I keep thinking about this article on Stanford students claiming disabilities for accommodations: "Why Are 38 Percent of Stanford Students Saying They're Disabled? — If you get into an elite college, you probably don't have a learning disability."
Not to virtue signal, but this same pattern shows up everywhere in software too.
"Our competitors installed this tracking pixel, so we need to."
"Everyone's doing these dark patterns now."
Each step feels small. Justifiable. Competitive.
Then you look up and realize the whole industry has drifted somewhere nobody actually wanted to go.
I've felt this pressure firsthand.
The uncomfortable truth is that most of these decisions aren't made by villains. They're made by reasonable people responding to what's around them.
So how do we reverse it? Genuine question. I don't have a clean answer.