25 ms·

I don't like the Googlers' trend of "make the policy message sound like a fact of life, rather than blaming the people who set the policy".

tylerag 4y ago
Fun fact: this is a common technique when dealing with children. > No, you can't leave the table until you eat your vegetables. > No, you can't go play until your chores are done.
- josephcsible 4y ago
  Which is a reason why I don't like it here: they're infantilizing the adults who use their products.
  - Rebelgecko 4y ago
    When some of your users are kids and some are adults, it seems like a situation where there really is no happy medium that will make everyone happy. Kind of tricky to deal with users who have diametrically opposed goals. It's interesting how strongly people feel about a basic little game. (full disclosure, I work at Google but I've never had to deal with upset teachers and upset children arguing in bugs assigned to me)
    - astrange 4y ago
      Presenting policies as facts of life (like Meta also does) is usually done to keep the abuse teams away from those angry customers and so they don’t have to reveal their anti-spam techniques. Security by obscurity does work for a while. There are ways to get companies to actually pay attention to you; a good place to start is sending registered mail to an executive in a way that looks like you might be a lawyer. patio11 has more advice on this.
- watwut 4y ago
  I think this is more of the case of not turning on playstation or tv while they do homework. The ticket is literally about distraction - the kid intends to do work, the game is literally placed in the middle and the kid forgets what was original goal. 100% normal for kids and I would not blamed neither them nor teachers.
Wicher 4y ago
I've noticed that way of framing too, and once you see it, you see it in many places, not just Google products. Basically, portraying rules (that are to your disadvantage) as some kind of laws of nature. So for instance: "To continue, you need to install the app". Instead of "We're not letting you read more of this since we think you're webbrowsing this on mobile and want you to install our app" Quite often we're indeed being lied to as if we're little children. But in this exceptional case, the "Fun disabled by administrator", it's frank! That must be because its this third party, the "administrator", which is to blame for the restriction. Were it google themselves setting the rules of the game, they would probably not frame it in the same way.
- randac 4y ago
  This looks better in the app -> We're too inept to design a good mobile interface and/or we would like more of your data please.
  - pantalaimon 4y ago
    Usually it's > We've actively worked on making the website a worse experience than the app e.g. by constantly nagging you do download the app

tylerag 4y ago

Fun fact: this is a common technique when dealing with children. > No, you can't leave the table until you eat your vegetables. > No, you can't go play until your chores are done.

josephcsible 4y ago
Which is a reason why I don't like it here: they're infantilizing the adults who use their products.
- Rebelgecko 4y ago
  When some of your users are kids and some are adults, it seems like a situation where there really is no happy medium that will make everyone happy. Kind of tricky to deal with users who have diametrically opposed goals. It's interesting how strongly people feel about a basic little game. (full disclosure, I work at Google but I've never had to deal with upset teachers and upset children arguing in bugs assigned to me)
  - astrange 4y ago
    Presenting policies as facts of life (like Meta also does) is usually done to keep the abuse teams away from those angry customers and so they don’t have to reveal their anti-spam techniques. Security by obscurity does work for a while. There are ways to get companies to actually pay attention to you; a good place to start is sending registered mail to an executive in a way that looks like you might be a lawyer. patio11 has more advice on this.
watwut 4y ago
I think this is more of the case of not turning on playstation or tv while they do homework. The ticket is literally about distraction - the kid intends to do work, the game is literally placed in the middle and the kid forgets what was original goal. 100% normal for kids and I would not blamed neither them nor teachers.

Wicher 4y ago

I've noticed that way of framing too, and once you see it, you see it in many places, not just Google products. Basically, portraying rules (that are to your disadvantage) as some kind of laws of nature. So for instance: "To continue, you need to install the app". Instead of "We're not letting you read more of this since we think you're webbrowsing this on mobile and want you to install our app" Quite often we're indeed being lied to as if we're little children. But in this exceptional case, the "Fun disabled by administrator", it's frank! That must be because its this third party, the "administrator", which is to blame for the restriction. Were it google themselves setting the rules of the game, they would probably not frame it in the same way.

randac 4y ago
This looks better in the app -> We're too inept to design a good mobile interface and/or we would like more of your data please.
- pantalaimon 4y ago
  Usually it's > We've actively worked on making the website a worse experience than the app e.g. by constantly nagging you do download the app