| > I know it's seems like it's 'dark pattern' week on HN OK, what is a dark pattern by your definition? Dark patterns are a relevant topic on HN because many startups are measured in terms of user engagement and the growth of their user-base. What is the difference between advertising and information? Growth hacking techniques and clickbait? Nudges and dark patterns? These things are interesting because the line is blurry, and many patterns (dark or otherwise) that used to work suddenly stop working. This is why banner ads worked for a while and why interruption ads are becoming more and more common, and why adblock is becoming more and more common. The world is not static, and so there is not ever going to be a consistent definition of what constitutes a dark pattern... it depends on the audience. In the first world, most 70 year olds are now on Facebook, and they are vulnerable to many patterns that the younger generations are not. Just as scammers send senior citizens envelopes that look like social security checks but are actually ads, Facebook offers something that looks like a way to voluntarily share information but is actually often involuntary. I think FB should take a hard line against dark patterns and be content to grow based on the massive network effect it can get without them. |