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shevy-javayesterday at 4:39 PM3 repliesview on HN

Alright. I may object to the wording, but ... isn't what you described also a good website? I am aware of how much propaganda Google uses too, e. g. "engage the user" - you see that on youtube "leave a like". They are begging people to vote. Not for the vote, but to engage him. I saw this not long ago on Magic Arena by Wizards of the coast. They claim "your feedback is valuable" but you can only vote up or vote down. That's not feedback - that is lying to the user to try to get the user to make a reaction and tell others about it. I just don't really see the difference. You describe it that they manipulate people, but ANY ad-department of a company uses propaganda and manipulates people. Look in a grocery, how many colours are used in the packaging. Isn't ALL of this also manipulative?


Replies

direwolf20yesterday at 4:42 PM

Google doesn't beg you for likes. Channels beg you for likes because it's one of the metrics they are stack–ranked by. Someone will lose, and they don't want it to be them.

intendedyesterday at 6:04 PM

There is an entire agency that focuses on Food and Drugs in America, and its similar around the world. We have many rules on food.

Food is actually a great place to think about social media, because there was a time where the FDA didnt exist. Its need was felt after cities grew larger and the food supply chain became longer. At that point food could be adultered and the old systems which people relied on to know the provenance of their food failed.

Some of the things that changed this was when people started doing indepedent testing and finding out exactly how much adultery was actually taking place.

Eventually we got rules about what was to be done, which we don't consider anymore since its part of daily life.

6510yesterday at 5:52 PM

> isn't what you described also a good website?

No, good software is and feels empowering. It should scream the developer understood what YOU want to do at that specific point. Most notable, the faster the job is DONE the better.

Putting up flyers in the toilet isn't to enhance your toilet experience. It is the opposite, if we want to enhance the flyer engagement the easiest way is by de-optimizing all parts of the toilet UX. Say we remove all but one toilet rolls and make the side a bit wet. If some of the locks don't work we could dramatically enhance the number of walls and doors people look at. Ideal would be to lock everyone in the stall until the next prey arrives. Should release them just early enough that they don't inform the next victim.