I recently wrote about the 10 dark patterns that companies use to persuade their users to make decisions that favor the interest of the company rather than the individual. Asshole design takes dark patterns a step further. These are just downright unethical and immoral practices that have by no mistake snuck their way into the products and services that consume.

Companies make these decisions not unintentionally, but rather solely to deceive or dupe their unsuspecting victims.

1. Shrinkflation

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Shrinkflation is a classic case of less product = more profit.

Companies use this tactic to discreetly sell less of a product at the same price that it was before.

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Companies can do this through labeling by displaying “FAMILY SIZE” or “PARTY SIZE” despite it being the same amount as the regular item. To the unsuspecting shopper, this is an easy one to miss.

2. Planned Obsolescence

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When I buy a gallon of milk, it has the best by date written on the side. Some products, however, don’t have a date; the company decides when that day is, and the consumer has no control or knowledge of it.

For those of us with a conscience for consumer waste, this is a frustrating pattern that appears time and time again. Products designed to be used for a finite amount of time, and then they’re useless.

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Companies also will completely stop supporting older versions of their product simply because it’s old. Chromebook, for example, has an “Auto Update Expiration (AUE) Date,” after which the operating system is unsupported by Google.

3. Lethal Enforcers

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Do what we want, then you can do what you want. Maybe…

Lethal enforcers require the user to take the action that the company wants before they can do what they intend to do.

Lethal enforcers are essentially a way that companies gatekeep the decision making for users. Instead of giving users a free choice, the company decides for the individual the decision that should be made then makes that their only choice.

Want to view reviews on Yelp? Download our app first. Or when a company suppresses relevant search results to display sponsored products or content.

4. Loaded Question

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Unless you’re a politician or a lawyer, you’ll likely get fooled by these trick questions.

Loaded questions take advantage of our good nature. We assume that we don’t need to read the entire question because we’ve already collected the information we need to answer it.

5. Bait and Switch

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Luring someone in with the intent of receiving one thing and then when they get it, it’s actually cheap junk. Or advertising a bargain, and when they proceed to purchase it, the price has changed.

6. Throttling

Throttling is when a company intentionally downgrades the service or product with the hopes that the customer upgrade. This is different than forced obsolescence because the product still works; it’s just much slower and shittier than it used to be.

Apple has even been found guilty of this; Apple has settled a class-action lawsuit over its practice of slowing down older iPhones, agreeing to pay up to $500 million to impacted consumers.

Another example is “unlimited” data providers that sneakily slow down internet speeds once they pass a certain threshold of data usage.

7. Guilt Tripping

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Guilt-tripping is the act of playing on one’s emotions to invoke them to take a particular action. Anything that guilts someone into making a purchase or making a decision because if they don’t then bad things will happen.

I see this a lot with companies requesting donations. Even if I’ve already donated to a company, they never seem satisfied and will emphasize that just another few dollars can REALLY make the difference.

Guilting can also be used in the form of Confirmshaming, a dark pattern that forces users to select an option like “No thanks, I don’t like free products” to close a pop-up.

8. Monopoly

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Companies create a monopoly when they force someone to buy a currency or product that can only be used there and not transferred.

By doing this, companies ensure that customers will return again and again because they can’t use their monopoly money elsewhere.

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9. Free Real Estate

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Ads, Ads, Ads.

When every square inch of space that meets a pair of eyeballs is turned into a display ad — that’s when you’re in the presence of a free real estate pattern.

This becomes even worse when it’s something that must be looked at. Like the seatback on an airplane or the menu at a McDonald’s. Yes, McDonald’s blocks out the entire menu to show an ad every minute or so.

10. Decoy

This phenomenon is when companies change the terminology used to describe a word with a negative connotation. Most frequently seen in food packaging, companies call ingredients like sugar anything but sugar to fly under the radar of health-conscious consumers.

The British Heart Association has made this chart so consumers can be aware of all the different names for sugar that companies use on their packaging.

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