FTC's rule banning fake online reviews goes into effect

This is an important thing to tackle too. Amazon is notorious for allowing shady practices like Sell product A for lots of 5* reviews, then change the product listing to a completely different thing (which may or may not deserve 5) ...

Another aspect is review solicitation. eg: ios games often pop up with their own modal of "Rate us" and if you click 5 it redirects you to app store to make a review, if you click 4 or less it redirects you to a feedback form. They grease the path for positive reviewers.

iOS: That’s 100% against the rules. Much like other dark patterns like forcing a sign up or location access as gating to the rest of the app. Or using notifications for advertising.

Now if only Apple would enforce those (or stop doing them themselves).

Unenforced rules aren't rules so much as taxes on the honest.

oof - the app we work on at my company does all of these..

That’s a pretty clever phrase!

Did you just have an “Are we the baddies?” moment?

Well I understand why people don’t like some of them, the truth is the vast majority of the App Store rules are really good as an end user/consumer.

Unfortunately Apple doesn’t seem to care unless the rule is really good for Apple.

If an app pops up a "rate us" modal, it gets a 1-star in the app store, with a note to the developer why. I don't care how great your app is.

on my phone, I have play store firewalled and only allow it out when I want updates/install something.

if I could be bothered with the effort, this is the kind of petty I would engage in.

I've thought about starting a page to call out the apps that abuse push notifications for ads to show that Apple isn't enforcing its rule.

> 4.5.4 ... Push Notifications should not be used for promotions or direct marketing purposes unless customers have explicitly opted in to receive them via consent language displayed in your app’s UI, and you provide a method in your app for a user to opt out from receiving such messages. Abuse of these services may result in revocation of your privileges.

The worst offender is DoorDash. If you turn off push ads, after you place an order it will prompt you to turn on notifications "to get the latest on your order". Agreeing turns on ads. You get the prompt even if you already have order update notifications enabled.

Does the new product have the same ASIN ?

How could they allow this?

Isn’t that against App Store TOS?

Absolutely my practice as well. App devs should never be in the business of nagging for reviews.

As an indie app developer this makes me really sad. We need reviews otherwise we won’t get enough downloads. Big companies can pay huge amounts on ads, we can’t and thus rely on positive reviews and ratings. Fact is that most users won’t rate unless asked.

If you really like an app give it a nice review.

They probably get way more reviews with the prompt, and positive ones, than without it, despite how some morally indignant outlier HN commenters would react.

we will, of our own accord without nagging.

"Amazon is notorious for allowing shady practices"

Surely, 'conspiring to/orchestrating profit through immoral practices' is a more precise statement of Amazon's activities.

New ASIN. They can take a physically unbranded product and list it under a new name brand at will. They can change the quantity or bundle. They can change an irrelevant attribute. Amazon plays ignorant.

I sell a product there and some of my competitors are doing those things I listed. Their reviews are also very obviously fake. I’ve also received some obviously fake negative reviews. I’m not really holding out any hope that it’ll get better anytime soon.

I just reduced my Amazon advertising spend so I can focus on other channels. Also a little bit out of spite.

While I appreciate that need, as a user this is the worst way to get me to review your app. Especially because so many of them aren't tuned for paying any attention at all to what their users are doing before prompting them. I had one app recently prompt me for a review before I'd even completed their "first time tutorial" slide deck. Not only do I not know enough at that point in time to even review the app, but if I was so inclined to click through at that moment it would have been to leave a review complaining about the practice rather than saying anything substantive about the app's functionality. But even when they're not that bad, they're almost always popping up when I open the app (the moment when I'm specifically intending to do something that I'm now being interrupted) or in the middle of some workflow. It's the same annoying behavior that web pop-up folks used to do too.

Personally, I'd rather see you add a small UI element somewhere, or a banner that appears briefly but critically doesn't cover up any controls. If you absolutely MUST use a pop up, you know when the best time to do that is? After I've completed some in app purchase. If I'm spending money on your product, chances are I'm moderately satisfied with it and feeling pretty good about it at that moment. Or if you don't have in app purchases, unless you've made a "content browsing only" app, you probably have some workflows that have a definite end state. Prompt me then, at the end of me doing what I've come to your app to do. But I've never once given a review / stars to any app that has interrupted me in the middle of or at the start of doing something.

I block every single notif from nearly every single program on my phone. The only real exceptions are my bank and brokerage and games I play everyday; you know, stuff I actually care about.

I haven't lost anything from blocking the rest, and I'm not about to start allowing now.

"Notif" because it's Not a question of If I will allow them, also because it's not worthy of being called by a full and proper name.

And a potential cudgel with which to strike those who's success is inconvenient.

I just don’t install apps.

It’s only a guess, but I don’t think data is on your side. I seriously doubt that appreciative users “will, of their own accord with your nagging” rate apps. I’d bet it’s less than 2% who do

Yeah I understand this and definitely do not retaliate against being asked for reviews. I find the usual modal pop-up for a review can be a bit jarring or appear at inopportune moments though, i wonder if not using modals would be better.

Oh they absolutely work. And given that ratings are about the only thing that matters in the App Store besides search ads, there is a huge incentive to push for it no matter how horrible it is for the user.