FOMO as a Dark Pattern
Joseph Reagle
FOMO
FOMO self-quiz
“3 Minute FOMO test” at irdlabs.com
JWT Report
Brands have many opportunities to fine-tune messaging, offers, contests and more to tap into fears of missing out. Although there’s no cure for the common FOMO, brands can focus on easing it, escalating it, making light of it or even turning it into a positive. (Miranda 2011, p. 17)
How to exploit
- Brands can inspire FOMO by offering “exclusive, unique or over-the-top experiences”; contextual advertising on social networks; incentives for name-dropping info tags, check in.
- Marketers can ease anxiety by encouraging consumers to step back from the fray (holidays and self-care); giving consumers some control over what they see.
Ethical?
Note that when tapping into FOMO, marketers must retain some sensitivity — this state of mind can be a sore spot for many consumers. So while FOMO has great potency as a marketing tool, it also has the potential to twist the knife for those especially sensitive to it (Miranda 2011, p. 18)
FOMO and Conspicuous Sociality
Defining FOMO
- what is cyberlanguage?
- what is FOMO? What are the two pieces?
- utility of Urban Dictionary?
- was FOMO the expression originally linked to social media? (Reagle 2015)
FOMO feelings
- missing out
- left out
(akin to envy vs. jealous)
FOMO’s manifestations
Conspicuous sociality
- Veblen’s conspicuous consumption
- social comparison
- conspicuous sociality
- “keeping up with the Joneses”
Addiction and illness
- FOMO disease
- neurasthenia
- class/gender
Do we need these?
- MOMO (Mystery of Missing Out)
- FOMOMO (Fear of the Mystery of Missing Out)
- FOJI (Fear Of Joining In)
- JOMO (Joy Of Missing Out)
- BROMO (‘BROs’ protect you from Missing Out)
- SLOMO (Slow to Missing Out)
- JOMO (Joy of Missing Out)
Dark patterns
Precursors of “dark patterns”?
- retail practices
- “nudge” research
- growth hacking
Defined
Dark patterns are user interfaces that benefit an online service by leading users into making decisions they might not otherwise make. Some dark patterns deceive users while others covertly manipulate or coerce them into choices that are not in their best interests. (Narayanan et al. 2021)
invade privacy; make services addictive; exploit users
Types of deceptive patterns
- Comparison prevention
- Confirmshaming
- Disguised ads
- Fake scarcity
- Fake social proof
- Fake urgency
- Forced action
- Hard to cancel
- Hidden Costs
- Hidden subscription
- Nagging
- Obstruction
- Preselection
- Sneaking
- Trick wording
- Visual interference (Brignull et al. 2023)
Fake scarcity
- TurboTax hiding free tax-file program
- Facebook abusing 2FA phone numbers
- Uber nudging drivers to keep driving
more than 95% of the popular Android apps contain dark patterns (Narayanan et al. 2021)
Psychology??
Define and exemplify:
- anchoring effect
- nudging
- sludges
- anchoring
- people’s estimates become fixed to suggested numbers, even arbitrary ones like digits of SSN; wine prices
- nudging
- “benevolent institutions” engineer “choice architectures”: maintain freedom-of-choice while steering; organ-donation consent rates; towel reuse; reminders; defaults
- sludges
- Sunstein and Thaler distance themselves from unethical nudges (Narayanan et al. 2021)
Nudge or sludge??
- auto-enrolling employees in retirement plan (e.g., Northeastern)
- adding ads as email signatures (e.g., Hotmail)
- seeding listing with fake items (e.g., vacation rentals)
- requiring health plan (e.g., Massachusetts)
- spam users’ address book (e.g., Linked In)
Ryan Holiday of “Trust Me I’m Lying”
became a Stoic guru
ex. Find deceptive patterns (of 16)??
- Fake scarcity
- “pressured into completing an action because … a fake indication of limited supply or popularity.”
- Fake social proof
- “misled into believing a product is more popular or credible … because … fake reviews, testimonials, or activity messages.”
- Forced action
- “wants to do something, but they are required to do something else undesirable in return.” (Brignull et al. 2023)
Here’s one and another.
What to do?
- “Go beyond superficial A/B testing metrics.”
- “Incorporate ethics into the design process.”
- articulate values that will guide design
- give users moments (“friction”) to consider and reflect
- “Self-regulate or get regulated.” (Narayanan et al. 2021)
- Hannah
- Jake
Legal?
- California’s CCPA/CPRA outlaws dark patterns relative to privacy.
- “A business can’t use confusing language, such as doublenegatives (e.g., ‘Don’t Not Sell My Personal Information’), when providing consumers the choice to opt-out.”
- Similar provisions in other states and at the Federal level have failed.
- FTC Commissioner Rohit Chopra conceded “whack-a-mole” strategy is insufficient, needs to “deploy all tools” toward enforcing existing laws. They held a workshop (Merkel 2021)
- Maria: platform accountability?
QICs 🎲
- Mia: BeReal
Conclusion
Wrap up
Take 3 minutes to answer all of the following:
- what is a dark pattern?
- what is FOMO?
- why does FOMO happen?
- how is FOMO spoken of?
Review
- what is a dark pattern?
- what is FOMO?
- why does FOMO happen?
- how is FOMO spoken of?