Maybe later... how about never, you fucks?

SokathHisEyesOpen@lemmy.ml to Technology@lemmy.ml – 924 points –

It is endlessly frustrating that companies have universally decided that they won't let people say "no" to stuff, ever. There are no longer options to reject stupid-ass new "features", only postponement until next time you open the app/website/program. They'll continue pestering you for the rest of your life. I realize that my frustration may be a little over-zealous, but we deal with these interfaces dozens of times per day and this is user hostile behavior. There isn't really an option to just use another service or program, since the entire technology landscape has been commandeered by a few major corporations, and they all enact the same shitty things as a group.

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You should be pissed off! It's software paternalism, utilizing new speak, removing your vocabulary and agency.

Every time you're given a dark pattern dialogue where it says " would you like this thing that you don't like? Yes absolutely, later " the developers don't respect you, they're trying to say you don't know what you want, they're using propaganda on you..

It's like the classic police interrogation question " is that when you stopped beating your wife?" Yes and no are both traps. So some edgy developer is trying to trap you with oh but you consented (can send it) to seeing this later. When it's really user hostile dark patterns using forced language to remove your agency as a human being. It's fucking scummy

This is why I love open source software, not only is it highly unlikely for you to see a dark pattern, if you do you can fix it!

Yes, the most egregious one that really grinds my gears is on the front page of YouTube, where it will show a shelf with YouTube shorts with an X top right. If you click it, it will hide the shelf and say "Okay, we'll hide shorts for 30 days" which is something no body would ever mean by pressing that button and it's such patronizing, insidious bullshit.

I freaking hate Shorts, and the persistence with which YouTube attempts to shove that crap down your throat is absolutely infuriating.

YouTube also recently made the thumbnails larger, which is also really bad as it makes it more difficult to see what videos are in your subscription feed (even moreso with all the shorts clogging it up).

Apparently it's where the real money is. People doom-scrolling through an endless stream of crap.

I've been watching shorts lately and now EVERYTHING is about shorts. I don't ever get the little x anymore to remove the annoying fucking shelf anymore. Why does all this shit have to suck so much.

TikTok makes tons of dollaroos with shorts, now Google wants a slice of the pie. "Me too, me too". It would be funny if it wasn't so annoying.

YouTube Revanced is the way (Android). Just disable shorts or anything else you don't like and live happily ever after.

Is it a little more finished now?

When the original vanced got stopped, I could never get the patcher for revanced to work on my phone, and it wasn't even clear what the issue was. just a lot of errors and glitchy youtube.

I've just beeing using firefox with ublock, but its not very convenient.

Yes, I've had a better time with it since then. I also couldn't get it to work initially but now I've used it on two phones and it works fine. The trick is to use a slightly older release of the YT apk.

From my experience, yes. The initial setup was kind of annoying, but it's been almost entirely smooth sailing from there.

Wow, you used to be able to just completely disable shorts in the settings.

At least it shows the shorts of the creators that you are subbed to.
I usually only watch the one on the front page if I can recognize them in the thumbnail or it actually seems interesting and never ever scroll them.

My only gripe:

  • Youtubers use shorts for the short sketches instead of actual short videos
  • Only 60s long
  • Vertical instead of horizontal
  • Both rot my brain. :(

And you can't see which ones are from your subscriptions and which ones aren't, right!

Yup.
But if, I usually only watch the once I recognize. Those random brain rotting shorts are very noticeable from the ones I usually consume.

You know, I don't think I've ever even been the the front page of YouTube.

It's like Stack Overflow in that regard. Google just takes you to pages in it, and then you leave again.

I think another issue here is a side effect of the move to Software As A Service. With installed software you could run an old version nearly forever, but with SASS you're always on the latest version

And this is one of the best reasons to categorically refuse to rent software.

Agreed. I hate anything auto updating on it's own because changes can break or remove features at any time.

Nagware was huge 20 years ago, hell Evernote still does it. They move the nag around each time as well.

Every time I go to the ATM to get cash it shows me an ad for a service and the options are "Yes" and "No thanks."

I am forced to choose one. I am forced to thank them for showing me an ad before they give me my own money.

Jesus where are you from? I never heard of ads in an atm, that scares the sht out of me, something I am trusting my personal data with could end up selling it or using it for ads.

I hate this specifically for one of the corner stores at my house. When I use tap-to-pay (or I assume swiping a card), it gives me a "Would you like to register for our rewards program? Selecting no will not impact your ability to complete this purchase" prompt...

Except then I'm forced to actually physically click "No", which circumvents the whole point of not having to touch the POS terminal when using tap-to-pay...

Tap to pay isn't there to stop you from interacting with the terminal though? I mean yeah it was handy during the pandemic to now have to touch things many other people touch but that wasn't the main idea behind tap to pay.

Yep, my apologies I should've been a bit more clear - a lot of stores during the pandemic put up signs saying that they preferred for you to use tap-to-pay as a preventative / safety measure, and this store is one of them.

Of course, even during the peak point of the pandemic that prompt was still there, and is still there... and due to the medication that I'm on I am somewhat immunocompromised so I would prefer to not have to touch the screen since everyone who pays using anything that isn't cash has to also touch the display.

Ah then yeah that kinda silly. They should at least have a cashier override for that prompt if they are going to brag about not having to touch it.

Tap to pay is there for banks to eliminate the last money transaction they weren't taking a cut of: cash payments.

They haven't been trying to get this shit going for almost 2 decades because the convenience othe their customers is their driving motivation...

I mean I hardly use the tap to pay feature on my cards but I use credit cards for everything. Tap to pay is more secure so protects the banks more. Same reason we moved to chips instead of always using mag strips.

I've actually worked in smartcard issuance at some point and tap to pay isn't at all more secure than the cards with smartchips requiring physical contact and a pin code that the banks had finally gotten around to adopt after more than a decade of Visa and Mastercard trying to force them to ditch magstrip (which was laughably insecure).

Tap to pay actuall reduced security because it removed the "locked for anything with a key known only to the user" element and replaced it with a limit on losses (i.e. pinless payments are limited to a certain amount so losses if the card is stolen are limited) and replaced the physical connection requirement with a radio-range one which can be worked around with a directional antenna (something as simple as a pringles can).

Sure, it's better than magstrip, but then pretty much anything is better than magstrip.

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I hear your frustration, but there are other options. They won't necessarily be the same, or perhaps equivalent in every way, but they do exist. You don't have to use the same corporations over and over again.

Actually, we do often have to use the same corporations over and over again. The choice to abstain or switch can often require more time, training, or money.

Even with suites like Adobe, the support for their programs from third parties is HUGE. That's finally changing slowly, but it's still typically easiest to stick with things like after effects and premier because it's got massive community resource support. Templates can be a huge shortcut, and without the right options mane projects are made a lot more difficult and/or decreased in quality.

I've don't think I've ever used an Adobe product. While they may be huge in specific fields, there are other options. Yes, extra time, training, and money will need to be used to move to alternatives, but what's the other option? Continue giving Adobe money and support their monopoly? Be the change you want to see.

Do you know of a music streaming service that isn't Amazon, Apple, YouTube, or Spotify? Because I'll check it out if you do. In my car I have a thumb drive with my entire lifelong music collection on it, but at work I can't plug anything into my work computer and need something that is accessible through the internet. I can't imagine not having music to listen to while coding, I'd eventually lose my mind.

Have you checked out Plex? Host your own steaming server … for years I used a 10yr old Mac Mini.

A streaming server that I can access from my work computer? Like on the web or something? I can't install Plex on my work computer. I set Plex up about 6 years ago, but then I realized I could just stream my movies and songs onto my home theater system straight from a HDD, so I didn't get very deep in the Plex configs before I stopped using it.

With Plex you can go to https://app.plex.tv from your work computer and steam from your browser. That said, if you can install software, Plexamp is a great way to listen to and rediscover your music.

I hear decent things about Deezer, never tried it myself though.

Since I just ranted about the family plan of YouTube: Deezer doesn't enforce (or even demand) family members to be in the same household. So I have Deezer Family and share it with family members living in three different cities.

So what "other option" do I have to stop my kid's ClassDojo app from badgering me to "upgrade" to "plus?"

Keep in mind that it's the public school system that chose to use ClassDojo, not me.

And that's only one out of about half a dozen shitty third-party services with shitty ToSs that the school system has tried to push on me in the last week!

There's always options.

  • Refuse to use the applications and consult with the school board with your concerns. Involve other parents and start a movement.
  • Use a different local school system. Is there a local private school that's better?
  • Home schooling is another option.

I'm not saying any of those are easy options. In fact, you may have no good options today. But you don't need to stay that way forever. Explore what options you could have next year, or the year after. What can you work toward?

At the end of the day, the more everybody gives in and allows the abuse to happen, the move it will be normalized and accepted. If you don't like what is happening, then make changes in what you accept in your life.

No, YouTube. NO. I will NEVER, EVER want YouTube Premium. Stop asking me about it every fucking time I watch a video.

YouTube premium is probably the video streaming purchase I get the most use out of lol.

You're only saying that because they forced you to buy it!

Actually I've had YouTube premium for a few years now and I love it! I use YouTube a lot, but I also then get YouTube Music which I also use A LOT because it's actually a really good music service.

Music plus ad free YouTube? Video/music background playing? All worth the money to me, and I'm helping keep a service I enjoy alive as YouTube still isn't profitable. Which also slows enshitification of another product I enjoy.

I want to help YouTube be profitable while I still like it, to

I tried the YouTube music service and I hated it. It would play the low quality BS that people uploaded instead of studio quality recordings from the bands. It also has way too many live versions of the songs. I also didn't like the interface. My wife and I considered signing up for YouTube premium, but it costs as much as traditional cable. I might as well just get Comcast or something. At least then I could watch baseball without a VPN. But I'm glad you enjoy it.

Having all the live versions of some songs is the best part for me. I love live recordings.

Are you sure you haven't gotten YouTube Premium mixed up with YouTube TV? The latter is priced like traditional cable because that's basically what it is; premium is just YouTube with no ads, basic app features that shouldn't be paywalled in the first place like downloading videos, and YT music thrown in.

The YouTube premium family plan (pairs with more accounts/devices) is a little more expensive at like $23 but I didn't think that was cable tv expensive. All the full-package cable replacement services I know of are around $70-$90.

If they wouldn't have that fucked up "same household"-policy for the family plan, I would be all over YouTube Premium. But for me alone it's too expensive (I don't use it THAT heavily) and I couldn't share it with my family that lives in three different places.

Because they irritate people into getting it. You wouldn't have it if they didnt turn features off and increase ads until you wanted it.

Fuck google

I heard it's one of the better ways to support YouTube creators. That's why I got it.

I have adblockers and a pihole so ads weren't that bad anyway.

Same here. I always said "ain't no way I'm ever paying for what used to be free!"

Fast forward to political ad season and some orange peckerhead keeps popping up... "Alright, here's your damn money. Now let me watch this autistic guy unclog drains in peace."

You don't want Shorts? Gotcha, we will remind you in 30 days.

I never even knew they suggest those with prompts. I use librewolf/Mull+uBO+yt enhancer for years so I guess it just filter those out. Also, you can convert short to regular videos so that's cool too

You want to avoid shorts and the algorithm by automatically opening the subscriptions feed? Fuck you, here's shorts in your subscriptions feed! proceeds to switch to RSS (That's my journey with YouTube)

Download LibreRube and PipePipe. No ads.

I switched to Nebula as most of the YouTubers I watched most are on there. NewPipe for the few that aren't. Now I'm spending the time I used to waste watching YouTube contributing to openstreetmap.

I've considered getting nebula. Are you also able to comment, like or dislike? Are there custom playlists?

No comments, likes or dislikes or playlists. No recommendation algorithm, just a nice simple video streaming platform with no ads

I don't think that you're being overzealous. Far from that - even the phrasing rubs me the wrong way; it conveys "you're something fooling itself that it has a choice. You don't - you aren't a rational human being, you're a user. Do as you're being ordered to. The continued pestering adds "You'll be bossed around until you learn to obey." to the insult.

On a lighter side I agree with Grouchy that you have options. I think that we should start giving those companies the middle finger. And frankly I think that we're better off doing so for other reasons - the data vultures love this sort of "non-confrontational on surface, but bossy upon analysis" discourse.

the data vultures love this sort of “non-confrontational on surface, but bossy upon analysis” discourse.

We need a simple name for this, like we have for enshittification or shrinkflation.

Perhaps "donkey taming"? Donkeys are often associated with stupidity, but they're actually rather smart... and stubborn, they don't do what you want them to do unless you're really insistent, and slowly lead them the way that you want. What those businesses are doing with users is the same.

Consumer manipulation?

Corporate badgering?

Hmmm... maybe something involving "false dichotomy", "Sysyphus", "pestering", "options", "forced politeness", ...

The tech market slowing after the end of Covid really showed these greedy fucks for who they are. Profits dropped and they all pulled out the enshittification dial for a big old twist.

Like, can't you just deal with being slightly less insanely rich for a few minutes?

I think it was Vanderbilt who answered the question of "how much money is enough" with "more". Billionaires have a hole in their soul. No amount of money will fill it, but that doesn't stop them from trying.

I suspect for most of them it's not even about how much money they have so much as it is about optimising the rate of growth of their wealth. IE, they don't care so much about the total amount they have so much as the amount they have coming in.

I believe it's a human thing. I've heard the term "hedonistic treadmill" where what you once wanted becomes "meaningless" once you have it and now you're looking to the next thing to obtain.

The ultra wealthy wanted money, but now they "won" capitalism and need more because it literally is never enough. This goes for you and me too though, if we became billionaires we'd be looking for "what's next?"

I disagree with your assertion that you and I would succumb to endless greed if given a large sum of money. Not everyone is built like that. Look at Tom from MySpace. He was offered hundreds of millions of dollars (not billions) for his website, took it, and fucked off to Africa to take a bunch of pictures. He pursues his hobbies now, and isn't focused on obtaining more money he'll never spend. He could have revamped his platform, put Facebook out of business, and pursued endless data and control, but that's not what he was about, and I don't think that is what most people are about. The billionaires who never have enough are broken. Something inside them is wrong.

They are legally obliged to, lmao. After companies become public, they have to maximize profits, if not, shareholders can simply vote to fire whomever they want. Look at every company on earth. They all with the same road. from facebook, google, to soon-to-be-public reddit.

That is not true, since not annoying your users can mean a long time profitability

You are correct, but unfortunately, this is what happens in reality.

"Fun" fact, Facebook isn't a good example here because Zuckerberg has his shares structured so he has full control.

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Start holding a grudge against all companies that don’t deserve your respect. If they clearly violate your trust, that bridge just got instantly burned to ashes, and there are no seconds chances.

I actively avoid products that get shoved in my face with ads and sponsorships. NordVPN, SkillShare, Brilliant, Raid Shadow Legends, fucking whatever can all go to hell. I wanna watch my videos in peace and they annoy me.

If a company is is pushing their product that hard, there might be something wrong. Perhaps the company behaves like a psychopath, the product sucks, or both.

Also, consider installing the sponsor block plugin. Not too long ago there was a good post that listed all the essential plugins like that. That post proves to me that I don’t need Reddit any more. I’ve already got what I need right here in Lemmy.

you should use SponsorBlock to block the sponsors, I've saved over a day of my life using it.

God Dammit! Now Im getting SponsorBlock ads in lemmy! When will it end!

use SponsorBlockForLemmyV2000

Oh, I do. Probably for years longer than necessary.

But for such a thing as the "Not now" button and there wont barely be software left.

In the eighties, it was acknowledged that since the fifties the viewing public are more resistant to commercials and marketing, outpacing their new techniques (more commercials, engaging commercials, obnoxious commercials, product placement, having whole shows that are one big commercial, etc.)

One factor is as marketers hard-sell middle age men, they're also immunizing their kids and grand kids who grow up skeptical of anyone saying anything nice lest they're trying to sell something.

This also likely figures into the attendance crises experienced by religious ministries as old parishioners age out and new ones realize they don't have time for spirit or money for tithes.

Fascinating, I assumed roughly this behavior but I don't think there's much information about the futility of marketing because it threatens the jobs of marketers, any good sources?

Both Cracked and Wisecrack have done videos on the phenomenon. I suspect the reason it doesn't affect the job is because the immunizing effect is general while the promoting effect is specific. Coca-cola wants to boost Coke, even if in so doing, they weaken all future promotions of everything.

Whenever I see an ad telling me how my life could be better if I just bought the next widget, I think of a line from the princess bride:

"Life IS pain. Anybody who tells you otherwise is trying to sell you something."

2020s big tech web platforms have a certain language to them that makes me think of a passive aggressive Californian dudebro designing them. It’s not “No”, it’s “Maybe later”; it’s not “OK” it’s “Got it” et cetera

"Got it" is a really weird one too, "Ok" had a hint that you are in approval of what you're seeing. "Got it" is more of a message of "we know you probably don't care or even detest this but you have to tell us you are at least aware of our latest thing".

It is underhanded in the language and has a bit of admission that they know you really just want the modal to just go away.

"Got it" is an acknowledgement while "OK" is an agreement. This is probably a deliberate choice on their part.

This is just one of a hundred reasons to avoid proprietary software. The only power we have to change the behavior of closed software is not using it.

Yeah, Google is doing this to analytics right now. The decision seems universally disliked amongst professionals.

Nowadays it's even in cars. When service is due, my car offers me to call service desk to schedule an appointment now or later. To get rid of this message, I need to make the call just to tell the person on the other side that this is a company car, I'm not the owner, and service is being scheduled by the leasing company through other means anyway.

Usually Fleet Management companies want you to do an Oil Change and Tire Rotation every 5000mi. So... Yeah.

It's just like those stupid GDPR cookie popups. They're all different, and I can't think of anyone who would ever want to select some cookies and not others, people either are okay with it or they want none of them, yet few sites offer a "no to all" option, and most push the boundaries of what's allowed under the law.

At least this popup usually isn't there the next time I visit, but there's just so many sites that I keep getting them multiple times a day, so it feels just like what you're talking about.

I use Consent-O-Matic to automatically select "Reject all". It's an extension for both Firefox and Chrome, and I highly recommend it.

https://github.com/cavi-au/Consent-O-Matic

Just so people are aware, this can make some pages misbehave, specially shopping, so make sure you add them to some "ignore list" like you do with your ad-blocker

Yes, thank you for adding that aspect. In general it behaves fantastically, but if a site misbehaves, you can disable it for specific sites by clicking the extension when on the page, and unticking the only box there.

and most push the boundaries of what's allowed under the law.

I worked for a company that wanted me to load all of their analytics stuff, which drops a shit ton of cookies, before the GDPR consent. I told them that is illegal in the EU and they said the legal department already approved it. I'm not an attorney or a GDPR expert, but it seemed to me that the big companies have already found loopholes around GDPR to get the data that they want. I don't work there anymore.

How about using the cookie auto delete plugin? Once I leave the site, those fishy files are also gone.

lmao. Even after disabling toggles, they got choices like:

  • Save my preferences (grayed out) - as much invisible as possible
  • Accept (bigger and in blue background) - feels like it will accept based on my choices

That asshole design works on me tho. I misclicked a couple of times and thus "consented" to the tracking. Should be illegal imo.

"Do you want to try the new Lemmy(TM) Story Experience? Click here or remind us now to keep reminding you until you finally cave to our humungous data-hoovering tentacles, puny little user."

Microsoft: "Please use Edge!"

Me: "No thanks!"

Microsoft, 6 months later: "Please use Edge!"

Me: "No, thanks."

Microsoft, when I visit Bing: "Please use Edge."

Me: "No. Thanks."

Microsoft, when I open Outlook: "We will be opening links in Edge instead of your default browser. To switch back, go to your preferences."

Me: "Motherfucker, I think we have a difference in viewpoints."

Yep, super annoying and you will get the same thing, but for Chrome, when hitting Google sites in Edge or Firefox.

The only way to say "no" is to not give them the opportunity to ask the question to begin with.

My LG television keeps asking to accept terms for voice control. I stand fast in my refusal to accept. There not even an option to say no...sigh..

I DNS blocked my LG TV services because I got tired of being served with paid content which I do not want to see but they give no choice to opt-out of. For example the recommended movies and TV shows from Amazon Prime. I don't have Amazon and I don't intend to get it. There should be an option to remove that but you can't. Same with the sports section.

So now the TV works as it should. It can't find the source for that content and just hides it.

Get Pi-hole

What domains did you ad to your pihole Blocklist for the LG tv WebOS services you mentioned?

The LG terms are the same as the Android terms, FYI. So if youve accepted them on your phone, you might as well accept them on your TV. LG uses Google for their voice control. I read the thing when I got my TV and if I remember correctly, they'll send bits of recordings from when you're holding the button to Google for processing of the requests. It's been a long time since I read it though, so they definitely could have changed it. The voice commands are one of my favorite things about our TV. Like if I want to watch John Wick, then I just say that and it shows me each of the services I have available that have that movie. It's pretty rad. That's one area where I conceded any privacy concerns for convenience and I really enjoy it.

Google voice is the first thing to get disabled on any Android phone I use. It's like the biggest invasion of privacy you could imagine outside of agreeing to let them film you on the toilet.

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MS Edge, when I accidentally open it.

Oh my God it's such a pain in the ass. It spawns like 15 processes that don't die when you close the browser window, and there's no indication which is the master so you just have to kill them one by one until they all die. And the search bar that pops up on the desktop is such tacky 90s spamware... I've never liked Windows but since they launched 11 they've really become intolerable, even the w10 experience is being degraded by it.

Obligatory mention: https://github.com/ChrisTitusTech/winutil for those who want to completely* remove Edge, but are unable to do so by conventional means.

* Windows updates can and sometimes do reinstall Edge. The toolbox offers a tweak that can delay feature updates by two years and security updates by four days. That gives you time to review the changes and check whether they'll reinstall this malware again. Alternatively, you could just re-run the tool after any feature update to uninstall Edge again.

uBO' block elements be like: see you never byee

Going sans ad-block is depressing. Even things like local news sites, it's just pop, cookies, pop agree to this bullshit, pop, download the app, then you get in and are scrolling past adverts three screens long.

Like who wants to read stories about potholes and stabbings so much they'd put up with that shit?

I still don't care about cookies + block EU cookie filter list works great for me. It even deals with this annoying YT cookie screen. And if I visit often and something dodged those, I just block it manually. Must sites don't update the elements often (or never lol)

Fandom "wikis" are unusable on mobile. The text you are trying to fucking read is constantly jumping around because the next shitty ad and autoplay video is loading. Just look at the user experience:

Except YouTube changes element ID every so often, so you see it again. Like their whole "try our shitty YouTube tv now!" Element, of which I have several IDs zapped, and still see it every day I go on yt.

E: autocorrect fix

Yeah i guess, but I still didn't see any promt on yt for years now. I guess uBO and yt enhancer just deals with all this crap automatically.

It does work well on most of the other sites.

Pester me and I'm done with you. I don't care. App quits working because I didn't upgrade it and your reason is "improvements", goodbye.

I had a lot of that experience with an app called Postman before I switched to Insomnia.rest for software development. Same thing with twitter after musk bought it.

it seems to be part of the general hostility corporations have toward, well, humans.. like you say, developers seem to be pushing every limit they can to try to get in your face, or chain you to them for life, and they don't seem to have a lot of incentive to back the fuck off.. i am completely fed up with all of them.. like you, i have a hostile attitude in return..

Bite the bullet. Move to slightly worse but non-abusive alternatives. Fund them with the portion of your budget that was previously coerced from you.

What app or tech is badgering you? I feel like with standard android and pop! OS I have zero complaints. Everything just works

This happens with YouTube, for example. Even though I pay for their premium, whenever I disable their shorts section they tell me "ok, we'll hide it for 30 days". How about you don't show me your shorts ever again?

Companies like this are abusing you as a paying customer. I would use newpipe if you're on android or if apple has any alternative to newpipe then use that otherwise use firefox with ublock.

I use piped.video for the dozen or so subscriptions I have. I don't have an account, I once exported my subscriptions and when I erase browser history I upload that subscriptions file. All I want to see on YT is right there.

Use Firefox with adblocker then disable the YouTube app so it goes with Firefox as your default

Use something like ReVanced, which has the ability to hide Shorts forever (or until YouTube changes their backend enough that you need to update your ReVanced install to continue blocking Shorts). ReVanced also has the ability to unlock certain Premium features for free, and it supports SponsorBlock, among many other things.

Yeah that's understandably frustrating. I heard they make like no money off of that. Wonder how long before it hits the killed by google list.

Duolingo just did this to me yesterday. Pissed me off

Huh. I guess I mostly use foss stuff and maybe a few apps like youtube premium/tv, that I pay them for service so I never hear about it.

I'm learning Japanese with duoligo, I discovered that you can get the free trial for premium, cancel it when it reminds you your trial is almost up, and then 2 days later it offers you the free trial again.

My girlfriend kept complaining about losing her hearts on Duolingo and I was very confused as I never had any "hearts" during regular lessons. Eventually I found out that since I had created a classroom while exploring the site, I was given access to a teacher version of Duolingo - which is basically a free premium version 😅

Surprise LPT! I'll have a poke around, see if I can do that too. I'll report back. 🫡

Discord has been hassling me about whatever name changes I read about. I only open it once or twice a month, so I've been able to delay taking whatever action so far. If I was in there on a regular basis, that'd be a big pain in the ass.

ETA: Oh, and the IMDB app keeps asking me to sign up for an account. I've been saying no for literally years.

Discord wants to move away from the #4-digit identifier system because it is an unnecessary hassle for users. The downside is that it means that a username must now be unique. That's why they're asking you.

I guess at one point they'll just force change your username and you'll have to stick with it or make a new acc.

Part of this is a symptom of support demands from users. There has been an expectation in software development historically, back from when software was always hideously expensive and limited to companies as users, that errors would be fixed by someone on demand ASAP. We're all familiar with the IT guy "file a ticket first" signs on offices, or the idiot executive's demands for a new computer because they filled theirs with malware somehow.

But now a lot of what software did is web-based and frequently free/freemium. But the customer's expectations of having their issue fixed ASAP remains. Despite the internet being far from a standardised system of completely intercompatible components. So updates and fixes need to continually be deployed.

And that's great for most people, until that expectation extends to the creation of new features, from management and end users alike. Then things start getting pumped out half-finished-at-best because you can just fix the MVP later, right?

We're going to get to the backlog sometime... right? We don't need to keep launching new features every quarter... right?

That is one of the things that was made worse by always on internet connections. It used to be that a game or program had to be perfect before it was released, because that was it, that was their one shot to get it right. Now they release things months before they're actually ready and then act like it is a privilege to pay to be part of the beta team. Beta testers are supposed to get paid, not pay for their own service.

I always give them a 1 star rating for disrespecting user intent.

Same. Also the same if they give me popups telling me to go leave them feedback. The first time I let it slide, but if it pops up again I'm like "oh I'll leave you feedback, you mudda fuckers, you!"

THANK YOU. I'm glad others are noticing this and getting fed up with it.

No means no, damnit.

Why use that corpo crap to begin with.

Because not everything has an open source alternative.

Especially when it comes to hardware

When I was just a lad looking for my true vocation
My father said "Now son, this choice deserves deliberation
Though you could be a doctor or perhaps a financier
My boy, why not consider a more challenging career?"

Heaps of stuff that's positioned as the "alternative of X" feels like garbo. For example when I'm forced to use Pinta editor / GIMP over Photoshop when I'm using Linux. I get the expectation can't be to have feature parity but some of these alternatives feel really poor

Well, to be fair, Pinta is a clone of Paint.NET. It has never claimed to be an alternative to Photoshop.

2 more...
3 more...

It's maddening. Some of our users prefer Edge, so I don't run anything that would remove it. So much M$ is a PITA. But hey, Patch Tuesday is tomorrow 😀