http://architectures.danlockton.co.uk/2006/09/01/planned-addiction-as-a-method-of-control-a-parasitic-lock-in-business-model/ Design and human behaviour Sat, 11 Feb 2012 15:34:54 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v= http://architectures.danlockton.co.uk/2006/09/01/planned-addiction-as-a-method-of-control-a-parasitic-lock-in-business-model/comment-page-1/#comment-27617 Limiting frequency of cigarette use at fulminate // Architectures of Control Sat, 30 Dec 2006 13:51:35 +0000 http://architectures.danlockton.co.uk/?p=109#comment-27617 [...] This is an interesting product, attempting to affect a user’s behaviour to reduce consumption rather than increase it as with so many other architectures of control. Indeed, smoking could well be seen as a battle between two attempts to control/influence users’ behaviour, with vast sums spent on advertising and methods both to promote the practice, and to encourage smokers to give up. We’ve looked before at cigarettes as a parasitic lock-in method, especially in the context of increasing nicotine levels to compound addiction*. [...] [...] This is an interesting product, attempting to affect a user’s behaviour to reduce consumption rather than increase it as with so many other architectures of control. Indeed, smoking could well be seen as a battle between two attempts to control/influence users’ behaviour, with vast sums spent on advertising and methods both to promote the practice, and to encourage smokers to give up. We’ve looked before at cigarettes as a parasitic lock-in method, especially in the context of increasing nicotine levels to compound addiction*. [...]

]]> http://architectures.danlockton.co.uk/2006/09/01/planned-addiction-as-a-method-of-control-a-parasitic-lock-in-business-model/comment-page-1/#comment-8341 Architectures of Control in Design » Locking users in by making it difficult to leave Mon, 11 Sep 2006 14:09:00 +0000 http://architectures.danlockton.co.uk/?p=109#comment-8341 [...] These are interesting examples of systems being designed to restrict users’ behaviour for commercial reasons, in an - on the face of it - extremely blatant way. There is some difference between a system which requires continuous payment, such as AOL, being designed to be difficult to cancel, and the eBay/Amazon examples, since the user is not locked in to paying a fee every month. But the effect for the locker-in is the same: more customers retained. There are plenty of parallels in designed-in lock-ins from other industries, from cigarettes and ink cartridges to deliberate software incompatability - even in Web 2.0 - and vendor lock-in generally. Please share this!These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages. [...] [...] These are interesting examples of systems being designed to restrict users’ behaviour for commercial reasons, in an – on the face of it – extremely blatant way. There is some difference between a system which requires continuous payment, such as AOL, being designed to be difficult to cancel, and the eBay/Amazon examples, since the user is not locked in to paying a fee every month. But the effect for the locker-in is the same: more customers retained. There are plenty of parallels in designed-in lock-ins from other industries, from cigarettes and ink cartridges to deliberate software incompatability – even in Web 2.0 – and vendor lock-in generally. Please share this!These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages. [...]

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