Ask HN: How does it feel to be a dark pattern programmer?

Re:Ask HN: How does it feel to be a dark pattern programmer? by PragmaticPulp on Saturday March 06, 2021 @07:29PM (#26371897)

I guarantee you the decisions behind what you're describing are not coming from the programmers. This is the realm of product managers, UX designers, and other decision makers.

Adding a few extra steps to your Amazon Prime cancellation isn't great, but it's not exactly worth throwing shade on fellow programmers somewhere who were tasked with implementing the designs as decided by the employer who provides their paycheck.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: How does it feel to be a dark pattern programmer? by anticristi on Sunday March 07, 2021 @02:59AM (#26374117)

Indeed, but it still must be meah that you ended up being "that d00d" that implemented yet another barrier to exit. I can already imagine a beer conversation with friends:

A: What did you do this week?

B: I operated an appendix to save someone's life.

C: I sold a home to a young family.

D: I added yet another layer of frustration to users trying to cancel their membership.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: How does it feel to be a dark pattern programmer? by hutzlibu on Sunday March 07, 2021 @03:59AM (#26374353)

" I added yet another layer of frustration to users trying to cancel their membership."

You probably have to tweak your language to match marketing speak.

So, you did:

"implemented a rich UI specifically aimed at the difficult group of unsatisfied customers, to convince them of keeping their membership"

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: How does it feel to be a dark pattern programmer? by carmen_sandiego on Saturday March 06, 2021 @09:25PM (#26372566)

It just depends on the org. Some places let engineers make these decisions, and some places like that also have OKR/KPI/whatever structure that encourages dark patterns.

[ Parent | on HN ]