Fediverse

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Onboarding experience needs to be simpler for mass adoption (lemmy.world)

submitted 1 week ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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If the fediverse is to be adopted by the masses, the onboarding experience needs to change. A new user can't be presented with a choice of instances as part of signing up or at least the process of making the choice needs to dumbed down a lot. I don't know how or if this can be solved, I just know as someone involved in app development and UX that the current experience won't work.

My mother would not know how to handle this paragraph: "Lemmy.world is one node in a network of hundreds of Lemmy instances. Before you sign up here, take a moment to explore all the instances at https://lemmyverse.net/. You may find an instance with a regional or topical emphasis that speaks to you! Don’t worry about being left out; Lemmy instances are interconnected so users from each instance can participate with communities on other instances."

For mass adoption it needs to be so simple that even non-techie older people can get through it without feeling like they might be doing something wrong.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (3 children)

Unique interests can be already be self-curated by subscribing to certain communities. All apps have the subscribed feed. There's no need for communities of a certain type to be on one instance.

Edit: typo

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

It's not that the local tab replaces your home 'subscriptions' tab, it's that it's nice to have in addition to it.

My instance, slrpnk.net, caters to solarpunk topics only, and we're small enough that it has a tight community of regular posters whom I recognize. In my local tab I can see at a glance just the stuff posted to my community, with my other subscriptions not mixed in and cluttering it up. I also see in my local tab what's being posted in communities I'm not subscribed to, but will often have comments from our members since we all collectively view our local tab. It's like a sort've town square feel that my all and subscriptions tab don't have.

I like having access to both.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago (1 children)

See, this falls apart when there's another instance that focuses on solarpunk. When some communities on that instance become more popular and active than the communities in your local instance, you'd want to be subscribed to the solar punk communities on that new instance too. Now, your local feed is only showing you solarpunk communities hosted on slrpnk.net but not solarpunk communities on other instances. This distinction is not meaningful because where a community is hosted can be totally detached from the content. The users you know by handle can also be very active, if not more active, on other instances talking about solarpunk than slrpnk.net.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

I don't think the existence of a second solarpunk instance would negate my experience with the first instance. It would still apply, there would just be another place where that same phenomena is happening for a different group of people.

That's not to say that I couldn't subscribe to their communities and get to know the regulars there too, but it would be more norrowed since I would only see the ones I specifically subscribe to, where as with my local tab I see the totality of what's posted to my 'home'.

If you personally don't care about that specific experience that a local tab can bring and think your curated subscriptions is just as good if not better, awesome, more power to you.

But for me specifically, and possibly for others as well, it's a noticeable difference and a welcome addition to our experience :)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

There’s no need for communities of a certain type to be on one instance.

It's nice to have country or language-communities in the local feed of one instance. Feddit.org or jlai.lu are good examples.

[–] Kichae 0 points 1 week ago

But it's better from many angles that they are. Discoverability alone. Consistency of instance level rules. Theme.

It just makes sense on some level that sports communities would be on a sports-focused website, and such a website is where people whose primary interest is in discussing sports would have their accounts. From there, they can follow other topics they're interested in, but their primary focus is still on, I don't know, basketball or whatever.

Same for cars. Some of the most active forums on the internet are car ownership forums. If you could access CivicForums from IoniqForums, then it would make sense to do so. Much more sense than finding people discussing Hondas on lemmy.world and Hyundais on sh.itjust.works.

Just because you don't give a shit where these discussions are taking place, doesn't mean it makes sense for people to just shit them out anywhere.