Mark made a follow-up post today, discussing some of the responses to this article, and addressing a rebuttal: No, an exploitative product is not "great"
I'm torn. Those were two good posts, but for one thing @whbboyd is right: These problems have nothing to do with UX, and they're more at a meta level of "The people I work for are asking me to...
I'm torn. Those were two good posts, but for one thing @whbboyd is right: These problems have nothing to do with UX, and they're more at a meta level of "The people I work for are asking me to help them do bad things."
If you're a UX designer at Amazon, you're asked to make the Prime cancellation obtuse. Sure. But if you're a web developer at Amazon, you're asked to implement it. If you're a graphics designer, you're asked to make all the "beautiful" pages that keep the users warm and fuzzy preventing them from cancelling. And if you're a software engineer not even working on that particular thing, you're probably working on squeezing every penny possible from the users.
Denouncing his own field and turning it into "user exploitation" sounds fancy but I'm not convinced that he himself understands the point he's making.
Incidentally, I found his twitter and saw him link Good Reports on it, which sounded nice at first but the recommendations are very questionable. Recommending against Firefox because they're Google-funded, while at the same time recommending Ungoogled Chromium or even just in general a bunch of Apple-only software is very what-the-fucky. This comes back to the same point as earlier IMO.
So in short, I agree with the general complaint but I don't think the author really understands the situation…
I was really struck by this quote from a supposed "rebuttal": …because it's factually true (the problems with Uber, Lyft, et. al. are certainly not the user experience, at least for passengers,...
I was really struck by this quote from a supposed "rebuttal":
You can have a great user experience in one sense and be exploited, or exploit others, at the same time (e.g. Uber, Facebook or even heroin).
…because it's factually true (the problems with Uber, Lyft, et. al. are certainly not the user experience, at least for passengers, and especially compared to the taxi systems they aim to replace) and an interesting observation in its own right, but is in fact an argument in favor of Mark's original thesis. The "great user experience" for passengers is used to drive exploitation of drivers (and, arguably, societies); UX being used for exploitation, exactly as described.
Very hard, because compared to businesses that do employ shady UX techniques, you are hamstrung from the get-go. You will most probably be outcompeted by companies with lower moral standards.
Start another company and hope to do better. (Hard.)
Very hard, because compared to businesses that do employ shady UX techniques, you are hamstrung from the get-go. You will most probably be outcompeted by companies with lower moral standards.
It's similar with pollution, employee abuse (or use illegal labor), and other externalities that a company can get away with. Being ethical is costly and reduces competitiveness, unless one can...
It's similar with pollution, employee abuse (or use illegal labor), and other externalities that a company can get away with.
Being ethical is costly and reduces competitiveness, unless one can leverage the PR well. But even good PR can only go so far.
Mark made a follow-up post today, discussing some of the responses to this article, and addressing a rebuttal: No, an exploitative product is not "great"
I'm torn. Those were two good posts, but for one thing @whbboyd is right: These problems have nothing to do with UX, and they're more at a meta level of "The people I work for are asking me to help them do bad things."
If you're a UX designer at Amazon, you're asked to make the Prime cancellation obtuse. Sure. But if you're a web developer at Amazon, you're asked to implement it. If you're a graphics designer, you're asked to make all the "beautiful" pages that keep the users warm and fuzzy preventing them from cancelling. And if you're a software engineer not even working on that particular thing, you're probably working on squeezing every penny possible from the users.
Denouncing his own field and turning it into "user exploitation" sounds fancy but I'm not convinced that he himself understands the point he's making.
Incidentally, I found his twitter and saw him link Good Reports on it, which sounded nice at first but the recommendations are very questionable. Recommending against Firefox because they're Google-funded, while at the same time recommending Ungoogled Chromium or even just in general a bunch of Apple-only software is very what-the-fucky. This comes back to the same point as earlier IMO.
So in short, I agree with the general complaint but I don't think the author really understands the situation…
I was really struck by this quote from a supposed "rebuttal":
…because it's factually true (the problems with Uber, Lyft, et. al. are certainly not the user experience, at least for passengers, and especially compared to the taxi systems they aim to replace) and an interesting observation in its own right, but is in fact an argument in favor of Mark's original thesis. The "great user experience" for passengers is used to drive exploitation of drivers (and, arguably, societies); UX being used for exploitation, exactly as described.
Very hard, because compared to businesses that do employ shady UX techniques, you are hamstrung from the get-go. You will most probably be outcompeted by companies with lower moral standards.
It's similar with pollution, employee abuse (or use illegal labor), and other externalities that a company can get away with.
Being ethical is costly and reduces competitiveness, unless one can leverage the PR well. But even good PR can only go so far.
So far, I think that regulation is necessary.