the dark patterns of ui redesign

[hitchhiker]

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/infinite-scroll/how-social-media-redesigns-manipulate-us

User interfaces aren’t just about technology or data gathering; they mediate how we relate to the kinds of culture that we consume through apps. A change to Instagram’s design influences how we keep photo albums; a change to Twitter’s influences how we access news. A change to Spotify’s design influences how we interact with the music there—for example, denaturing genres in favor of an automated “Chill Vibes” playlist, as the writer Liz Pelly has observed. In March, Spotify updated the interface of its desktop app, the version that I use most often. The goal was to remove clutter, but I found that I could no longer click once to get directly to the albums that I had saved; instead, I had to click to a Your Library tab, which loads a Playlists window, and only then gives options for Podcasts, Artists, and Albums, in that order. The change encourages users to gravitate toward playlists—not coincidentally, the type of experience that the company can control, by offering its own curated streams.

Comments

[amaebi]

Very true-- and I guess not much thought of in consumer space?

[cjsmith]

Not by most consumers, but by most companies, I'd wager.

(I worked for a video streaming service, briefly, in 2006 ish; we thought about that kind of thing constantly.)

[amaebi]

Oh, yes, definitely-- that's at least as old as optimizing grocery store layout to increase expenditure or profit.