33 votes

Air ticket booking site uses Math.random for "38 people are looking at this right now" UX dark pattern

@ophirharpaz:
1/4] Ok this is really funny, check this out. I was in the process of booking a flight via @OneTravel. Trying to make me book ASAP, they claimed: "38 people are looking at this flight". Whoa, 38 is a lot, I have to hurry up.

13 comments

  1. [2]
    joelthelion
    Link
    Is it legal to do that? What do they risk?

    Is it legal to do that? What do they risk?

    10 votes
    1. Omnicrola
      Link Parent
      I'm guessing it's probably legal (at least in the US). Should it be? Nope.

      I'm guessing it's probably legal (at least in the US). Should it be? Nope.

      4 votes
  2. [5]
    Adys
    Link
    Neat, from the replies: https://twitter.com/Atrafikant/status/1183811655970492423
    5 votes
    1. fandegw
      Link Parent
      No github to see the source of the extension, the team behind it is proposing online marketing to other businesses, and the homepage of website linked to the extension is using googletagmanager....

      No github to see the source of the extension, the team behind it is proposing online marketing to other businesses, and the homepage of website linked to the extension is using googletagmanager.

      So I would be suspicious of it before installing it

      11 votes
    2. [3]
      Menio_Mercina
      Link Parent
      I was just about to ask if anyone knew of any add-ons to block these super annoying clearly fake pop-ups that seem to escape most ad-blockers. Thanks! Now I just hope that someone comes out with a...

      I was just about to ask if anyone knew of any add-ons to block these super annoying clearly fake pop-ups that seem to escape most ad-blockers. Thanks! Now I just hope that someone comes out with a Firefox version sometime soon.

      1 vote
      1. [2]
        balooga
        Link Parent
        I haven't verified this but I'd expect uBlock Origin's element picker to be able to kill these things consistently. You'd need to do the legwork for each site up front, but shouldn't have to worry...

        I haven't verified this but I'd expect uBlock Origin's element picker to be able to kill these things consistently. You'd need to do the legwork for each site up front, but shouldn't have to worry about it again until the sites update.

        6 votes
        1. Menio_Mercina
          Link Parent
          I don't know if it's just me but I have tried that before using the element picker but it would only ever block the current "XXX are looking at this right now" notification and never the following...

          I don't know if it's just me but I have tried that before using the element picker but it would only ever block the current "XXX are looking at this right now" notification and never the following ones no matter how many times I tried. The only success I have had in the past was seeing a URL in uBlock's dashboard for something like "yo-notification-info" on the site and then setting a red blocking rule for that which stopped all the pop-up notifications on that website although most others haven't had it labelled so obviously unfortunately.

          1 vote
  3. [6]
    Akir
    Link
    The surprising thing is not that they are pulling a random number for this, it's that they didn't even try to hide it. And even then, it's not that surprising. I've always ignored those numbers...

    The surprising thing is not that they are pulling a random number for this, it's that they didn't even try to hide it. And even then, it's not that surprising.

    I've always ignored those numbers because I just assume they're fake.

    3 votes
    1. [4]
      Deimos
      Link Parent
      Being able to figure out things like this is an interesting consequence of so much being done client-side in Javascript now. When this is done server-side, you have no idea where the number came...

      Being able to figure out things like this is an interesting consequence of so much being done client-side in Javascript now. When this is done server-side, you have no idea where the number came from, it's just a number in the HTML. But if it's done in JS, it's effectively all open-source, even if it's usually obfuscated somewhat from being minified.

      9 votes
      1. [3]
        balooga
        Link Parent
        Give it a few more years. WebAssembly is on the horizon, soon we'll be seeing closed-source binaries replacing these scripts. The work will still be happening client-side, but not transparently....

        Give it a few more years. WebAssembly is on the horizon, soon we'll be seeing closed-source binaries replacing these scripts. The work will still be happening client-side, but not transparently. Unless you're motivated enough to decompile and reverse-engineer what's happening, you won't have this kind of insight anymore.

        9 votes
        1. [2]
          moocow1452
          Link Parent
          Eww, and here I thought WebAssembly was going to be amazing, but it's going to be Flash and Wildvine, but sandboxed in the browser.

          Eww, and here I thought WebAssembly was going to be amazing, but it's going to be Flash and Wildvine, but sandboxed in the browser.

          2 votes
          1. balooga
            Link Parent
            It's definitely got its pros and cons. I expect to see some very scary privacy/security headlines related to wasm in the near future. On the other hand, as a developer I appreciate that I can code...

            It's definitely got its pros and cons. I expect to see some very scary privacy/security headlines related to wasm in the near future. On the other hand, as a developer I appreciate that I can code in my language of choice and compile down to it, also the smaller bundle sizes and performance improvements over JavaScript are very appealing. But yeah, when I think about the possible downsides this will have for the free and open web... it's a ticking time bomb.

            5 votes
    2. unknown user
      Link Parent
      I suspect at least Airbnb does use actual macro-system data to inform their scarcity comments; but the effect is the same: it's a technique designed to induce "fear of missing out" anxiety in the...

      I suspect at least Airbnb does use actual macro-system data to inform their scarcity comments; but the effect is the same: it's a technique designed to induce "fear of missing out" anxiety in the user to the detriment of them and the profit of the business. I can't stand it.

      7 votes