> As noted multiple times in the article, the unethical design we’re seeing in popular apps and services today is largely a result of the widespread use of advertising as a revenue model.
Advertisement as a revenue model exacerbates this problem, but I submit the problem stems from how we define success for mobile apps and websites. We directly designate "engagement" as success, rather than customer value provided or even asking our customers if they like the service.
We assume if they are there that they have made a clear-eyed assessment about the value proposition of our product compared to every other aspect of their lives and decided this is the best use of their time.
Because of that hidden assumption, our UX folks are encouraged to ruthlessly push by any means available to get more of that time. There is an assumption that the cutoff switch is somehow built into the user; that the user will say, "Enough is enough" if the engagement every reaches a toxic level in their lives.
And I think what many of the people in this article are trying to say is: That is a bad assumption. We're making our products so sticky that we're starting to surpass some our user's ability to say, "No."
Part of the reason Google's initial launch was so ballsy and great (which they've lost over the years) was a strong focus on getting the user off the search results page as fast as possible. It was a decision informed by their technical limits at the time, but it was a fantastic value to the user. Once they had the results they needed (very quickly) they were gone, off to do whatever it was they had asked Google for in the first place.
This contrasted starkly with the Alta Vistas, Yahoos, and AOLs of the day, which were all creating interlinked portal networks and trying to keep users within the company's own bubble of services to increase engagement.
Somewhere along the way, when we figured out how to use advertising revenue to "pay the bills" and turn on a profit on the cost of hosting... I think this was lost. Sometimes the user just needs the content they came for, and sometimes delivering that content to them in the leanest, most efficient manner possible is worth more than all the engagement tactics in the world.
> Part of the reason Google's initial launch was so ballsy and great (which they've lost over the years) was a strong focus on getting the user off the search results page as fast as possible.
That's an interesting example, because it contains also why Google changed. There is little business to be had in just being a place where users spend as little time as possible.
But the choice of "engagement" as the success metric directly stems from the advertising revenue model. That's why it is chosen as the definition of success. Because it triggers ad payments.
All the "customer value", "customer happiness" and all the rest is inward facing PR. Creative people need a better motivation to build these attention traps than "suck em in so they watch ads" so it has to be phrased differently to them.
I think it was chosen as definition of success because it is _easy to measure_.
From the beginning of the Web onwards, you had very little idea of what people actually did on your site, but the fact that they visited was an easily counted line in a plain text log file.
The moment something else was available (e.g. actual clicks on an ad, or conversion rate), that was used.
Even if a site gets micro-paid for each video viewed or article written, they still have an incentive to nudge viewers to keep viewing. If you think about it, even if they have a pure subscription model they will want people "engaged", i.e. addicted.
Yes, the tendency of focus on easy to measure metrics instead of what you actual care about is a whole other discussion of interesting craziness.
But isn't that orthogonal to this discussion? There are better metrics, but they still have the same large scale attention economy, filter bubble, junk food media effects as "engagement" does. "actual clicks on ads" is conversion rate x ad views and ad views is a function of engagement.
I don't see how more accurate measurements would positively affect the way content is written, presented and optimized. If anything wouldn't it just get worse?
I think you underestimate the power of intertia and groupthink in this industry. I also think there are lots of counterexamples who still do this even though they don't directly market ads.
Do you work in this industry? I used to work for a social games company and while 'engagement' of our free-to-play users was certainly a driver, I can tell you, the bosses cared much more about revenue. Engagement was certainly secondary to that.
Yes. I've been involved in 3 ventures and successfully exited on my own once.
If your model is explicitly ad revenue, then yes; you will find similar pressures.
I don't work in entertainment and I'm telling you we got the same guidance even from respected VC firms. We never once showed an ad and we had a similar model for a long time.
Success is defined as engagement because it leads to more ad revenue. If those applications had different business models, they would have different success definitions.
Advertisement as a revenue model exacerbates this problem, but I submit the problem stems from how we define success for mobile apps and websites. We directly designate "engagement" as success, rather than customer value provided or even asking our customers if they like the service.
We assume if they are there that they have made a clear-eyed assessment about the value proposition of our product compared to every other aspect of their lives and decided this is the best use of their time.
Because of that hidden assumption, our UX folks are encouraged to ruthlessly push by any means available to get more of that time. There is an assumption that the cutoff switch is somehow built into the user; that the user will say, "Enough is enough" if the engagement every reaches a toxic level in their lives.
And I think what many of the people in this article are trying to say is: That is a bad assumption. We're making our products so sticky that we're starting to surpass some our user's ability to say, "No."