Have you found yourself looking at deals and services online that seem too good to be true? Wondering “where’s the catch?” You’re not alone. There are lots of ways that software uses and manipulates us to give up details about ourselves, or to somehow get us to pay for services that we either didn’t want, or to provide information about ourselves and our habits to others that we don’t really want to be known. These practices are grouped together under the phrase ‘Dark Patterns” and Emma Keaveny has made it a point to learn about and warn about them. We discuss several varieties of Dark Patterns and debate where on the spectrum they fall, whether they be nuisances, poor design or an outright breach of ethics.

Also, where were you when Amazon’s E3 services went down on February 28, 2017? Did it affect you? It affected some of us, and at the time we recorded this episode it was a very fresh memory, so we had plenty to say about it.

Resourced by QualiTest Group

How well do we know the work that we do as testers? Do we understand what it is we do? Really understand it? Jon Bach thinks we can do better at figuring out what it is that we do in our roles as testers and in the roles that support and offer service to people in our organizations. Much of what we do is implicit, and carries responsibilities, expectations and even contracts for what we do and how we act. In today’s episode, Jon helps us break down both traditional and not so traditional roles that we may find ourselves in, and ways that we can leverage both explicit and implicit knowledge of what we do, and maybe what we can stop doing.

Also, in an unconventional news segment this go around, friend of the show Anna Royzman tells us about Test Masters Academy and a fresh take on testing conferences geared towards testing leaders (the Testing Leadership Conference is May 1-3, 2017 in New York City) and emerging topics and technologies at the New Testing Conference coming this fall to New York City). It’s a wild ride!

Resourced by QualiTest Group