4 ms·
I disagree with declaring all helper agents as dark patterns. From a regular user point of view, it would be acceptable to have a helper agent as long as it fo
by vinay_ys 7y ago
I disagree with declaring all helper agents as dark patterns.
From a regular user point of view, it would be acceptable to have a helper agent as long as it follows:
- platform provided background process methodology (example: launchd could launch your process when you hit the socket),
- and it is made clearly apparent that such a thing is installed on your system (say, via system preferences panel, via status bar icon menu, and via in-app preferences panel),
- and it does cleanly uninstall as part of a simple standard regular uninstall.
And from a technical/security point of view, it would be acceptable if it:
- has minimal necessary privileges and proper separation of concerns.
- and does only what it needs to provide a user-expected functionality and doesn't do random egregious things.
- has secure ways to allow only expected/authorized caller to talk to it.
- does not violate any platform guidelines or tries to circumvent protections.
- colechristensen 7y agoBut for what? My caveat is that a helper service is acceptable when it is doing something necessary for the basic function of the software. Virus scanners, file sync, and things which are obviously servers fit the bill. Not much else I can think of does.
- o-__-o 7y agoLibreoffice has an agent that preloads java bins to make the startup time comparable to MS Office. There are valid uses for startup agents, please get over yourself
- colechristensen 7y agoI don't want that. I don't want installing an office suite to permanently take away a percentage of my computer's resources.
- LaGrange 7y ago> From a regular user point of view, it would be acceptable It would be not, stop pretending acquiring consent from a statistical model counts as acquiring consent from the actual user. Thing you wrote may make it acceptable for you, but certainly ain't sufficient for me.
- vinay_ys 7y ago> It would be not, stop pretending acquiring consent from a statistical model counts as acquiring consent from the actual user. I don't know what you are referring to here. Care to elaborate? > Thing you wrote may make it acceptable for you, but certainly ain't sufficient for me. This isn't about individual taste. Nothing I wrote above was about my personal taste. My point was about differentiating between the OS provided valid architectural mechanisms vs surreptitious dark patterns applied on top of it by an application developer.
- LaGrange 7y agoI don't know what you are referring to here. Care to elaborate? You make assumptions about individual user's consent from whatever bulk experiences you might have measured. Either that, or you didn't even measure anything and therefore you're just making things up about what's "acceptable." > This isn't about individual taste. Who said anything about taste, it's about individual boundaries. > My point was about differentiating between the OS provided valid architectural mechanisms vs surreptitious dark patterns applied on top of it by an application developer. First, that's a word salad. Second, after untangling it, I'm pretty sure you mean "if there's a mechanism in the OS that enables this then it's okay" in which case that's even more absurd than the usual "if it's legal then it's okay." Look, even if you take Zoom's "let's leave a tray icon there when you thought you quit the app without putting a honking huge notice you just did that like a decent app usually does" is more about having a way to disawov ("see, we did leave a notification, lol") than actually ethical design. That's the _essence_ of a dark pattern. Seriously, though, you're being creepy and advocating pushing people's boundaries here.