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Why are we optimizing the case of users browsing bad websites? Why not cater to good websites instead? Isn't a notification receiver of the most important uses

Why are we optimizing the case of users browsing bad websites? Why not cater to good websites instead? Isn't a notification receiver of the most important uses of a phone?

olliej 6y ago
web pages aren't something users want notifications from. Mozilla literally studied this and essentially 100% of "let us spam you" requests were denied.
- nexuist 6y ago
  Because essentially 100% of web pages that request push notification access are garbage tabloids that nobody cares about. No push notifications on mobile Safari means that there is no incentive to build mobile web apps that function similar to their native counterparts. Obviously people are accepting push notifications somewhere or else they wouldn't be such a popular design decision.
  - Google234 6y ago
    People could also build cool websites if your computer gave all sites kernel access into your computer. Doesn’t make it a good idea
- fragile_frogs 6y ago
  > web pages aren't something users want notifications from. I agree users don't want notifications from web pages, but the web is much more then just web pages and I would argue that on web applications users are much more likely to allow push notifications if they get a clear benefit.
  - Google234 6y ago
    Every other platform supports these notifications and yet somehow 99% of the sites that do it are using it for spam.
    - olliej 6y ago
      Every non-web platform has an initial gate of "install application X". The web does not have that gate. The web has "I went to the apps website to see if it did what I wanted. it did/didn't, and then asks to send me update notifications"
paulmd 6y ago
> Why are we optimizing the case of users browsing bad websites? Why not cater to good websites instead? I would say it's not so much optimizing for good websites vs bad websites, as optimizing for real-world websites. Real-world websites are overwhelmingly shitty, push dark patterns, invade users' privacy, abuse any APIs they are given access to, etc. Limiting the amount of things they can do is an enhancement to the user experience, even if it's worse for you as a dev. It's a lot like having to have laws. Why do we have to have laws, isn't that "optimizing for bad people" instead of maximizing the freedom of good people?
- Leherenn 6y ago
  But surely we can devise a way to minimise abuse and still let people who wants the features have them? This defeatist attitude is pretty sad, we have to be careful when designing new features, but we shouldn't let bad users just make it worse for everyone and give up. For instance, you could forbid websites from requesting the notification permission, but the user could manually go and allow it. It would probably cut 99% of the spam while allowing people that really want notifications to have them. As for the 1% left, we're not talking life and death scenario here, at that point the good outweighs the bad I would say.
- CameronNemo 6y ago
  Don't real world native apps do the same thing? Abuse APIs, push dark patterns, track users? There has to be a better way to prevent abuse other than "don't let this particular type of app use push notifications".
Ar-Curunir 6y ago
The number of terrible websites a far higher than the number of good ones. The former category includes many different news websites, streaming sites, etc

Why are we optimizing the case of users browsing bad websites? Why not cater to good websites instead? Isn't a notification receiver of the most important uses of a phone?

olliej 6y ago

web pages aren't something users want notifications from. Mozilla literally studied this and essentially 100% of "let us spam you" requests were denied.

nexuist 6y ago
Because essentially 100% of web pages that request push notification access are garbage tabloids that nobody cares about. No push notifications on mobile Safari means that there is no incentive to build mobile web apps that function similar to their native counterparts. Obviously people are accepting push notifications somewhere or else they wouldn't be such a popular design decision.
- Google234 6y ago
  People could also build cool websites if your computer gave all sites kernel access into your computer. Doesn’t make it a good idea
fragile_frogs 6y ago
> web pages aren't something users want notifications from. I agree users don't want notifications from web pages, but the web is much more then just web pages and I would argue that on web applications users are much more likely to allow push notifications if they get a clear benefit.
- Google234 6y ago
  Every other platform supports these notifications and yet somehow 99% of the sites that do it are using it for spam.
  - olliej 6y ago
    Every non-web platform has an initial gate of "install application X". The web does not have that gate. The web has "I went to the apps website to see if it did what I wanted. it did/didn't, and then asks to send me update notifications"

paulmd 6y ago

> Why are we optimizing the case of users browsing bad websites? Why not cater to good websites instead? I would say it's not so much optimizing for good websites vs bad websites, as optimizing for real-world websites. Real-world websites are overwhelmingly shitty, push dark patterns, invade users' privacy, abuse any APIs they are given access to, etc. Limiting the amount of things they can do is an enhancement to the user experience, even if it's worse for you as a dev. It's a lot like having to have laws. Why do we have to have laws, isn't that "optimizing for bad people" instead of maximizing the freedom of good people?

Leherenn 6y ago
But surely we can devise a way to minimise abuse and still let people who wants the features have them? This defeatist attitude is pretty sad, we have to be careful when designing new features, but we shouldn't let bad users just make it worse for everyone and give up. For instance, you could forbid websites from requesting the notification permission, but the user could manually go and allow it. It would probably cut 99% of the spam while allowing people that really want notifications to have them. As for the 1% left, we're not talking life and death scenario here, at that point the good outweighs the bad I would say.
CameronNemo 6y ago
Don't real world native apps do the same thing? Abuse APIs, push dark patterns, track users? There has to be a better way to prevent abuse other than "don't let this particular type of app use push notifications".

Ar-Curunir 6y ago

The number of terrible websites a far higher than the number of good ones. The former category includes many different news websites, streaming sites, etc