4 ms·

Yeah, definitely better to just blindly click through a ToS on some private corporate social media service...

JumpCrisscross 3y ago
> definitely better to blindly click through a ToS on some private corporate social media service Philosophically, no. Practically, yes. Because it actually delivers the product. Creating an ideological and technical filter at the mouth of the funnel is absurd. This is heading straight for either Reddit getting its act together or one of Facebook, Twitter or Substack taking the prize. Because they spent two seconds thinking about onboarding. Perfect is the enemy of good.
- BaseballPhysics 3y ago
  > Creating an ideological and technical filter at the mouth of the funnel is absurd. So then just pick a large, popular instance and be done with it. You've already made it clear you don't care what the platform's policies are, so why are you pretending this is a barrier?
  - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
    > pick a large, popular instance and be done with it .world is having technical issues. (I could sign up. But first login spawns an infinite spinny. The only reason I know that's one of the larger servers is because of this thread.) I'm doing it. But it's tedious, and the hacker in me sees an opening for a competitor to scoop out the 90% of users who don't care about federation, they just want it to work. > you don't care what the platform's policies are, so why are you pretending this is a barrier You really don't see the barrier?
    - sudosysgen 3y ago
      The problem is that there's no reason it won't end the same as Reddit if you don't have federation, so you actually can't scoop out 90% of users because they might as well stay on Reddit.
      - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
        > there's no reason it won't end the same as Reddit if you don't have federation, so you actually can't scoop out 90% of users because they might as well stay on Reddit It will end up like Reddit. But right now it isn't, and that's good enough to make a play for the users. Given a choice between that and choosing a server, signing up, finding its log-in unresponsive, looking for another server, signing up... (I haven't gotten further than this) who do you think wins? By the way, we agree. I want a federated system to work. But simple sign-up fuck-ups, where even someone who's curious for curiosity's sake has to spend half an hour figuring out which servers even work at the moment,
        sudosysgen 3y ago
        I think we do largely agree here. However, I think it should be noted that the current migration is largely driven by moderators and power-users, not the 90% of users that don't really care, so I don't think there actually is any competitive opportunity. I think that you're right in that the sign up UX is not great - there are also serious performance concerns, and in many ways the platform isn't ready yet. But I don't think that's going to persist for too long. I think some kind of "I don't care" instance (probably lemmy.world) will emerge, and the UX will improve. Perhaps it won't be in time, though.
        JumpCrisscross 3y ago
        > current migration is largely driven by moderators and power-users, not the 90% of users that don't really care, so I don't think there actually is any competitive opportunity Power users' power is users. We've frequently seen the celebs-first gambit by new social media entrants, most notably Clubhouse, and while it can generate hype for a bit, it's far from a proven strategy. It's frustrating to watch a re-play of Mastodon's fumbles, particularly since this time the protest is actually semi-organized.
        sudosysgen 3y ago
        By power users, I'm referring to the small minority that generated the vast majority of content on Reddit. It's true that it isn't a proven strategy, but given that the Lemmy ecosystem has gotten around 100k users in the past 2-3 days, it's not failing as bad as it could be.
  - mrcrumb1 3y ago
    You say this as if it has not already proven to be a barrier. That is to say: it's already preventing adoption, whether you think it's a good reason or not.
  - anigbrowl 3y ago
    Why are you pretending that this isn't confusing to newbies? You are the archetypal technical person snapping about the workaround instead of engaging with the user problem. If everyone can have access to all the content (which is what most people want), why are they being herded into choosing an instance in the first place? Federation might run 100x better if instances were suggested based on geographic proximity rather than semantics, a concept which makes intuitive sense to people. 'Pick from a random and inconsistent list of servers in no particular order' is like demanding that people who are considering taking a holiday decide where to eat lunch after they arrive before they buy the plane ticket.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - BaseballPhysics 3y ago
      > Why are you pretending that this isn't confusing to newbies? I'm not. Absolutely the onboarding experience can be improved. The problem is you're losing the plot, here. The original commenter complained about having to "read up on what rights server admins have over my account, why I should choose one versus another, which servers are de-federating which others, et cetera." But you don't have to do that if you don't want to. If you're already willing to blindly join Reddit, you can blindly join mastodon.social. And the app is already now driving people to do that if they really don't care (which is what the OP claims). So this is already being improved (and yes, can absolutely be improved further).
      - anigbrowl 3y ago
        It's 'being improved' even though it's been identified as a problem from the outset of the fediverse, nearly a decade ago. I don't know how to make this any simpler: Forced choices drive away users. People don't like making decisions without context because they feel like scams. That's why uptake is slow almost a decade into federation. The UX model is bad.
        BaseballPhysics 3y ago
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
anigbrowl 3y ago
You don't take an aeronautics course when you buy a plane ticket, because 99% of people don't want to do that. I've been a nerd for ~40 years, I used to live on Usenet, I understand federation inside out, and I don't want to learn another protocol just to try a new website. Blindly clicking through a ToS while chuckling that 'nobody reads that shit lol' is in fact a better user experience for almost everyone. If your approach were so great, there would be physical cities whose population consisted entirely of architects and engineers.
- Barrin92 3y ago
  >there would be physical cities whose population consisted entirely of architects and engineers. the analog to a digital federation in the physical world, is literally just that, an actual federation. People making choices about what community they participate in isn't technical, it's social. Everyone who lives in a democratic society does in fact participate in how their city is run and governed or understands how to move from one state to another. You do not need to understand the technical details of federated systems, but it is absolutely infantilizing to pretend that people are unable to choose or build the communities they want, and take some responsibility in maintaining them. This 'consumer' mentality needs to die, people need to learn to be proper citizens on the internet. We ask it from people in the real world, so we can do it online. Why are we pretending the online version of some 19th century company town is inevitable?
  - BaseballPhysics 3y ago
    > You do not need to understand the technical details of federated systems, but it is absolutely infantilizing to pretend that people are unable to choose or build the communities they want, and take some responsibility in maintaining them. Not only is it infantilizing, it's wrong. People create communities online all the time. Whether it's Facebook groups or subreddits or Discourse forums or Discord groups and on and on and on. That's literally how the internet has always worked.
    - captaincrisp 3y ago

> definitely better to blindly click through a ToS on some private corporate social media service Philosophically, no. Practically, yes. Because it actually delivers the product. Creating an ideological and technical filter at the mouth of the funnel is absurd. This is heading straight for either Reddit getting its act together or one of Facebook, Twitter or Substack taking the prize. Because they spent two seconds thinking about onboarding. Perfect is the enemy of good.

BaseballPhysics 3y ago
> Creating an ideological and technical filter at the mouth of the funnel is absurd. So then just pick a large, popular instance and be done with it. You've already made it clear you don't care what the platform's policies are, so why are you pretending this is a barrier?
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago
  > pick a large, popular instance and be done with it .world is having technical issues. (I could sign up. But first login spawns an infinite spinny. The only reason I know that's one of the larger servers is because of this thread.) I'm doing it. But it's tedious, and the hacker in me sees an opening for a competitor to scoop out the 90% of users who don't care about federation, they just want it to work. > you don't care what the platform's policies are, so why are you pretending this is a barrier You really don't see the barrier?
  - sudosysgen 3y ago
    The problem is that there's no reason it won't end the same as Reddit if you don't have federation, so you actually can't scoop out 90% of users because they might as well stay on Reddit.
    - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
      > there's no reason it won't end the same as Reddit if you don't have federation, so you actually can't scoop out 90% of users because they might as well stay on Reddit It will end up like Reddit. But right now it isn't, and that's good enough to make a play for the users. Given a choice between that and choosing a server, signing up, finding its log-in unresponsive, looking for another server, signing up... (I haven't gotten further than this) who do you think wins? By the way, we agree. I want a federated system to work. But simple sign-up fuck-ups, where even someone who's curious for curiosity's sake has to spend half an hour figuring out which servers even work at the moment,
      - sudosysgen 3y ago
        I think we do largely agree here. However, I think it should be noted that the current migration is largely driven by moderators and power-users, not the 90% of users that don't really care, so I don't think there actually is any competitive opportunity. I think that you're right in that the sign up UX is not great - there are also serious performance concerns, and in many ways the platform isn't ready yet. But I don't think that's going to persist for too long. I think some kind of "I don't care" instance (probably lemmy.world) will emerge, and the UX will improve. Perhaps it won't be in time, though.
        JumpCrisscross 3y ago
        > current migration is largely driven by moderators and power-users, not the 90% of users that don't really care, so I don't think there actually is any competitive opportunity Power users' power is users. We've frequently seen the celebs-first gambit by new social media entrants, most notably Clubhouse, and while it can generate hype for a bit, it's far from a proven strategy. It's frustrating to watch a re-play of Mastodon's fumbles, particularly since this time the protest is actually semi-organized.
        sudosysgen 3y ago
        By power users, I'm referring to the small minority that generated the vast majority of content on Reddit. It's true that it isn't a proven strategy, but given that the Lemmy ecosystem has gotten around 100k users in the past 2-3 days, it's not failing as bad as it could be.
- mrcrumb1 3y ago
  You say this as if it has not already proven to be a barrier. That is to say: it's already preventing adoption, whether you think it's a good reason or not.
- anigbrowl 3y ago
  Why are you pretending that this isn't confusing to newbies? You are the archetypal technical person snapping about the workaround instead of engaging with the user problem. If everyone can have access to all the content (which is what most people want), why are they being herded into choosing an instance in the first place? Federation might run 100x better if instances were suggested based on geographic proximity rather than semantics, a concept which makes intuitive sense to people. 'Pick from a random and inconsistent list of servers in no particular order' is like demanding that people who are considering taking a holiday decide where to eat lunch after they arrive before they buy the plane ticket.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - BaseballPhysics 3y ago
    > Why are you pretending that this isn't confusing to newbies? I'm not. Absolutely the onboarding experience can be improved. The problem is you're losing the plot, here. The original commenter complained about having to "read up on what rights server admins have over my account, why I should choose one versus another, which servers are de-federating which others, et cetera." But you don't have to do that if you don't want to. If you're already willing to blindly join Reddit, you can blindly join mastodon.social. And the app is already now driving people to do that if they really don't care (which is what the OP claims). So this is already being improved (and yes, can absolutely be improved further).
    - anigbrowl 3y ago
      It's 'being improved' even though it's been identified as a problem from the outset of the fediverse, nearly a decade ago. I don't know how to make this any simpler: Forced choices drive away users. People don't like making decisions without context because they feel like scams. That's why uptake is slow almost a decade into federation. The UX model is bad.
      - BaseballPhysics 3y ago
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

anigbrowl 3y ago

You don't take an aeronautics course when you buy a plane ticket, because 99% of people don't want to do that. I've been a nerd for ~40 years, I used to live on Usenet, I understand federation inside out, and I don't want to learn another protocol just to try a new website. Blindly clicking through a ToS while chuckling that 'nobody reads that shit lol' is in fact a better user experience for almost everyone. If your approach were so great, there would be physical cities whose population consisted entirely of architects and engineers.

Barrin92 3y ago
>there would be physical cities whose population consisted entirely of architects and engineers. the analog to a digital federation in the physical world, is literally just that, an actual federation. People making choices about what community they participate in isn't technical, it's social. Everyone who lives in a democratic society does in fact participate in how their city is run and governed or understands how to move from one state to another. You do not need to understand the technical details of federated systems, but it is absolutely infantilizing to pretend that people are unable to choose or build the communities they want, and take some responsibility in maintaining them. This 'consumer' mentality needs to die, people need to learn to be proper citizens on the internet. We ask it from people in the real world, so we can do it online. Why are we pretending the online version of some 19th century company town is inevitable?
- BaseballPhysics 3y ago
  > You do not need to understand the technical details of federated systems, but it is absolutely infantilizing to pretend that people are unable to choose or build the communities they want, and take some responsibility in maintaining them. Not only is it infantilizing, it's wrong. People create communities online all the time. Whether it's Facebook groups or subreddits or Discourse forums or Discord groups and on and on and on. That's literally how the internet has always worked.
  - captaincrisp 3y ago