulses!
We need our smartphones, notifications screens and web browsers to be exoskeletons for our minds and interpersonal relationships that put our values, not our impulses, first.
Aleksey Khodakovskiy
Simple ways to access and hijack our psychological vulnerabilities + how facebook, instagram and other applications do it with you everyday
Surprisingly insightful, it’s about dark patterns in product design, and how they are used to keep you hooked.
Remi Lacoste
A nice overview of how the internet is built that everyone should read.
Igor Carvalho
Um interessante olhar aos triques que nem percebemos
Jan Pleis@theholisticview
Some amazing ideas and insights on design. A must read for everyone who is at least a bit interested in design.
Justin Eckrich
Another clue to what my next business is all about. Going to be epic.
Fiona MacDougall
Excellent article on the #psychology behind #tech #design. Now I’m noticing all kinds of sneaky hijacks…
Jaydeep Singh
Wonderful read. Also what a cool job “product philosopher” and studying “design ethics”
Tony Mann
Slot machines make more money in the United States than baseball, movies, and theme parks combined.
Falko Noe
We’re all vulnerable to social approval. The need to belong, to be approved or appreciated by our peers is among the highest human motivations. But now our social approval is in the hands of tech companies.
Charles Lestari
Estimated reading time: 12 minutes
Naomi Fennell
Wow. Worth the read. Very insightful. After reading this I feel like I have been brainwashed by technology.
Niall McCullagh
Gamification of user experiences
Alex Vanacker
A thorough article on how we are modeled by tech firms to use their products, and how to let go.
Sydney Fliorent
and
Minn Kim
This. Plus So glad this led to Joe Edelman’s talk https://vimeo.com/123488311 #design
But the closer we pay attention to the options we’re given, the more we’ll notice when they don’t actually align with our true needs.
Vivien Siu
good read for product / designers with a great message.
Gavin Dluehosh
Instead of viewing the world in terms of availability of choices, we should view the world in terms of friction required to enact choices.
Fran Kee
great
N.M Jafari
good
Fang Jie
Where does technology exploit our minds’ weaknesses?
George Proimakis
Incredible work! Many thanks!
DT Pham
estern Culture is built around ideals of individual choice and freedom. Millions of us fiercely defend our right to make “free” choices, while we ignore how those choices are manipulated upstream by menus we didn’t choose in the first place.
This is exactly what magicians do. They give people the illusion of free choice while architecting the menu so that they win, no matter what you choose. I can’t emphasize enough how deep this insight is.
Alex Coelho
Don’t forget, 12 well spent minutes!
Estimated reading time: 12 minutes.
Rolf Thijsen
But here’s the unfortunate truth — several billion people have a slot machine their pocket:
When we pull our phone out of our pocket, we’re playing a slot machine to see what notifications we got.
Chin yee ann
Worth reading it 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻
Ryan Pramberg
dang this was good. definitely putting sone of these into practice in my life
Rich Hall
Excellent article – now I need to try my best to not implement these in any of the digital ad units I build 😉
Szabolcs Bokonyi
Amazing article about Technology’s mindfucks
Cedrick Song
Like push
But now companies like Apple and Google have a responsibility to reduce these effects by converting intermittent variable rewards into less addictive, more predictable ones with better design. For example, they could empower people to set predictable times during the day or week for when they want to check “slot machine” apps, and correspondingly adjust when new messages are delivered to align with those times.
Wen Luo
product designers or user experience designers’ job is not to provide user best product. They are aim to trick users in a merciful way to let them believe all of this is for their good.
Jo Hetland
Good insight, to the point
Photo
Humberto Brasiliense
Vale a pena conferir!
Srg Kas
“..this is exactly what product designers do to your mind. They play your psychological vulnerabilities (consciously and unconsciously) against you in the race to grab your attention.”
Once you know how to push people’s buttons, you can play them like a piano.
Srg Kas
“Millions of us fiercely defend our right to make “free” choices, while we ignore how those choices are manipulated upstream by menus we didn’t choose in the first place.”
Western Culture is built around ideals of individual choice and freedom.
Srg Kas
The more choices technology gives us in nearly every domain of our lives (information, events, places to go, friends, dating, jobs) — the more we assume that our phone is always the most empowering and useful menu to pick from. Is it?
Srg Kas
We’re all vulnerable to social approval. The need to belong, to be approved or appreciated by our peers is among the highest human motivations. But now our social approval is in the hands of tech companies.
Srg Kas
Everyone innately responds to social approval, but some demographics (teenagers) are more vulnerable to it than others.
Srg Kas
Imagine millions of people getting interrupted like this throughout their day, running around like chickens with their heads cut off, reciprocating each other — all designed by companies who profit from it.
Welcome to social media.
Srg Kas
“Tech companies exploit the same principle. News feeds are purposely designed to auto-refill with reasons to keep you scrolling, and purposely eliminate any reason for you to pause, reconsider or leave.’
you can trick people into keep eating soup by giving them a bottomless bowl that automatically refills as they eat.
Srg Kas
“In an ideal world, there is always a direct way to get what you want separately from what businesses want.”
The ultimate freedom is a free mind, and we need technology that’s on our team to help us live, feel, think and act freely.
Abigail Young
Definitely worth the read
Priyanka Bamnikar
Very interesting point if view. Loved it
Michał Nowakowski
How internet deceives you
çağla Tekeli
çeşitli paylasim uygulamalari anksiyete, dikkat dağınıklığı, depresif semptomlar ve zaman kaybına neden olur. Bunlara nasıl sebep olduğunu anlatan yazı.
çağla Tekeli
paylaşım uygulamaları kaygı, dikkat dağınıklıği ve depresif semptomlara neden oluyor. Zaman kaybettiriyor. bu uygulamaların hangi yöntemlerle kişileri kendine bağladığını anlatan yazı.
Eugenia Chapman
Time well spent
prashant bisht
while
Bernat Riera
Very interesting.
Grzegorz Wierzowiecki
Must read for all living in our beginnings of digital age.
Great article closely related to http\:// imewellspent.io/ .
Grzegorz Wierzowiecki
Must read for all living in our beginnings of digital age.
Great article closely related to http://timewellspent.io/ .
PjotBekks
Engineering distraction.
– 12 Minutes –
Christina Lee
urban
We don’t miss what we don’t see.
George Allen
Interesting article on the tricks used to keep you on social media and other sites. I often find my phone a distraction from the real world and try my best to limit my dependence on it. Knowing these tactics is useful in combating them. Remember that you should control your technology and not let it control you.
Antoaneta Angelova
I just cannot recommend this article enough.
Leaves you wondering: “where is this going?” After all, can this kind of intrusiveness be sustainable in the long term?
LikeLiked by 1 person
I believe it’ll trigger the opposite reaction in many people and many will get back to the old ways. History is like a wheel.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yeah, probably not ☺
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