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I agree with the sentiment, this stuff's important. But when does "playing marketing games" become OK? Maybe for mobile games, but even then you have kids taki

by rtpg 10y ago

I agree with the sentiment, this stuff's important. But when does "playing marketing games" become OK? Maybe for mobile games, but even then you have kids taking their parent's credit cards out of wallets and spending 100s... everything's important to somebody. Clearly medical tech is extra important, and the consequences even more grave, but I hope this is a lesson to everyone that trying to dupe all of society sometimes has consequences. And hopefully convince more people to do ... nicer things? Better things? Well, at least taking things seriously.

BinaryIdiot 10y ago
> But when does "playing marketing games" become OK? When it comes to anything that can affect your health in medical related capacities it's tough to say it's ever okay. But duping a 9 year old into buying $200 worth of bullshit in-app purchases? Also very unethical, in my opinion, but at least it doesn't directly result in inaccurate medical care which could easily lead to serious injury or death. So ultimately I'm not sure it's ever ethically okay but that's probably going to depend on each person's definition of "playing marketing games".
- MawNicker 10y ago
  It's only ever OK. That's just a societal agreement. It's never good. It seems like an extremely conservative application of innocent until proven guilty. Advertising has been deemed necessary despite the ways it can be abused. We should likely be more critical in "serious" markets. It's insane that we let Coke/Pepsi regularly subject us all to babes in bikinis sensually consuming fizzy sugar water. That or whatever other psychologically invasive scene they've contrived. But even then, we still require that you not tell outright lies about your product. This ruling was definitely fair. If not lenient. It would be nice to see fewer marketing games it's just hard to find a good place to draw the line. Not lying is a very low bar.
  - rtpg 10y ago
    I mean, advertising can also just be about brand awareness, or talking about a product. How many psychological tricks are ads in the sidebar of Stack Overflow? The concept of advertising isn't inherently evil. To be clear, I agree 10000% with the action taken here. I would like for us to start applying this strict standard more often.
    - MawNicker 10y ago
      I'm talking about "playing marketing games" and not advertising in general. Then I'm talking about how hard it is to tell the two apart and the lousy compromises we've made in doing so. That being said I think brand awareness is mostly manipulative. Consumers need product awareness. It's definitely on the safer side of games though. I suspect it's fairly intrinsic/necessary. I don't want to advertise for my competitors. The sidebar on StackOverflow is great.
solidsnack9000 10y ago
Maybe it's never "OK" but sometimes it threatens life and limb.

by rtpg 10y ago

BinaryIdiot 10y ago

> But when does "playing marketing games" become OK? When it comes to anything that can affect your health in medical related capacities it's tough to say it's ever okay. But duping a 9 year old into buying $200 worth of bullshit in-app purchases? Also very unethical, in my opinion, but at least it doesn't directly result in inaccurate medical care which could easily lead to serious injury or death. So ultimately I'm not sure it's ever ethically okay but that's probably going to depend on each person's definition of "playing marketing games".

MawNicker 10y ago
It's only ever OK. That's just a societal agreement. It's never good. It seems like an extremely conservative application of innocent until proven guilty. Advertising has been deemed necessary despite the ways it can be abused. We should likely be more critical in "serious" markets. It's insane that we let Coke/Pepsi regularly subject us all to babes in bikinis sensually consuming fizzy sugar water. That or whatever other psychologically invasive scene they've contrived. But even then, we still require that you not tell outright lies about your product. This ruling was definitely fair. If not lenient. It would be nice to see fewer marketing games it's just hard to find a good place to draw the line. Not lying is a very low bar.
- rtpg 10y ago
  I mean, advertising can also just be about brand awareness, or talking about a product. How many psychological tricks are ads in the sidebar of Stack Overflow? The concept of advertising isn't inherently evil. To be clear, I agree 10000% with the action taken here. I would like for us to start applying this strict standard more often.
  - MawNicker 10y ago
    I'm talking about "playing marketing games" and not advertising in general. Then I'm talking about how hard it is to tell the two apart and the lousy compromises we've made in doing so. That being said I think brand awareness is mostly manipulative. Consumers need product awareness. It's definitely on the safer side of games though. I suspect it's fairly intrinsic/necessary. I don't want to advertise for my competitors. The sidebar on StackOverflow is great.

solidsnack9000 10y ago

Maybe it's never "OK" but sometimes it threatens life and limb.