9 ms·

People (understandably) hate to register

192 points by jbogp 12y ago

btbuildem 12y ago
Spot on. I like the method he used - simple on the code end of things, simple for the end-user. I think simplicity is a proxy for success. I think the only reasonable time to require someone's email (or other contact information) is when sending emails delivers real value to your users - when there is no other way to accomplish what you need to, except by sending email.
iambase 12y ago
Wait up ! Signing up via twitter or Fb is pretty clutch afaic
sdrinf 12y ago
This is definitely a solution to the registration problem; and metrics will probably back you up on conversion. However, a major drawback of this occurs while moving across multiple devices: Peter (fictional archetype) might click through on his work computer; then go home, and might want to have another look at the site; however he won't have any recollection of his "personal URL", nor any way to access it. Peter will, at this point, perceive all his time investment going down the drain. He will either re-register (to be wacked on the head when he's back at work again), or refuse the site altogether. Note this is different in Doodle's case, due to it's inherent sharing nature: people will email the link as part of the main process, so they're able to get back later. One way to see how this affects user's lifecycle is measuring: 1, username only; 2, username + email; 3, username, email, password variants against eachother, across the entire user funnel: registration, main mechanics, retention (or length of lifecycle).
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- jbogp 12y ago
  I think the combining the "no registration at all" with an optional "send me the link via email" is really nice. Actually of the 5000 people who have "registered", more than half have given their email address... probably means people like optional stuff, I know I do.
  - mrweasel 12y ago
    Do you then store the email address after having sent the link to the user? Because I don't think people view it as "giving their email address", but more like "send me the link and forget that you ever saw my email address".
    - jbogp 12y ago
      Nah I don't actually. Just have a field in the db to know if they gave one or not, for statistics purposes...
      - kubiiii 12y ago
        Storing emails would be a convenient way to send the link if the user did not send it from the registration page or lost it in the meantime. As a user I would love seeing this kind of identification and would probably set a email account only used to recover links and avoid sharing my main email account. Nice work by the way.
        jbogp 12y ago
        Good point, but for something done in 3 days I didn't want to risk having left some SQL injection somewhere somehow and leaking people's email. But yes that's a good idea.
- philers 12y ago
  I think that your exception for Doodle's case is also applicable to this use case and many more: if you're creating a predict-a-score league with your friends, you're going to have to share it immediately.
webhat 12y ago
Completely agree! Our website does require you register. Only at the end - just before payment - do we ask for an email address. EDIT: the email address is so we can send you the product you just ordered.
- taspeotis 12y ago
  Those are the worst kinds of websites.
  - webhat 12y ago
    I'm still trying to figure out what you mean.
    - taspeotis 12y ago
      Wait for the user to invest some time in your website and then bam! Register now.
      - webhat 12y ago
        Ah, I see, we are an online school. You can browse the courses, and some course materials for free, but if you want to take them and get credit you need to pay.
- jessaustin 12y ago
  Why not just provide a link to the product on the last page in the process? This could even be a link that automatically stopped working after it was used a few times. Harvesting email addresses is definitely not the only way to solve this problem, so it seems unfriendly to allow only that method.
  - webhat 12y ago
    For many use cases this would not be required. We have an online school. How would you solve being an online school without the ability to contact your students by email?
csbrooks 12y ago
It's unfortunate that signing up via Facebook or twitter or some other OAuth method gives people such a creepy feeling. It sure is a lot more convenient for everyone involved: don't need a password, no email confirmation, sometimes it's one click and you're in. I feel like Facebook screwed this up for everyone when people's feeds were covered with apps their friends were using. Now when a site asks you to authorize it with facebook, users don't feel like they can trust what it's going to do.
- jbogp 12y ago
  I agree. I think the creepy feeling comes from the potential threat to your private life... I know Facebook and the others are trying hard to make it clear what permissions are involved each time you sign-up but the fact that you have to check "ooh this one can access my friends list, I don't like that" is pretty unconfortable
  - lazyjones 12y ago
    > I know Facebook and the others are trying hard to make it clear what permissions are involved each time you sign-up What they don't make clear is that Facebook is informed every time people visit (or in some cases, login in to) those other sites and can generate better profiles from that data, even sleep schedules, even for people who rarely use FB itself.
- return0 12y ago
  I would like a minimal identity provider, i.e. something like BrowserID where you can create throwaway identities that is not associated with any social presence.
  - skrebbel 12y ago
    I used to think that this was an ideal space for governments, or some semi-public organization. Identity as a societal service, much like running water and electricity and highways. But then Snowden dropped by to tell us that we can trust our own governments even less than all these companies.
JulianMorrison 12y ago
Website creators seem to not understand that when we register, we are giving them something of serious value - we are giving up our privacy. And I do not give that to strangers in exchange for nothing.
- mtdewcmu 12y ago
  You don't necessarily lose privacy by making up a username and password for a site. You do lose some privacy if you use social sign-on or the site requires you to provide an email address that's verified. My pet peeve is the arbitrary rules that sites now have for passwords. When I am registering for something I don't care much about just because I have to, my inclination is to use the same easy-to-remember password I always use. But the rules thwart this, and no two sites can agree on the same rules, thus forcing me to alter the password, and guaranteeing that I will not remember it.
  - vdaniuk 12y ago
    Ah, yes, one easy-to-remember password for large number of sites is definitely a great way to protect your security. /s Complaining about loss of privacy, but eagerly weakening your security for convenience. I don't understand this argument at all.
    - mtdewcmu 12y ago
      I wasn't complaining about loss of privacy. I was talking about when I have to create an account that I don't need just because the site requires it.
    - tim333 12y ago
      Works for me with sites I don't give a damn about.
    - pjc50 12y ago
      It depends on the site; especially if I never wanted to register for it at all. It's their security I'm compromising. I don't particularly care if the account I made for some random product information website gets hijacked, that won't affect the important accounts which have different passwords.
olssonm 12y ago
I've seen this idea before, and I really do like it. However, I managed to close my window (had incognito mode), and now I will never be able to retrieve my predictions. No big deal perhaps – but still annoying.
sida 12y ago
Funnily enough, a lot of Bitcoin gambling sites like just-dice.com, also operate on an URL-based account system. It is really minimal barrier to gamble.
hellbreakslose 12y ago
AMEN BROTHER!
mschuster91 12y ago
It would be very cool if browsers had an "auto-register" feature, where you give the browser your information (name, nickname, email) and it automatically fills registration forms when it encounters e.g. an META tag in the page header. One part already exists - the new html5 input type="foo" classes which COULD be used if sites would actually USE them. The other part is the password manager - it would need some rework to generate truly random passwords. Oh, and if the email confirmation messages could be standardized, too, then the mailclient could automatically confirm the mail. edit: dear website owners, please allow facebook, twitter or any OpenID based flow, no matter how much you dislike these services. I hate nothing more than the tedious crap of filling out differently laid out forms, captchas and email confirmations.
- arethuza 12y ago
  That's a lovely idea - I rather like the idea of a standard for "one touch registration" that would: - Give the site a username (and negotiate a new one if my preferences are already taken) - Generate a password and store it somewhere sensible - Generate a unique email address and pass it to the site - Handle the email confirmation My initial reaction was, of course, why would sites ever support such a thing (they don't get real names or real email addresses)? But then I realized that could be a great way for a site to prove to me that they have absolutely no intention of handing my details to other people - so it might work as a way of identifying sites that have honorable intentions. Edit: Does anything like this already exist?
- mtdewcmu 12y ago
  I work on websites in drupal and so I've both given thought to this problem and seen how the process works from the inside. The problem with random passwords is that they are impossible to remember, so you have to have your password file with you all the time if you want to be able to access those sites from another computer. The lack of a standardized registration form is not likely to change as long as sites manage their own accounts. However, perhaps there is some way that accounts and registration could be outsourced to a third party. It would have to be a company, or perhaps some not-for-profit entity, that did account management as their only business, so that they weren't just trying to use it as a vehicle to advertise their other business or sell your data, like Facebook. If it was simple, streamlined, and effective for both site owner and user, it could become a de facto standard.
mtdewcmu 12y ago
Somebody really needs to solve this problem. I've given some thought to it, but I haven't come up with any idea that's a slam-dunk.
nwalfield 12y ago
An unguessable ID that designates some resource is called a (crypto) capability. Capabilities are quite different from access control lists (ACLs). In an ACL system, the list of authorized principals is attached to the resource. Thus, sharing access to a resource requires updating the resource. For instance, if Alice creates a document and wants to share it with Bob, then Bob needs an account and Alice needs to add Bob to the document's ACL. In a capability system, the capabilities designate the resource and sharing the resource is as simple as copying the capability. In fact, Bob can also share the document (without copying it first) with Carol. In an ACL system, Bob would not typically have permission to update the ACL. For more information about capabilities, start with, for instance, the e-rights wiki at http://erights.org/elib/capability/index.html http://erights.org/elib/capability/index.html .
Malarkey73 12y ago
Here in the UK I played a game on the CBeebies website with my daughter (age 7). It wanted her to sign up for an account with an email address and details so that she could save her progress. She just plays from the beginning restarting each time and picking a different path through the game.
- rlpb 12y ago
  This is what cookies were invented for. It could easily save her progress in a persistent cookie with no need to sign up. (Signing up might still be an optional way of persisting that state beyond the cookie, for example to share progress between cookies, but that could easily come later and only when the user wants it)
OliverM 12y ago
Passwords are weird. You give a site your user name and password via a form. Your browser converts these into a http request to a link via parameters. The site sends you your account page, or makes you try again if you fluffed it. Isn't this the equivalent of giving somebody private URL, like in the article? It's essentially the same, functionally, as a password you remember. Except passwords are less secure, as people use the same ones repeatedly, or generate them from a simple system repeatedly (less vulnerable to automated password guessing attempts, but as vulnerable to a dedicated human attacker). Are their web frameworks that let you determine if a user is genuine by their behaviour as much as their passwords? E.g. if I usually log in from the US, why am I suddenly logging in from Russia, less than a half-hour since I logged in via the US?
- boobsbr 12y ago
  That's an interesting idea. But when you submit your user/pass and are logged in, a cookie is set on your browser, and then a private link with your page is sent back to you. To access the private link, you'd need to be authenticated by that cookie. And the only way to obtain the cookie is through a user/pass form.
  - lazyjones 12y ago
    > But when you submit your user/pass and are logged in, a cookie is set on your browser, and then a private link with your page is sent back to you. Not necessarily. Usually either the link is public (i.e. the same for everyone) and the session ID is in the cookie, or the session ID is in the URL (considered unsafe). This is the default behaviour of various Java application servers when cookies are disabled, for example (a jsessionid=... paramter is added to the URL). The "unique private URL" concept is then functionally equivalent to session IDs in the URL with sessions that never expire.
- thret 12y ago
  I was burned by something like that just yesterday. I've never used my mobile to log onto my email before, but after taking a 4hr trip and expecting an email, I tried and found myself locked out. This despite having the correct password, but it ran me through 'secret questions' which I filled out with gibberish about 20 years ago because I correctly believed they were a security risk. Thanks for that hotmail, very helpful.
fenesiistvan 12y ago
People don't like to register? I don't think so: I am using a CRM as our main website. It has a small "Register" link in the corner which I was unable to remove until now due to my poor html/css knowledge. It doesn't have any functionality. Still we have around 3 new user every day :)
aragot 12y ago
We need to keep in mind that we are the old generation: We all have more than 10 years Internet experience and we know how many times Facebook has betrayed us. Now we should ask the younger generation and people with non-IT jobs what they think about logging in through a social network. Perhaps it's just another noise like managing URLs and Adobe updates.
- lazyjones 12y ago
  > Now we should ask the younger generation Indeed, for them it's probably just a click, they already have no expectation of privacy on the Web. I'd really like to see numbers for various registration methods (where several are available), as well as age distribution for each.
- csixty4 12y ago
  I think we should be asking the older generation why the proposed SSO/Digital Identity solutions from a decade ago never got traction. OAuth is the only thing from back then that got anywhere, and it's been stripped of its identity management components and reduced to single sign-on.
wcchandler 12y ago
I've been hacking away at a hobby project in my spare time that implements this method. You can password protect the page, if you want, but by default the unique ID is publicly accessible. The easiest way to password protect it? Use your email address as the "password." It's also easy to create forks/snapshots using this method. If somebody makes a change that they don't like, or wish to test something themselves and not have their "default" page get crowded then they can share/revert to their one "master" ID, and use their other ID until it's ready. My use case is fairly specific (simple server monitoring tool), but sometimes there are better ways of doing things than the default go-to solution.
- xerophtye 12y ago
  >The easiest way to password protect it? Use your email address as the "password." yeah that would be cool. You open YOUR page and it asks for your email id. So you need to know the username (assuming that's what u make url from) and the email id. Simle two factor auth without annoying sign ups
  - oneeyedpigeon 12y ago
    I'm not sure I'd call that two factor authentication. Sure, there are two unknown elements - effectively, username and password - but I'm pretty sure the intent of two-factor authentication goes a bit further than that.
  - Xurinos 12y ago
    This is not two-factor authentication. It is important to know what it means. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-factor_authentication https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-factor_authentication factors are: * Something only the user knows (e.g., password, PIN, pattern); * Something only the user has (e.g., ATM card, smart card, mobile phone); and * Something only the user is (e.g., biometric characteristic, such as a fingerprint). Your example was two things that someone knows -- one factor.
    - xerophtye 12y ago
bambax 12y ago
I hate to register. If I'm willing to register it means I really need the service; if I need it so much I'm probably okay with paying for it. "Free Registration" doesn't mean anything: if you get me to register for something, you should really ask for money too.
thomasfl 12y ago
Mozilla persona seems to be better than ouath, but most users have unfortunately not heard about it yet.
conradfr 12y ago
To the website owner about the french version : "pronostics", not "pronostiques".
- jbogp 12y ago
  good point. wasn't sure. merci
  - flaie 12y ago
    I sent a message via the contact form (not via email) pointing some spelling mistakes in the French translations, but it was not taken into account for the moment ;-)
    - jbogp 12y ago
      Yes I did change it, especially in the rules ! Except "Brazil" because I needed to keep this international. By the way the French version is not the translation, it's the original.
      - flaie 12y ago
        Ok except that "Brézil" is incorrect, it's "Brésil" or "Brazil" if you want to keep it international. There are still typos on the league page "Voir ses pronotics" is missing a "s" for example. But as I said in the message the site is usable so I don't really care that much, it's just some polishing that would make it greater.
pauljohncleary 12y ago
I solved this problem (at http://tab.bz http://tab.bz) by creating a fake account with a dummy username/password when a user first interacts with the site. All of the user's work is saved to that account, so they're free to do anything they like. When they "Register" we just change the email and password
- hughstephens 12y ago
  This is quite smart -- thanks Paul! Might use it for something else I'm building.
- TuringTest 12y ago
  That may very well be a good way to handle first-time users, but I can't make any sense of how the site works, and there's no help page. The testimonials make it look like something I'd like to use, if only I could understand how to use it.
leorocky 12y ago
> I know I'm going to need to come up with some password. I agree with the premise, but you shouldn't come up with passwords when you register. You should use a password manager that generates a unique password for every site you use.
bguthrie 12y ago
No, what this article states is that the author hates to register, and for their particular app, not registering may have made a difference in its adoption rate. That doesn't say much about the implications of registration for your business. I recently launched an app that requires Facebook registration. I expected it to be a disaster, but a necessary evil for our first pass. I was shocked to find a conversion rate from opening the app to logging in of 95%; it's not hurting us nearly as badly as I anticipated. Measure!
- sillysaurus3 12y ago
  Which tools are you using to measure your stats?
- TuringTest 12y ago
  I don't know about the needs for a business, but regarding the needs of the site's users, the article is dead-on.
- thejosh 12y ago
  Isn't his for a website? Is yours a mobile app? I'm guessing that since the user has already committed to downloading the app, and probably has FB clients on their phone it's easy for them to use FB oauth (since it's actually quite nice how that is haandled), they probably just want to use the app and are happy to sign in with FB.
  - bguthrie 12y ago
    Neither myself or the author presented a controlled study; they are both individualized experiences that may or may not be relevant to one's own project. I'm simply trying to say that the OP isn't gospel. That said, for the forcefulness of the headline, I would've expected much more data.
- CR45H 12y ago
  Well, I guess I would be one of the 5% because I absolutely refuse to sign in to anything with FB (or any other "social" sign-in).
joeblau 12y ago
Here is a thought that I've been playing with over the previous weeks, but I'm not sure if it's viable. What if instead of making a website, you created an entirely mobile application? My theory is that you could eliminate the need for creating accounts since most people only usually use one device. You can still have all of the mechanics for inviting and creating teams, because that would be native to the system. All you would need to do is store a UUID for each user. There are a few drawbacks to this approach such as a user losing their device. Essentially all of their history would be lost with it unless you used something like CloudKit to back the users info up. The problem with an API like CloudKit is that it isn't cross platform (yet). A user with multiple devices could join the same game, but I don't see how that would stop users with multiple emails from accomplishing the same thing. Just something I was thinking about, but I do agree with not creating more accounts. There needs to be a more elegant solution.
- uptown 12y ago
  "My theory is that you could eliminate the need for creating accounts since most people only usually use one device." I think that's a very risky assumption, and only bound to be less-true as time goes on.
  - thret 12y ago
    And is a nightmare if your device is stolen.
  - nvdk 12y ago
    agreed, tablet + phone is quite common for example
    - SalimoS 12y ago
      but tablet + phone have generally the same iCloud/google account and event if the device is stoled you can recover the account !
- woogle 12y ago
  As you said CloudKit provides a very efficient approach for this. With CloudKit the app get an unique persistant identifier related to the iCloud account. The cons are it only works through Apple devices for now. But if you have an iOS only app, it's so easy to identify the user through all his devices without asking him anything. And if it loose his phone or use the app on another device, his CloudKit ID is persistant (and related to your app(s) only, not global).
mcv 12y ago
I wholeheartedly agree! At the time of the Adobe password leak, I was surprised to find that I had an account there. I'm not a heavy Adobe user, and certainly not a paying customer. So why did I have an account? I suspect I had to create one at some point simply to be able to download something for free. Requiring registration for something that's free is totally unnecessary. Now they had my password for something that didn't need one, and by leaking it, they leaked the password I also used on other sites that shouldn't need a password. There's a popular Dutch site, datumprikker.nl (date picker) that works exactly like the author describes. No need for accounts; just a link and you fill in only the stuff that's actually necessary for the service to work. It's very popular for a reason: no hassle, easy to use, nobody has to register or sign up.
- annnnd 12y ago
  Just use mailcatch.com - you enter whatever@mailcatch.com as your e-mail, then check http://whatever.mailcatch.com/ http://whatever.mailcatch.com/ to see your "inbox". Great stuff. Of course, this is only applicable if you don't care who uses the newly created account (because all such e-mail is public).
- aestra 12y ago
  >I had to create one at some point simply to be able to download something for free. I only use bugmenot for those sites.
MicroBerto 12y ago
We run a Price comparison site for nutrition products. The main reason we have a "registration" process is so that you can sign up for price drop alerts on your favorite brands, products, categories, and our hot deals we find. So, since these users want to receive emails from us, the system proposed simply won't work. We've spent a fair amount of time refining our process, and still have ways to go, but this is the current process: 1. User is not logged in, wants to get a price alert on their favorite protein. They click the button. 2. A modal popup comes in, only asking for their email. 3. They're now logged in, and the alert is saved (but not activated). They're told to check their email. 4. We send an activation email via Mandrill. 5. They activate, when entails entering a password and their (optional) full name, and all price alerts are now active for them. 6. After they activate, we send them on over to a welcome page, showing them where they can see their settings. This process is as simple as we can make it. The only thing I want to change is some of the verbage in #4. Right now it's a blanket Confirmation email, but doesn't mention the product they want to follow. Our userbase is all over the map in terms of gmail, facebook, and twitter. I don't trust any of those. So this is our best thing. See my profile if you want to test it out.
- revelation 12y ago
  Why have a password and full name or the whole UI shebang around logins? Save their email in a cookie, then only send a confirmation email for the first alert. Prepopulate the alert sign up with the mail from their cookie.
  - MicroBerto 12y ago
    But what about when they come from another browser or on mobile? Most people will check their email from their mobile devices. Could be a different browser than where they started, so now they have no easy way of removing the alert, (unless we generate new codes for that in every email?)
    - revelation 12y ago
      You should already be providing one-click unlist links in every mail you send out. That is pretty much the law in some european countries now.
brudgers 12y ago
I don't really hate sites that require registration unnecessarily, because, well, I usually don't register, and until reading the article I always thought it was some combination of the bother of password management and a dislike for being tracked, I mean you know, if I didn't care about being tracked I'd just let my browser keep phoning home to the 1000's of tracking companies, and stay logged into Facebook and Gplus and hell I'd stay on Windows and use consumer grade AntiVirus software and the Ask toolbar that Adobe and Oracle like to install as default by default. Not caring should mean not caring, dammit. But as I read the article I realized that it's really something else. Requiring a user name and email means a trip to Epcot. It ain't Europe. There are hyperlinks and pages and it looks like the internet. But it isn't. The links will all be part of a sitemap. Registering is symptomatic of crabtraps: once in, the only way out is back the way I came in and usually what's in the middle is pretty much a three day old fish head, which isn't too bad if one is a crab, I imagine, but a fishhead in a cage is still pretty much a fishhead in a cage compared to the entire fucking ocean...even to a crabby bastard like me. I'm the first to admit that there are a lot more smart people in the world than I tend to imagine, but the odds that I want to spend time in someone's crabtrap for a few bytes of the someone's idea of the best fishhead ever are pretty low. I mean if I'm that bored, there's YouTube and HN and Facebook and Twitter. And one of them doesn't even require me to register...at least not yet. Don't get me wrong, you probably don't want me as a customer anyway - requiring registration makes sense by filtering out people who might be harder to track. It's the strategy successfully used by Nigerian princes. http://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/default.aspx?id=167713 http://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/default.aspx?id=1677...
SimpleXYZ 12y ago
Name: afdssdf email: fsdass@dfafd.com password:fsdssd How many times have I filled forms out like that? Probably over 10,000. I also use my fake facebook account almost as much as my real one.
- BillyParadise 12y ago
  As long as you always use afdssdf@. If you ever want to log in again (without reregistering), be sure you don't use afdsddf@!
  - SimpleXYZ 12y ago
    No, those are just random. If I find I actually want an account, I'll log-out and sign up with a real e-mail/password. (It's very rare.) Most sites that require e-mail I will just leave an never come back. If it looks SUPER useful or amazing I'll go to the trouble of getting a disposable e-mail account.
ph4 12y ago
This is a good way to piss off your marketing department. Unfortunately sometimes UX has to take a hit in the name of the bottom line. Email/direct marketing works. It won't deliver value to every user on every contact, but even 5% response rates can offer ROI.
- warcode 12y ago
  Make software to solve problems and help people. The money will follow. You don't need ALL the money, just enough money.
lucb1e 12y ago
The author is right in that I do not want to sign up with Facebook, Twitter, Github, Google+ or any other SSO SPOF. He is wrong in that "Nooooo people do not want to create an account either". If there is a reason to register, I am perfectly happy creating an account with a self-invented password and email validation, even if it's to do only so much as post a few comments under the same name somewhere.
jeena 12y ago
The problem I have with this solution is that I have already lost the link to the ligue I created an hour ago and have no way to get back there :( BrowserId (Persona) would work a bit better for me.
- eitland 12y ago
  Browser history?
  - jeena 12y ago
    Ok you're right, but on the other hand if I, a vivid user of the browser didn't think about searching the browser history for that, other people will neither.
drivingmenuts 12y ago
Sometimes I wonder if the only actual value of an site is in the list of people who sign up?
sebastianconcpt 12y ago
The site is super cute. You don't need that to predict the WorldCup outcome. The cup is staying in Brazil. It's all here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKded0d0M7E https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKded0d0M7E In the other hand, the signing up issue is valid
wldcordeiro 12y ago
The most obnoxious offenders are job sites for specific companies. You need to create an account that you will use probably a handful of times. To make it worse they all use something like Taleo but for some reason can't share logins.
- aestra 12y ago
  This is very truly annoying but I believe that it serves a purpose of reducing spam job applications.
Chromozon 12y ago
I was one of the users who went to your website the first time it was posted, saw that you had to register to see anything at all, and left. +1 for the changes!
sophiaedm 12y ago
no password, no login = facefeed
cpeterso 12y ago
I was shopping for high-speed internet yesterday. Comcast's website refused to share any details about their internet options' prices or bandwidths until I registered an account. I guess when you are a near monopoly like Comcast, price comparison is not something your customers need to worry themselves about..
LukeB_UK 12y ago
I quite like Twitter's approach: https://twitter.com/signup https://twitter.com/signup 4 Fields, all relevant.
throwaway420 12y ago
Now, this obviously wouldn't work for most types of bank or email security, but for casual forums and things, I really like the way that Bret Victor presented the trip phrase concept. http://worrydream.com/#!/tripphrase http://worrydream.com/#!/tripphrase
rogerbinns 12y ago
There is a fantastic article https://www.uie.com/articles/three_hund_million_button/ https://www.uie.com/articles/three_hund_million_button/ and followup http://www.uie.com/brainsparks/2011/10/17/the-back-story-for-the-300-million-button/ http://www.uie.com/brainsparks/2011/10/17/the-back-story-for... about the $300 million button. They showed just how much forcing people to register actually costs, and stats on how many accounts people had, how often they remembered which one was used etc.
PythonicAlpha 12y ago
eMail-only registration I found the discussion about registration so inspiring, that I wanted to throw in a different approach that I outlined in an own blog post and posted as different thread. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7884415 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7884415
takinola 12y ago
I hate to register on sites but I often do. This is because if I expect the trade off between the pain of registration against the value I expect to get from continuing to use the full functionality to be positive then I sign up. My pain from registration is largely due to the friction from having to think up a unique username (I hate when my favorite username is already taken) and making up a password. I am really not bothered by receiving email from services as most respectable sites will unsubscribe you with one click and if they don't I simply mark their email as spam. I never sign up with social services (GooFaceTwit) due to my irrational fear that at some point my activity on the site will be made public without my consent. Your takeaway as a product owner I think is that if you are building a service for technical folks (would your typical user hang out on HN? If so, read on. If not, ymmv), you should really think about if your service truly needs user registration (I have seen some creative workarounds that don't impose a burden on the customer and still allow the product to achieve business objectives). If you do need registration, you should remove as many impediments as you can (meaningful engagement prior to registration, email as username, only ask for information you absolutely need to have, stagger your profile updates within the user lifecycle, etc). Personally, I would like to see a structural solution to the registration problem. This is such a common issue for a significant portion of the web that it should be solved at the browser level. Why is there not a "Register for this site" button on the browser chrome? The user signs into their browser and from then on can simply create an account on any site by clicking the button. A little drop down or tooltip can show what information they need to share to successfully register so the user is making an informed choice. I shouldn't need to enter a user name password combo on any website ever again and the entire process should be as easy as hitting the back button.

192 points by jbogp 12y ago

Spot on. I like the method he used - simple on the code end of things, simple for the end-user. I think simplicity is a proxy for success. I think the only reasonable time to require someone's email (or other contact information) is when sending emails delivers real value to your users - when there is no other way to accomplish what you need to, except by sending email.

iambase 12y ago

Wait up ! Signing up via twitter or Fb is pretty clutch afaic

sdrinf 12y ago

This is definitely a solution to the registration problem; and metrics will probably back you up on conversion. However, a major drawback of this occurs while moving across multiple devices: Peter (fictional archetype) might click through on his work computer; then go home, and might want to have another look at the site; however he won't have any recollection of his "personal URL", nor any way to access it. Peter will, at this point, perceive all his time investment going down the drain. He will either re-register (to be wacked on the head when he's back at work again), or refuse the site altogether. Note this is different in Doodle's case, due to it's inherent sharing nature: people will email the link as part of the main process, so they're able to get back later. One way to see how this affects user's lifecycle is measuring: 1, username only; 2, username + email; 3, username, email, password variants against eachother, across the entire user funnel: registration, main mechanics, retention (or length of lifecycle).

deleted 12y ago
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jbogp 12y ago
I think the combining the "no registration at all" with an optional "send me the link via email" is really nice. Actually of the 5000 people who have "registered", more than half have given their email address... probably means people like optional stuff, I know I do.
- mrweasel 12y ago
  Do you then store the email address after having sent the link to the user? Because I don't think people view it as "giving their email address", but more like "send me the link and forget that you ever saw my email address".
  - jbogp 12y ago
    Nah I don't actually. Just have a field in the db to know if they gave one or not, for statistics purposes...
    - kubiiii 12y ago
      Storing emails would be a convenient way to send the link if the user did not send it from the registration page or lost it in the meantime. As a user I would love seeing this kind of identification and would probably set a email account only used to recover links and avoid sharing my main email account. Nice work by the way.
      - jbogp 12y ago
        Good point, but for something done in 3 days I didn't want to risk having left some SQL injection somewhere somehow and leaking people's email. But yes that's a good idea.
philers 12y ago
I think that your exception for Doodle's case is also applicable to this use case and many more: if you're creating a predict-a-score league with your friends, you're going to have to share it immediately.

webhat 12y ago

Completely agree! Our website does require you register. Only at the end - just before payment - do we ask for an email address. EDIT: the email address is so we can send you the product you just ordered.

taspeotis 12y ago
Those are the worst kinds of websites.
- webhat 12y ago
  I'm still trying to figure out what you mean.
  - taspeotis 12y ago
    Wait for the user to invest some time in your website and then bam! Register now.
    - webhat 12y ago
      Ah, I see, we are an online school. You can browse the courses, and some course materials for free, but if you want to take them and get credit you need to pay.
jessaustin 12y ago
Why not just provide a link to the product on the last page in the process? This could even be a link that automatically stopped working after it was used a few times. Harvesting email addresses is definitely not the only way to solve this problem, so it seems unfriendly to allow only that method.
- webhat 12y ago
  For many use cases this would not be required. We have an online school. How would you solve being an online school without the ability to contact your students by email?

csbrooks 12y ago

It's unfortunate that signing up via Facebook or twitter or some other OAuth method gives people such a creepy feeling. It sure is a lot more convenient for everyone involved: don't need a password, no email confirmation, sometimes it's one click and you're in. I feel like Facebook screwed this up for everyone when people's feeds were covered with apps their friends were using. Now when a site asks you to authorize it with facebook, users don't feel like they can trust what it's going to do.

jbogp 12y ago
I agree. I think the creepy feeling comes from the potential threat to your private life... I know Facebook and the others are trying hard to make it clear what permissions are involved each time you sign-up but the fact that you have to check "ooh this one can access my friends list, I don't like that" is pretty unconfortable
- lazyjones 12y ago
  > I know Facebook and the others are trying hard to make it clear what permissions are involved each time you sign-up What they don't make clear is that Facebook is informed every time people visit (or in some cases, login in to) those other sites and can generate better profiles from that data, even sleep schedules, even for people who rarely use FB itself.
return0 12y ago
I would like a minimal identity provider, i.e. something like BrowserID where you can create throwaway identities that is not associated with any social presence.
- skrebbel 12y ago
  I used to think that this was an ideal space for governments, or some semi-public organization. Identity as a societal service, much like running water and electricity and highways. But then Snowden dropped by to tell us that we can trust our own governments even less than all these companies.

JulianMorrison 12y ago

Website creators seem to not understand that when we register, we are giving them something of serious value - we are giving up our privacy. And I do not give that to strangers in exchange for nothing.

mtdewcmu 12y ago
You don't necessarily lose privacy by making up a username and password for a site. You do lose some privacy if you use social sign-on or the site requires you to provide an email address that's verified. My pet peeve is the arbitrary rules that sites now have for passwords. When I am registering for something I don't care much about just because I have to, my inclination is to use the same easy-to-remember password I always use. But the rules thwart this, and no two sites can agree on the same rules, thus forcing me to alter the password, and guaranteeing that I will not remember it.
- vdaniuk 12y ago
  Ah, yes, one easy-to-remember password for large number of sites is definitely a great way to protect your security. /s Complaining about loss of privacy, but eagerly weakening your security for convenience. I don't understand this argument at all.
  - mtdewcmu 12y ago
    I wasn't complaining about loss of privacy. I was talking about when I have to create an account that I don't need just because the site requires it.
  - tim333 12y ago
    Works for me with sites I don't give a damn about.
  - pjc50 12y ago
    It depends on the site; especially if I never wanted to register for it at all. It's their security I'm compromising. I don't particularly care if the account I made for some random product information website gets hijacked, that won't affect the important accounts which have different passwords.

olssonm 12y ago

I've seen this idea before, and I really do like it. However, I managed to close my window (had incognito mode), and now I will never be able to retrieve my predictions. No big deal perhaps – but still annoying.

sida 12y ago

Funnily enough, a lot of Bitcoin gambling sites like just-dice.com, also operate on an URL-based account system. It is really minimal barrier to gamble.

hellbreakslose 12y ago

AMEN BROTHER!

mschuster91 12y ago

It would be very cool if browsers had an "auto-register" feature, where you give the browser your information (name, nickname, email) and it automatically fills registration forms when it encounters e.g. an META tag in the page header. One part already exists - the new html5 input type="foo" classes which COULD be used if sites would actually USE them. The other part is the password manager - it would need some rework to generate truly random passwords. Oh, and if the email confirmation messages could be standardized, too, then the mailclient could automatically confirm the mail. edit: dear website owners, please allow facebook, twitter or any OpenID based flow, no matter how much you dislike these services. I hate nothing more than the tedious crap of filling out differently laid out forms, captchas and email confirmations.

arethuza 12y ago
That's a lovely idea - I rather like the idea of a standard for "one touch registration" that would: - Give the site a username (and negotiate a new one if my preferences are already taken) - Generate a password and store it somewhere sensible - Generate a unique email address and pass it to the site - Handle the email confirmation My initial reaction was, of course, why would sites ever support such a thing (they don't get real names or real email addresses)? But then I realized that could be a great way for a site to prove to me that they have absolutely no intention of handing my details to other people - so it might work as a way of identifying sites that have honorable intentions. Edit: Does anything like this already exist?
mtdewcmu 12y ago
I work on websites in drupal and so I've both given thought to this problem and seen how the process works from the inside. The problem with random passwords is that they are impossible to remember, so you have to have your password file with you all the time if you want to be able to access those sites from another computer. The lack of a standardized registration form is not likely to change as long as sites manage their own accounts. However, perhaps there is some way that accounts and registration could be outsourced to a third party. It would have to be a company, or perhaps some not-for-profit entity, that did account management as their only business, so that they weren't just trying to use it as a vehicle to advertise their other business or sell your data, like Facebook. If it was simple, streamlined, and effective for both site owner and user, it could become a de facto standard.

mtdewcmu 12y ago

Somebody really needs to solve this problem. I've given some thought to it, but I haven't come up with any idea that's a slam-dunk.

nwalfield 12y ago

An unguessable ID that designates some resource is called a (crypto) capability. Capabilities are quite different from access control lists (ACLs). In an ACL system, the list of authorized principals is attached to the resource. Thus, sharing access to a resource requires updating the resource. For instance, if Alice creates a document and wants to share it with Bob, then Bob needs an account and Alice needs to add Bob to the document's ACL. In a capability system, the capabilities designate the resource and sharing the resource is as simple as copying the capability. In fact, Bob can also share the document (without copying it first) with Carol. In an ACL system, Bob would not typically have permission to update the ACL. For more information about capabilities, start with, for instance, the e-rights wiki at http://erights.org/elib/capability/index.html http://erights.org/elib/capability/index.html .

Malarkey73 12y ago

Here in the UK I played a game on the CBeebies website with my daughter (age 7). It wanted her to sign up for an account with an email address and details so that she could save her progress. She just plays from the beginning restarting each time and picking a different path through the game.

rlpb 12y ago
This is what cookies were invented for. It could easily save her progress in a persistent cookie with no need to sign up. (Signing up might still be an optional way of persisting that state beyond the cookie, for example to share progress between cookies, but that could easily come later and only when the user wants it)

OliverM 12y ago

Passwords are weird. You give a site your user name and password via a form. Your browser converts these into a http request to a link via parameters. The site sends you your account page, or makes you try again if you fluffed it. Isn't this the equivalent of giving somebody private URL, like in the article? It's essentially the same, functionally, as a password you remember. Except passwords are less secure, as people use the same ones repeatedly, or generate them from a simple system repeatedly (less vulnerable to automated password guessing attempts, but as vulnerable to a dedicated human attacker). Are their web frameworks that let you determine if a user is genuine by their behaviour as much as their passwords? E.g. if I usually log in from the US, why am I suddenly logging in from Russia, less than a half-hour since I logged in via the US?

boobsbr 12y ago
That's an interesting idea. But when you submit your user/pass and are logged in, a cookie is set on your browser, and then a private link with your page is sent back to you. To access the private link, you'd need to be authenticated by that cookie. And the only way to obtain the cookie is through a user/pass form.
- lazyjones 12y ago
  > But when you submit your user/pass and are logged in, a cookie is set on your browser, and then a private link with your page is sent back to you. Not necessarily. Usually either the link is public (i.e. the same for everyone) and the session ID is in the cookie, or the session ID is in the URL (considered unsafe). This is the default behaviour of various Java application servers when cookies are disabled, for example (a jsessionid=... paramter is added to the URL). The "unique private URL" concept is then functionally equivalent to session IDs in the URL with sessions that never expire.
thret 12y ago
I was burned by something like that just yesterday. I've never used my mobile to log onto my email before, but after taking a 4hr trip and expecting an email, I tried and found myself locked out. This despite having the correct password, but it ran me through 'secret questions' which I filled out with gibberish about 20 years ago because I correctly believed they were a security risk. Thanks for that hotmail, very helpful.

fenesiistvan 12y ago

People don't like to register? I don't think so: I am using a CRM as our main website. It has a small "Register" link in the corner which I was unable to remove until now due to my poor html/css knowledge. It doesn't have any functionality. Still we have around 3 new user every day :)

aragot 12y ago

We need to keep in mind that we are the old generation: We all have more than 10 years Internet experience and we know how many times Facebook has betrayed us. Now we should ask the younger generation and people with non-IT jobs what they think about logging in through a social network. Perhaps it's just another noise like managing URLs and Adobe updates.

lazyjones 12y ago
> Now we should ask the younger generation Indeed, for them it's probably just a click, they already have no expectation of privacy on the Web. I'd really like to see numbers for various registration methods (where several are available), as well as age distribution for each.
csixty4 12y ago
I think we should be asking the older generation why the proposed SSO/Digital Identity solutions from a decade ago never got traction. OAuth is the only thing from back then that got anywhere, and it's been stripped of its identity management components and reduced to single sign-on.

wcchandler 12y ago

I've been hacking away at a hobby project in my spare time that implements this method. You can password protect the page, if you want, but by default the unique ID is publicly accessible. The easiest way to password protect it? Use your email address as the "password." It's also easy to create forks/snapshots using this method. If somebody makes a change that they don't like, or wish to test something themselves and not have their "default" page get crowded then they can share/revert to their one "master" ID, and use their other ID until it's ready. My use case is fairly specific (simple server monitoring tool), but sometimes there are better ways of doing things than the default go-to solution.

xerophtye 12y ago
>The easiest way to password protect it? Use your email address as the "password." yeah that would be cool. You open YOUR page and it asks for your email id. So you need to know the username (assuming that's what u make url from) and the email id. Simle two factor auth without annoying sign ups
- oneeyedpigeon 12y ago
  I'm not sure I'd call that two factor authentication. Sure, there are two unknown elements - effectively, username and password - but I'm pretty sure the intent of two-factor authentication goes a bit further than that.
- Xurinos 12y ago
  This is not two-factor authentication. It is important to know what it means. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-factor_authentication https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-factor_authentication factors are: * Something only the user knows (e.g., password, PIN, pattern); * Something only the user has (e.g., ATM card, smart card, mobile phone); and * Something only the user is (e.g., biometric characteristic, such as a fingerprint). Your example was two things that someone knows -- one factor.
  - xerophtye 12y ago

bambax 12y ago

I hate to register. If I'm willing to register it means I really need the service; if I need it so much I'm probably okay with paying for it. "Free Registration" doesn't mean anything: if you get me to register for something, you should really ask for money too.

thomasfl 12y ago

Mozilla persona seems to be better than ouath, but most users have unfortunately not heard about it yet.

conradfr 12y ago

To the website owner about the french version : "pronostics", not "pronostiques".

jbogp 12y ago
good point. wasn't sure. merci
- flaie 12y ago
  I sent a message via the contact form (not via email) pointing some spelling mistakes in the French translations, but it was not taken into account for the moment ;-)
  - jbogp 12y ago
    Yes I did change it, especially in the rules ! Except "Brazil" because I needed to keep this international. By the way the French version is not the translation, it's the original.
    - flaie 12y ago
      Ok except that "Brézil" is incorrect, it's "Brésil" or "Brazil" if you want to keep it international. There are still typos on the league page "Voir ses pronotics" is missing a "s" for example. But as I said in the message the site is usable so I don't really care that much, it's just some polishing that would make it greater.

pauljohncleary 12y ago

I solved this problem (at http://tab.bz http://tab.bz) by creating a fake account with a dummy username/password when a user first interacts with the site. All of the user's work is saved to that account, so they're free to do anything they like. When they "Register" we just change the email and password

hughstephens 12y ago
This is quite smart -- thanks Paul! Might use it for something else I'm building.
TuringTest 12y ago
That may very well be a good way to handle first-time users, but I can't make any sense of how the site works, and there's no help page. The testimonials make it look like something I'd like to use, if only I could understand how to use it.

leorocky 12y ago

> I know I'm going to need to come up with some password. I agree with the premise, but you shouldn't come up with passwords when you register. You should use a password manager that generates a unique password for every site you use.

bguthrie 12y ago

No, what this article states is that the author hates to register, and for their particular app, not registering may have made a difference in its adoption rate. That doesn't say much about the implications of registration for your business. I recently launched an app that requires Facebook registration. I expected it to be a disaster, but a necessary evil for our first pass. I was shocked to find a conversion rate from opening the app to logging in of 95%; it's not hurting us nearly as badly as I anticipated. Measure!

sillysaurus3 12y ago
Which tools are you using to measure your stats?
TuringTest 12y ago
I don't know about the needs for a business, but regarding the needs of the site's users, the article is dead-on.
thejosh 12y ago
Isn't his for a website? Is yours a mobile app? I'm guessing that since the user has already committed to downloading the app, and probably has FB clients on their phone it's easy for them to use FB oauth (since it's actually quite nice how that is haandled), they probably just want to use the app and are happy to sign in with FB.
- bguthrie 12y ago
  Neither myself or the author presented a controlled study; they are both individualized experiences that may or may not be relevant to one's own project. I'm simply trying to say that the OP isn't gospel. That said, for the forcefulness of the headline, I would've expected much more data.
CR45H 12y ago
Well, I guess I would be one of the 5% because I absolutely refuse to sign in to anything with FB (or any other "social" sign-in).

joeblau 12y ago

Here is a thought that I've been playing with over the previous weeks, but I'm not sure if it's viable. What if instead of making a website, you created an entirely mobile application? My theory is that you could eliminate the need for creating accounts since most people only usually use one device. You can still have all of the mechanics for inviting and creating teams, because that would be native to the system. All you would need to do is store a UUID for each user. There are a few drawbacks to this approach such as a user losing their device. Essentially all of their history would be lost with it unless you used something like CloudKit to back the users info up. The problem with an API like CloudKit is that it isn't cross platform (yet). A user with multiple devices could join the same game, but I don't see how that would stop users with multiple emails from accomplishing the same thing. Just something I was thinking about, but I do agree with not creating more accounts. There needs to be a more elegant solution.

uptown 12y ago
"My theory is that you could eliminate the need for creating accounts since most people only usually use one device." I think that's a very risky assumption, and only bound to be less-true as time goes on.
- thret 12y ago
  And is a nightmare if your device is stolen.
- nvdk 12y ago
  agreed, tablet + phone is quite common for example
  - SalimoS 12y ago
    but tablet + phone have generally the same iCloud/google account and event if the device is stoled you can recover the account !
woogle 12y ago
As you said CloudKit provides a very efficient approach for this. With CloudKit the app get an unique persistant identifier related to the iCloud account. The cons are it only works through Apple devices for now. But if you have an iOS only app, it's so easy to identify the user through all his devices without asking him anything. And if it loose his phone or use the app on another device, his CloudKit ID is persistant (and related to your app(s) only, not global).

mcv 12y ago

I wholeheartedly agree! At the time of the Adobe password leak, I was surprised to find that I had an account there. I'm not a heavy Adobe user, and certainly not a paying customer. So why did I have an account? I suspect I had to create one at some point simply to be able to download something for free. Requiring registration for something that's free is totally unnecessary. Now they had my password for something that didn't need one, and by leaking it, they leaked the password I also used on other sites that shouldn't need a password. There's a popular Dutch site, datumprikker.nl (date picker) that works exactly like the author describes. No need for accounts; just a link and you fill in only the stuff that's actually necessary for the service to work. It's very popular for a reason: no hassle, easy to use, nobody has to register or sign up.

annnnd 12y ago
Just use mailcatch.com - you enter whatever@mailcatch.com as your e-mail, then check http://whatever.mailcatch.com/ http://whatever.mailcatch.com/ to see your "inbox". Great stuff. Of course, this is only applicable if you don't care who uses the newly created account (because all such e-mail is public).
aestra 12y ago
>I had to create one at some point simply to be able to download something for free. I only use bugmenot for those sites.

MicroBerto 12y ago

We run a Price comparison site for nutrition products. The main reason we have a "registration" process is so that you can sign up for price drop alerts on your favorite brands, products, categories, and our hot deals we find. So, since these users want to receive emails from us, the system proposed simply won't work. We've spent a fair amount of time refining our process, and still have ways to go, but this is the current process: 1. User is not logged in, wants to get a price alert on their favorite protein. They click the button. 2. A modal popup comes in, only asking for their email. 3. They're now logged in, and the alert is saved (but not activated). They're told to check their email. 4. We send an activation email via Mandrill. 5. They activate, when entails entering a password and their (optional) full name, and all price alerts are now active for them. 6. After they activate, we send them on over to a welcome page, showing them where they can see their settings. This process is as simple as we can make it. The only thing I want to change is some of the verbage in #4. Right now it's a blanket Confirmation email, but doesn't mention the product they want to follow. Our userbase is all over the map in terms of gmail, facebook, and twitter. I don't trust any of those. So this is our best thing. See my profile if you want to test it out.

revelation 12y ago
Why have a password and full name or the whole UI shebang around logins? Save their email in a cookie, then only send a confirmation email for the first alert. Prepopulate the alert sign up with the mail from their cookie.
- MicroBerto 12y ago
  But what about when they come from another browser or on mobile? Most people will check their email from their mobile devices. Could be a different browser than where they started, so now they have no easy way of removing the alert, (unless we generate new codes for that in every email?)
  - revelation 12y ago
    You should already be providing one-click unlist links in every mail you send out. That is pretty much the law in some european countries now.

brudgers 12y ago

I don't really hate sites that require registration unnecessarily, because, well, I usually don't register, and until reading the article I always thought it was some combination of the bother of password management and a dislike for being tracked, I mean you know, if I didn't care about being tracked I'd just let my browser keep phoning home to the 1000's of tracking companies, and stay logged into Facebook and Gplus and hell I'd stay on Windows and use consumer grade AntiVirus software and the Ask toolbar that Adobe and Oracle like to install as default by default. Not caring should mean not caring, dammit. But as I read the article I realized that it's really something else. Requiring a user name and email means a trip to Epcot. It ain't Europe. There are hyperlinks and pages and it looks like the internet. But it isn't. The links will all be part of a sitemap. Registering is symptomatic of crabtraps: once in, the only way out is back the way I came in and usually what's in the middle is pretty much a three day old fish head, which isn't too bad if one is a crab, I imagine, but a fishhead in a cage is still pretty much a fishhead in a cage compared to the entire fucking ocean...even to a crabby bastard like me. I'm the first to admit that there are a lot more smart people in the world than I tend to imagine, but the odds that I want to spend time in someone's crabtrap for a few bytes of the someone's idea of the best fishhead ever are pretty low. I mean if I'm that bored, there's YouTube and HN and Facebook and Twitter. And one of them doesn't even require me to register...at least not yet. Don't get me wrong, you probably don't want me as a customer anyway - requiring registration makes sense by filtering out people who might be harder to track. It's the strategy successfully used by Nigerian princes. http://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/default.aspx?id=167713 http://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/default.aspx?id=1677...

SimpleXYZ 12y ago

Name: afdssdf email: fsdass@dfafd.com password:fsdssd How many times have I filled forms out like that? Probably over 10,000. I also use my fake facebook account almost as much as my real one.

BillyParadise 12y ago
As long as you always use afdssdf@. If you ever want to log in again (without reregistering), be sure you don't use afdsddf@!
- SimpleXYZ 12y ago
  No, those are just random. If I find I actually want an account, I'll log-out and sign up with a real e-mail/password. (It's very rare.) Most sites that require e-mail I will just leave an never come back. If it looks SUPER useful or amazing I'll go to the trouble of getting a disposable e-mail account.

ph4 12y ago

This is a good way to piss off your marketing department. Unfortunately sometimes UX has to take a hit in the name of the bottom line. Email/direct marketing works. It won't deliver value to every user on every contact, but even 5% response rates can offer ROI.

warcode 12y ago
Make software to solve problems and help people. The money will follow. You don't need ALL the money, just enough money.

lucb1e 12y ago

The author is right in that I do not want to sign up with Facebook, Twitter, Github, Google+ or any other SSO SPOF. He is wrong in that "Nooooo people do not want to create an account either". If there is a reason to register, I am perfectly happy creating an account with a self-invented password and email validation, even if it's to do only so much as post a few comments under the same name somewhere.

jeena 12y ago

The problem I have with this solution is that I have already lost the link to the ligue I created an hour ago and have no way to get back there :( BrowserId (Persona) would work a bit better for me.

eitland 12y ago
Browser history?
- jeena 12y ago
  Ok you're right, but on the other hand if I, a vivid user of the browser didn't think about searching the browser history for that, other people will neither.

drivingmenuts 12y ago

Sometimes I wonder if the only actual value of an site is in the list of people who sign up?

sebastianconcpt 12y ago

The site is super cute. You don't need that to predict the WorldCup outcome. The cup is staying in Brazil. It's all here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKded0d0M7E https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKded0d0M7E In the other hand, the signing up issue is valid

wldcordeiro 12y ago

The most obnoxious offenders are job sites for specific companies. You need to create an account that you will use probably a handful of times. To make it worse they all use something like Taleo but for some reason can't share logins.

aestra 12y ago
This is very truly annoying but I believe that it serves a purpose of reducing spam job applications.

Chromozon 12y ago

I was one of the users who went to your website the first time it was posted, saw that you had to register to see anything at all, and left. +1 for the changes!

sophiaedm 12y ago

no password, no login = facefeed

cpeterso 12y ago

I was shopping for high-speed internet yesterday. Comcast's website refused to share any details about their internet options' prices or bandwidths until I registered an account. I guess when you are a near monopoly like Comcast, price comparison is not something your customers need to worry themselves about..

LukeB_UK 12y ago

I quite like Twitter's approach: https://twitter.com/signup https://twitter.com/signup 4 Fields, all relevant.

throwaway420 12y ago

Now, this obviously wouldn't work for most types of bank or email security, but for casual forums and things, I really like the way that Bret Victor presented the trip phrase concept. http://worrydream.com/#!/tripphrase http://worrydream.com/#!/tripphrase

rogerbinns 12y ago

There is a fantastic article https://www.uie.com/articles/three_hund_million_button/ https://www.uie.com/articles/three_hund_million_button/ and followup http://www.uie.com/brainsparks/2011/10/17/the-back-story-for-the-300-million-button/ http://www.uie.com/brainsparks/2011/10/17/the-back-story-for... about the $300 million button. They showed just how much forcing people to register actually costs, and stats on how many accounts people had, how often they remembered which one was used etc.

PythonicAlpha 12y ago

eMail-only registration I found the discussion about registration so inspiring, that I wanted to throw in a different approach that I outlined in an own blog post and posted as different thread. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7884415 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7884415

takinola 12y ago

I hate to register on sites but I often do. This is because if I expect the trade off between the pain of registration against the value I expect to get from continuing to use the full functionality to be positive then I sign up. My pain from registration is largely due to the friction from having to think up a unique username (I hate when my favorite username is already taken) and making up a password. I am really not bothered by receiving email from services as most respectable sites will unsubscribe you with one click and if they don't I simply mark their email as spam. I never sign up with social services (GooFaceTwit) due to my irrational fear that at some point my activity on the site will be made public without my consent. Your takeaway as a product owner I think is that if you are building a service for technical folks (would your typical user hang out on HN? If so, read on. If not, ymmv), you should really think about if your service truly needs user registration (I have seen some creative workarounds that don't impose a burden on the customer and still allow the product to achieve business objectives). If you do need registration, you should remove as many impediments as you can (meaningful engagement prior to registration, email as username, only ask for information you absolutely need to have, stagger your profile updates within the user lifecycle, etc). Personally, I would like to see a structural solution to the registration problem. This is such a common issue for a significant portion of the web that it should be solved at the browser level. Why is there not a "Register for this site" button on the browser chrome? The user signs into their browser and from then on can simply create an account on any site by clicking the button. A little drop down or tooltip can show what information they need to share to successfully register so the user is making an informed choice. I shouldn't need to enter a user name password combo on any website ever again and the entire process should be as easy as hitting the back button.