>(By the way, if significant portions of your userbase are capable of becoming addicted to your product, consider that it may not be fully ethical to produce it.)
Would this also apply to products like Uber? I use it all the time, and can't imagine life without it. Am I addicted to it? Is it an unethical company because people love to use it and it provides value to their lives?
I chose the word "addiction" pretty specifically - does it enrich the user's life? Uber does. (And you probably don't have a desire to use Uber for hours every day).
Social gaming (someone mentioned below) does, to a point, and then it's engineered to go way, way beyond that point.
It's complicated of course - and there's a spectrum - but I think a bad sign is if your architecture is intended to hack the reward systems of your customers.
"I use it all the time" - you might find it more economical to buy a car. I fail to see how anyone could be addicted to something as basic as transport. It's like saying you're addicted to using BART or MUNI.
I think you mean the micro-transaction social gaming industry.
If you re-read what you quoted (emphasis mine):
"By the way, if significant portions of your userbase are capable of becoming addicted to your product, consider that it may not be fully ethical to produce it."
Would this also apply to products like Uber? I use it all the time, and can't imagine life without it. Am I addicted to it? Is it an unethical company because people love to use it and it provides value to their lives?