Design Decisions I Question

Certain things occur every day while browsing the internet, that are very annoying and stupid at the same time. I just wonder why does it have to be like the way it is.

Here is the list:

• Date of Birth Input Control on registration forms

Why does it have to start with the "Current Date". Many websites just pick the system date and default to it. Pretty Insane.

Some visionaries have empty values or place-holders selected for the date. Here is a Facebook Registration Page:

Now Month and Day are clear, but does Facebook seriously think that someone will have a Year of Birth as 2014? 

Not a big deal, the user just ends up scrolling a bit more, and number of new user registration << existing users, but still, for a website which looks at such tiny things, this should matter.

• OTP : One Time Passwords

These are those system generated passwords that provide a second level of authentication required before performing sensitive operations, like making a online banking transaction.

My question is, why does it have to be a Obscured Text Input ( input type=password) .

 

Those password type input fields are meant to enter passwords, something, which a over-the-shoulder eves-dropper cannot read. An OTP is a One Time Password, even if someone reads it, they wont be able to re-use it. It just makes the lives of people entering those digits, slightly harder.

• Signing-In into websites

There would be certain portals which would keep pestering you to sign-in. I am pretty sure the moment a user would see a Lightbox or a Popup blocking content, asking the user to sign-in, the chances that the user would actually sign-in would reduce to 1/4 ( not based on actual data :) ). 

And here is an interesting exercise :

1. Go to http://www.dominos.co.in/  
2. Ensure that you get an annoying popup, that starts playing a YouTube Video without you clicking any start button.
3. Now close that popup.
4. Click on the Order Online icon
5. Ensure that you see the annoying sign-in/sign-up shenanigan.
6. Click on Login via Facebook, and give the permissions ( you can revoke this application from accessing your data at any time)
7. You are redirected to a page to complete the form, which includes a Date of Birth control
8. Attempt to enter your Date of Birth
9. Click approximately 300 times ( If you are born in 1987 ) to reach to the correct month.