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I have to admit: I hate the zoom experience. I use Chrome to avoid installing the app on my Mac. They use some dark patterns to force the app on you, but you ca

by baxtr 4y ago

I have to admit: I hate the zoom experience. I use Chrome to avoid installing the app on my Mac. They use some dark patterns to force the app on you, but you can use zoom in the browser. However, you can’t use any backgrounds unlike google meet, which again is a way to force you into their app. These patterns alone show what kind of company you're dealing with.

coconut_man 4y ago
If I switch to other tab while using the Zoom web version in one tab, all the video of everyone in the call disappear when go back to the Zoom tab, it's really annoying and a dump way to nudge people to switch to the app.
wodenokoto 4y ago
In zooms defense, backgrounds in meet is a great way to stress test your laptop fans max capacity.
- baxtr 4y ago
  Fair point. Then again, I think users are mature enough to make this trade-off decision by themselves.
origin_path 4y ago
But you installed Chrome even though it does the exact same thing (runs an auto update Daemon with admin privileges, at least in Windows). Meet works well in Chrome because Google just adds whatever their apps need to html5. Other companies don't have that option. Seems kinda unfair to insist that everyone uses Google's app runtime otherwise they're guilty of "dark patterns".
- christophilus 4y ago
  I trust Chrome, Brave, and Firefox more than Zoom, by a lightyear or so.
- baxtr 4y ago
  Yes. You're right. I don't feel good about it either. Zoom didn't work well in safari last time I tried. And avoiding zoom is really difficult these days.
  - dylan604 4y ago
    I use Zoom in FF on macOS daily, and have not had any of the above issues. I fire up the Zoom meeting in a browser tab, and then flip back and forth between tabs and windows with no negative results to the Zoom tab's functioning. Every time I have to relaunch FF after updates, the Zoom webpage forces me to download their installer (which I delete without using), and working their way through the dark pattern UI BS to get to the 'launch in browser' link to appear.
    - CameronNemo 4y ago
      There is an extension to go straight to the webjoin link. you can also just edit the link manually. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/zoom-redirector https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/zoom-redirect... Check the screenshot. You just need to edit the "/j/" part of the path to "/wc/join/".
      - dylan604 4y ago
        There are very few extensions that I trust, and to depend on an extension to do something as trivial as this is not worth the risk to me. This particular dark pattern isn't the darkest in the scheme of things.
        CameronNemo 4y ago
        The source code is literally 20 lines, very easy to audit. You can put the static download in your Mozilla folder to avoid auto-updates. It is a nice quality of life thing for me. But yeah definitely not necessary as you can always edit the URL yourself, as the extension author helpfully notes.
modzu 4y ago
i could never bring myself to trust the app, so i made a browser extension to make using the web version less painful (skips the dark pattern page where the "join from browser" link is often hidden). its open source so if ya dont trust this installer either, grab it from GitHub, its only a few lines of code :) hopefully others find it useful: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/zoom-web-launcher/idaiicgfjfmggdeedalmnmmlibcnbacd https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/zoom-web-launcher/...

by baxtr 4y ago

coconut_man 4y ago

If I switch to other tab while using the Zoom web version in one tab, all the video of everyone in the call disappear when go back to the Zoom tab, it's really annoying and a dump way to nudge people to switch to the app.

wodenokoto 4y ago

In zooms defense, backgrounds in meet is a great way to stress test your laptop fans max capacity.

baxtr 4y ago
Fair point. Then again, I think users are mature enough to make this trade-off decision by themselves.

origin_path 4y ago

But you installed Chrome even though it does the exact same thing (runs an auto update Daemon with admin privileges, at least in Windows). Meet works well in Chrome because Google just adds whatever their apps need to html5. Other companies don't have that option. Seems kinda unfair to insist that everyone uses Google's app runtime otherwise they're guilty of "dark patterns".

christophilus 4y ago
I trust Chrome, Brave, and Firefox more than Zoom, by a lightyear or so.
baxtr 4y ago
Yes. You're right. I don't feel good about it either. Zoom didn't work well in safari last time I tried. And avoiding zoom is really difficult these days.
- dylan604 4y ago
  I use Zoom in FF on macOS daily, and have not had any of the above issues. I fire up the Zoom meeting in a browser tab, and then flip back and forth between tabs and windows with no negative results to the Zoom tab's functioning. Every time I have to relaunch FF after updates, the Zoom webpage forces me to download their installer (which I delete without using), and working their way through the dark pattern UI BS to get to the 'launch in browser' link to appear.
  - CameronNemo 4y ago
    There is an extension to go straight to the webjoin link. you can also just edit the link manually. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/zoom-redirector https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/zoom-redirect... Check the screenshot. You just need to edit the "/j/" part of the path to "/wc/join/".
    - dylan604 4y ago
      There are very few extensions that I trust, and to depend on an extension to do something as trivial as this is not worth the risk to me. This particular dark pattern isn't the darkest in the scheme of things.
      - CameronNemo 4y ago
        The source code is literally 20 lines, very easy to audit. You can put the static download in your Mozilla folder to avoid auto-updates. It is a nice quality of life thing for me. But yeah definitely not necessary as you can always edit the URL yourself, as the extension author helpfully notes.

modzu 4y ago

i could never bring myself to trust the app, so i made a browser extension to make using the web version less painful (skips the dark pattern page where the "join from browser" link is often hidden). its open source so if ya dont trust this installer either, grab it from GitHub, its only a few lines of code :) hopefully others find it useful: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/zoom-web-launcher/idaiicgfjfmggdeedalmnmmlibcnbacd https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/zoom-web-launcher/...