Can Interfaces be Evil?

I think the term ‘evil design’ is plain wrong though. A better term is needed. Deceptive design isn’t great but more descriptive of the problem?

So my question is:

How would you recognize evil design? Your distinction between evil and bad design is designer intention, but besides a designer coming out and saying they intentionally were deceptive, how can you ever firmly say something is an evil design? Otherwise, it all returns to the user’s perception of a design, but you’ve already established that perception isn’t a reliably way to make the distinction.

I have a feeling there isn’t an answer here, as this starts to tread in very philosophical waters.

@Mark - Facebook Beacon is deceptive (evil?). The designers intentionally deceived users into committing to something without giving them fair warning or a clear heads-up on what was happening. The service was opt-out to begin with, and that was a weak opt-out. Their interface was too polished for it to be an accident…as the defaults were things like a popup that disappeared before you could read it, much less understand what the heck was going on. That is deceptive at best and evil at worst.

Please see this blog post for more on how knowing Facebook designers were. I think you’ll find that their intentions were pretty clear here…they intended to keep the service as opaque as possible and only relented under serious public scrutiny.

The Evolution of Facebook’s Beacon

The term “evil” has taken on new life thanks, I suppose, to Google. As such, it does seem a bit “slippery” and easy to be misconstrued. But regardless of the term used (and I agree with Rich, “deceptive” might be better), I think you are right. As a designer, what intrigues and concerns me is not just that these deceptions or acts of evil design occur, but that, in the world of advertising and marketing, deception is still in many ways the modus operandi. Unlike most start-ups, I think that many established businesses (ie, potential clients) view the interactive medium as just the newest tool for the old game of coercion.

A really interesting post, and unfortunately I think the answer is “yes”.

@Josh - I understand that Facebook’s Beacon is the prime example here, but we clearly know the designer’s intentions were to be deceptive (or evil).

But what if we don’t know the designer’s intentions? Can a design then be evil?

Also, another question: since this discussion seems to be equating deception with being evil, is deception always evil?

These feelings, of course, were silly.

Josh, don’t be so quick to dismiss your feelings. While it might seem silly now, those are the feelings that the design invoked in you at the time. I’m sure that the designers would not have ever intended to invoke a feeling of manipulation and should appreciate the feedback, even if the original method of feedback might have been a bit inappropriate at the time.

I agree that evil may be a bit strong but deceptive is right on. I do however doubt that it is the designers that are behind the deception. It is more likely their client. Most designers I know, who are also users of course, despise just the thing you’re talking about. From personal and professional experience I can easily see the directive coming down from the client, who doesn’t care about the user experience, just needs numbers to justify their salary. Luckily that is an old school mentality and is hopefully changing for the better.

“I assumed that the interface was designed intentionally, and that the designers had made an explicit decision to put only one link there with the hope that people would be more likely to click on it.”

Design is intentional. Here is a cut & paste from the dictionary:

“purpose, planning, or intention that exists or is thought to exist behind an action, fact, or material object : the appearance of design in the universe.”

“In this case, the feature is a *very* minor one, an invitation to join a group.”

That does not look like a minor feature to me. An invitation to join a group on social webapp is minor?

I agreed with your original post. I thought evil was a harsh word to use. Your main point, nonetheless, remains true. It was bad design no matter how you look at it.

Bad design? Maybe. Ability to fix it fast? Admirable. http://www.looptblog.com/

@Tom Thanks for the pointer to the Loopt blog. I’ve updated the post accordingly.

Stealth design. Wait, that sounds too cool.

Josh, you make a great point. It’s been said that to the user, the UI is the computer. A user’s perception is completely dependent on the visual design and interaction. When poor planning is executed, the user experience suffers and perceived product reliability diminishes.

I assumed that the interface was designed intentionally

Did it fall out of the sky?

I wouldn’t be so quick to back off on this one, Josh. Yes, the slideshare folks are great. But that doesn’t mean they can’t make dumb mistakes. They need to be called on it when they do. The Facebook people are good people, too. In the process of pushing the boundaries of social interaction on the web, they also make some dumb things.

“Evil” is one thing, but I wouldn’t holster those six-shooters just yet. The email you got was “spammy” to say the least. Poorly designed for sure.

Josh, I had a very similar experience with a startup called Feedly. It is a textbook example of what your are talking about here.

Basically I went from publicly irate to helping them design a solution to their problem on getSatisfaction.

It can all be found here….

http://getsatisfaction.com/feedly/topics/feedly_destroyed_my_google_reader_feeds_tags

@Mark_M I think you’re asking a useful question (”Is deception always evil?”).

I think the answer is no. The example that springs to mind is progress meters. These are not always truthful, but they are by-and-large helpful.

Anyone have other examples of non-evil deception?

I think I might have an example of genuinely evil deception by design in food labelling. At least, it seems to be an attempt to make sure that people keep buying stuff that’s probably bad for them while the manufacturers present a “caring” image.

Yesterday I wrote an unthoughtful post [...]

Josh, I believe the word is “thoughtless”

Wow, I have to say, I totally admire your willingness to write an entire thoughtful post when you realize you may have reacted rashly to the user experience you were subjected to. I have the same issues sometimes - being a user interface designer and marketing person, things sometimes rub me the wrong way and I write similar posts on my blog. I think you’ve hit on an interaction that can be done better, and kudos to you for stating your truth, at the time, and now.

How about Insidious Interfaces?

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/insidious

Nicely alliterative.