Well, I'm not entirely sure that subtly influencing people to be nicer to each other is a bad thing and I don't see how anything they are doing is devious or underhanded.
> I'm not entirely sure that subtly influencing people to be nicer to each other is a bad thing
This would be a subjective opinion. The ends do not justify the means.
I agree with you that getting people to act nicer to each other is a nice goal, but you can't do it by enlisting them all into a hidden experiment.
> I don't see how anything they are doing is devious or underhanded.
Well that's the point of A/B testing isn't it? The user doesn't realize that they are part of the experiment. That's the devious part. If they had signed up to be part of an experiment, then at least it wouldn't be an underhanded maneuver to start changing game UI or semantics on them without their knowledge.
This would be a subjective opinion. The ends do not justify the means.
I agree with you that getting people to act nicer to each other is a nice goal, but you can't do it by enlisting them all into a hidden experiment.
> I don't see how anything they are doing is devious or underhanded.
Well that's the point of A/B testing isn't it? The user doesn't realize that they are part of the experiment. That's the devious part. If they had signed up to be part of an experiment, then at least it wouldn't be an underhanded maneuver to start changing game UI or semantics on them without their knowledge.