Defaulting to Defaults
The World Wide Web presents user with a variety of choices unlike any other information and marketplace medium. For instance, if you want to search you can use Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc.. However, when you open up your Mozilla browser your search bar and homepage may be already set to Google. This defaulting product setting is extremely valuable on the Internet. It creates market leverage based on the role of defaults in steering consumer’s decisions.
Default design choices have also been pivotal in the discussion of privacy issues. Privacy advocates want the default to be that marketers have to ask consumers to collect and share their information. While advertisers prefer an opt-out option for tracking online behavior.
