Woohoo! I made it through User Inyerface!
From the moment of ‘go’ – or should I say ‘NO’ – this felt like I was pulled into an ‘opposite day’ without being made aware of it. The first page used a series of fonts, shapes, and colours deceptively designed to make it take longer than necessary to click ‘HERE’ to continue…although I think by that point I was already clicking every word that I’m not entirely confident that was the one that moved things along.
On the next page, the Terms & Conditions box appeared. I try to make a habit of reading the Terms & Conditions before agreeing to them, and this was one situation where I deeply regretted it. The scrolling feature to get to the bottom of the Terms & Conditions was SSSLLLLLOOOOOWWWWW, and of course, one couldn’t continue before reaching the bottom. All the while, pop ups served as distractions, asking if I needed help and reminding me that time is ever-fleeting. Nevertheless, I persisted, only to be met with a form even more annoying than most. A red-text alert to say that I did NOT have issues with my password (yep, that got me…twice), a requirement to upload a photo (thank you for being my stand-in, grimace emoji 
), and a personal details page that I would still be working through had I not decided to be deceptive myself (if anyone asks, I DO live at 3 Somewhere Street in Waterloo with a zip code of 12345). I was able to use the drop-down pronouns feature and identify my sex as they both had options aligned with how I identify, but it definitely got me by highlighting in blue the sex choice that was not being selected. At least it was kind enough to alert me to the inconsistency.
Although I have *thankfully* never quite met an interface as devious as the one I just completed, it does clearly show the power of UI design and how using ingrained colours (e.g., red vs green), font styles (e.g., underlined, bolded, capitalized) and shapes typically reserved for clickable buttons can be used used to guide a user through a series of steps without giving much thought to one. It does beg to question, though: should the onus be put on the user to carefully decipher each time, or on the creator to avoid deception and remain honest, even if honesty results in lost (potential) revenue? Likely, it needs to be – and should be – both. But as the annoying pop-up kept reminding me, who has time for that?