It’s pretty easy to spot dark patterns when you look out for them, but I found a pretty obvious example of this.
Stoofie is a brand that sells water fountains for your pet (I don’t know what the problem with a water bowl is, but I digress). WayBack Machine
Plastered at the top of their website is “33% OFF Ends Today- Free Shipping” with no way to dismiss it. There is a scrolling text under the main image “FAST AND FREE SHIPPING 60-DAY FREE RETURNS”
If you scroll down, you’re immediately introduced with a product with the option to buy two preselected. The rest of this section explains itself:
Other things are sprinkled in the main page, but it really is the prime example of dark patterns. I am personally sick of finding them, but would love to see more examples of what others have found. Please, share your favorite examples of dark patterns. Don’t forget to archive them first so they can never be lived down.
We have a cat that scoops her food out of the bowl, walks a few feet, drops it on the ground and eats (most of it). It’s very annoying to constantly have to sweep up cat food. Maybe this is related.
That does sound very annoying! The first time I noticed my cat doing this, her food and litter box were in the basement, which was stone and dirt in that house. (We put them down there because it was the only place in that house where we could practically prevent the dog from getting to them.) Nowadays the cat stuff is in, essentially, a much cleaner sun porch; as a result, we still have to clean her bowl more frequently than seems reasonable, but it lasts a lot longer than it used to.