Task 10: Attention Economy

• 3 years ago
• Posted in:Tasks
• 3
• Author: Clarissa

In one word, this task was: distressing! I have played a few games before designed to “confuse” you and it still took me a while to get past the first “task” set out by GUI. The clock added this sense of impending doom, even if it quite literally tells you the time is ticking, but not running out. Which, I now realize was purposeful to veer or divide your attention; or as Harris describes in his Ted Talk, to keep you on a page longer (2017). Much of this GUI seemed to be developed in that sense; to allure, distract and withhold a user, all in one place.

I thought my initial engagement with the GUI went well, clicking the word “here” instead of clicking “No”. I found myself stuck on that first page for a while because I needed to stop and read the instructions. I had spent some time clicking the help box to see if there were clues. It forces you to be conscious about reading instructions to completion; something I am sure many of us are guilty of when “agreeing to the terms” in any online agreement.

Which brought me to the next task – accepting the terms and conditions. I had scrolled through, although I proudly I realized fairly quickly that there were going to be hidden instructions; I had read about that somewhere else, where rules or clues are hidden in the terms and conditions section. I felt that sense of pride is also something developers and designers play on when creating these attention economies. Much like a video game, they, in a sense, scaffold what you achieve in order to help you gain skill and go further to more challenging tasks (Fullerton, 2014). This may have been created in a similar vein. Even if the timer did not mean anything, progressing from the current task to the next, you felt that sense of accomplishment due to the “racing against the clock” environment. Thankfully for this task, the hidden clue, was close to the top.

During the next task, I started to put my real, personal information but I was suddenly conscious of “big brother” and putting all my real personal information in a random game, that I started to put only half truths. I dawned on me that I did not need to put my real information, as long as it was accurate to the rest of the information – such as matching my birth year to the age. That must be how GUI and attention economy developers bait real people; as opposed to bots, when designing these environments. Much like the weighed nodes on the web (Code.org, 2017), certain information has to be “accurate”, for a whole group to find what they need. One other aspect that took me some time to realize was my gender not matching with my title. I had the wrong one highlighted, usually if a box is “coloured in”, you have selected it, but for that particular function it was opposite. Another play on what is “universally” accepted when it comes to online forms.

The last section, the “make sure you’re human”/CAPTCHA section was tedious and I wanted to make sure that I had not missed a “select all” function; which I did try to find. It was interesting that the page was purposefully scrolled down, so you do not realize which box you are ticking, matches to the picture. One thing I recognized through this task, is that I am better at language than I thought. I distinctly recall reading the words, then saying to myself “Oh obviously, it’s all meanings and definitions of the word”. Although the general nature of the GUI still stirred suspicion; if it had to be the whole word itself or iterations of the word; such as “check”, showing the checkered pattern but it was a variation on the word itself.  I also spell money “checks” as “cheque”, which caused me to stop and think about what was accepted in this economy versus what was accepted universally.

By the time I got to the end I did not believe it and still clicked around to make sure; clicking the “Homepage” of the creators to make sure it was simply “Homepage” and not another challenge. As previously mentioned, it had become second nature of the economy to be skeptical. I conjecture that developers use this distrust as well, to lure people in. They must keep a database and consistently do research to see what looks questionable; to avoid that appearance. That feeling of immediacy and distrust remained at this last page; even though it was not counting down, I was “competing”, and just with myself.

Throughout my entire engagement with the GUI, I did not know what the prize, was yet I hurriedly carried on. Even if the opening page tells you to complete it quickly and accurate as possible, it does not mention any consequence. One example of there being an immediate consequence on online forums such as these, is purchasing something; such as concert tickets, buying an item with few left in stock or catching the sale. If you do not complete your information or transaction within that time frame – or the clock – you instantly lose out on that deal. This sense of imminence is truly what the GUI plays on and it was thrilling and stressful to say the least. While reading instructions was not my strong suit when trying to “beat the game”, I was impressed at my ability to decode and work through the tasks.

References

Code.org. (2017, June 13). The Internet: How Search Works 

. Retrieved from

Fullerton, T. (2014). Game Design Workshop: A Playcentric Approach to Creating

Innovation Games, NY: Taylor & Francis (CRS Press)

Harris, T. (2017). How a handful of tech companies control billions of minds every day.

Retrieved from

https://www.ted.com/talks/tristan_harris_the_manipulative_tricks_tech_compan

es_use_to_capture_your_attention?language=en (Links to an external site.)

Systems Innovation. (2015, April 18). Graph Theory Overview

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Systems Innovation. (2015, April 19). Network Connections 

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