The Dark Side of UX Design: Dark Patterns & Infinite Scroll

Sorry to tell you, but you already in the spiral. If you are using TikTok, YouTube Shorts or Instagram Reels, you are already stuck in a dark pattern, the dark side of User Experience Design: a user interface that has been carefully crafted and designed to trick users into doing things.

Since several years, apps and website are manipulating you and it’s, maybe, something you are not even aware of. These apps are using tricks, super smart levers and designs for their goals. What goal? Make you stay.

The main goal of these apps is retention. The more a user stays on the app and uses it, the more he is likely to generate money. How? By making you buy things, it can be virtual or physical stuff, on an online store for example, or forcing you to watch ads.

But how are they crafting it?

TikTok is considered as the most efficient retention app by using one of the most controversial design to make you stay. The infinite scroll.

Created by Aza Raskin in 2006 (formerly working at Mozilla) to make navigation more pleasant by avoiding clicks for users, at first. He actually conceived something evil without even noticing it. That’s what he said. Here are these words:

“If you don’t give your brain time to catch…