4 ms·

Unfortunately, the Ello ecosystem seems more or less resist any non-artsy content like an immune system warding off a plague. They've quite thoroughly positione

by jarcane 11y ago

Unfortunately, the Ello ecosystem seems more or less resist any non-artsy content like an immune system warding off a plague. They've quite thoroughly positioned themselves as an alternative to Tumblr photoblogs, and little else. The recommendations and suggested users are all weighted towards hipstery, partly because the algorithms all seem to be seeded off connections to the founders, themselves artists. The end result is that everyone not interested in posting art photos inevitably seems to get bored and wander away.

sehr 11y ago
It's not totally a bad thing though is it? Seems almost natural for a social network to start with a sort of single focus
- jarcane 11y ago
  No, it's totally a cool place, if that's what you're into. As a writer and a techie though, I struggled to even find anyone else on the network with similar interests, and of those, they seemed to wither away over time. The end result is less a "Facebook-killer" and more a "Tumblr/Pinterest alternative for upmarket artists".
  - ay 11y ago
    Indeed, finding nerds on ello is a bit tricky, and as you say some of them went silent after trying it initially. Amongst my friends https://ello.co/danyork https://ello.co/danyork has been impressively insistent in using it, but that's among the only of my friends that managed to sustain the activity there. That said, with iOS client + with freedom re. your data that they seem to have, I plan to switch over more to it for the longer stuff that does not fit into a tweet - it feels pleasant to write there, even if as an archive for myself. I feel Ello so far as a club-like with whiskey and cigars as opposed to a common living room feel that the FB is.
  - dredmorbius 11y ago
    My suggestion: be the Ello you want it to be, if you're going to play there. Since Markdown's supported, (with a few quirks), content from any other Markdown-based site works well. You don't need to polish text much. Add in images. They boost viewership. Submit posts to appropriate Communities: https://ello.co/wtf/resources/community-directory/ https://ello.co/wtf/resources/community-directory/ Search (both internal and external search engines) helps turn up stuff related to keywords of interest. The social graph is small. My experience elsewhere (G+) was that it took a few years for a real community to gel. And no, it's not a challenge to HN, StackExchange, or Reddit. Or Facebook or G+, for that matter. Yet. But it's got some good basics and the founding community ain't bad. Good stuff does eventually get noticed and passed around.
  - dredmorbius 11y ago
    @ddailey has some amazing SVG examples, I highly recommend him: https://ello.co/ddailey https://ello.co/ddailey There's @ellotech: https://ello.co/ellotech https://ello.co/ellotech And @ellowrites: https://ello.co/ellowrites https://ello.co/ellowrites Search can turn up people writing on topics of interest, say: https://ello.co/search?terms=webdesign https://ello.co/search?terms=webdesign https://ello.co/search?terms=python https://ello.co/search?terms=python (about 90 posts in 9 months) Or you can enjoy the art.
ultimape 11y ago
I never got the whole "facebook alternative" hype that happened. Social network that uses art sales to support itself? I've been on deviant art since 2005 - well before facebook hit popularity.
dredmorbius 11y ago
I'm finding it quite useful for longer-form bloggy posts, especially where including multiple images is preferred. I'm less enamoured overall with the styling, though I've taken my own spin on that: http://stylebot.me/styles/9519 http://stylebot.me/styles/9519 (You'll need to have an account to use that as unauthenticated Ello sessions still default to the Ello v1 style: http://stylebot.me/styles/8070 http://stylebot.me/styles/8070) Basically: with a slew of embeds (video, audio, codepen, and others), graphics, and a decent (though still somewhat flawed) Markdown support (biggest omissions are blockquotes and lack of distinguished headers, though a few other glitches annoy me), it's possible to create well-structured long-form documents. Yes, there's quite the artistic community there, and no, discussion's not yet up to the level I'd like to see it, though I'm finding a few interesting voices. One thing Ello's taken to heart is hacking around the very small social graph (~6-12k daily viewing users, estimated, around 100k monthly), by providing curated communities and integrated re-shares, so that popular content gathers rather than splits discussion as it's re-shared. The company's done a really good job of not repeating the glaring faux pas of Google+ which alienated much of its core community early on (myself included, though I remain active there), and has been highly responsive to user suggestions, picking up quite a few of the ones I've made over the past months. There's more I'd like to see, but progress has been impressive and in the right directions, generally. You'll find me there as @dredmorbius.
teaneedz 11y ago
I'm not so sure about that. I recently wondered if the mundane would be accepted on Ello. I've seen that everyday plain text is quite ok with the community. You get what you put into it though. With smaller numbers, you have to reach out and comment on other posts. Eventually, people find you and decide to follow or not if they click with your previous posts too. In many ways, people on Ello take a follow decision more seriously than elsewhere I think. Someone said Ello is Twitter's overflow. When you want more than 140 chars (not that Twitter should ever change that), Ello is a great place for the long form.
jszymborski 11y ago
>resist any non-artsy content like an immune system warding off a plague I might be being pedantic, but the immune system didn't do a very good job of resisting the plague, in fact it mostly let it do it's thing...

by jarcane 11y ago

sehr 11y ago

It's not totally a bad thing though is it? Seems almost natural for a social network to start with a sort of single focus

jarcane 11y ago
No, it's totally a cool place, if that's what you're into. As a writer and a techie though, I struggled to even find anyone else on the network with similar interests, and of those, they seemed to wither away over time. The end result is less a "Facebook-killer" and more a "Tumblr/Pinterest alternative for upmarket artists".
- ay 11y ago
  Indeed, finding nerds on ello is a bit tricky, and as you say some of them went silent after trying it initially. Amongst my friends https://ello.co/danyork https://ello.co/danyork has been impressively insistent in using it, but that's among the only of my friends that managed to sustain the activity there. That said, with iOS client + with freedom re. your data that they seem to have, I plan to switch over more to it for the longer stuff that does not fit into a tweet - it feels pleasant to write there, even if as an archive for myself. I feel Ello so far as a club-like with whiskey and cigars as opposed to a common living room feel that the FB is.
- dredmorbius 11y ago
  My suggestion: be the Ello you want it to be, if you're going to play there. Since Markdown's supported, (with a few quirks), content from any other Markdown-based site works well. You don't need to polish text much. Add in images. They boost viewership. Submit posts to appropriate Communities: https://ello.co/wtf/resources/community-directory/ https://ello.co/wtf/resources/community-directory/ Search (both internal and external search engines) helps turn up stuff related to keywords of interest. The social graph is small. My experience elsewhere (G+) was that it took a few years for a real community to gel. And no, it's not a challenge to HN, StackExchange, or Reddit. Or Facebook or G+, for that matter. Yet. But it's got some good basics and the founding community ain't bad. Good stuff does eventually get noticed and passed around.
- dredmorbius 11y ago
  @ddailey has some amazing SVG examples, I highly recommend him: https://ello.co/ddailey https://ello.co/ddailey There's @ellotech: https://ello.co/ellotech https://ello.co/ellotech And @ellowrites: https://ello.co/ellowrites https://ello.co/ellowrites Search can turn up people writing on topics of interest, say: https://ello.co/search?terms=webdesign https://ello.co/search?terms=webdesign https://ello.co/search?terms=python https://ello.co/search?terms=python (about 90 posts in 9 months) Or you can enjoy the art.

ultimape 11y ago

I never got the whole "facebook alternative" hype that happened. Social network that uses art sales to support itself? I've been on deviant art since 2005 - well before facebook hit popularity.

dredmorbius 11y ago

I'm finding it quite useful for longer-form bloggy posts, especially where including multiple images is preferred. I'm less enamoured overall with the styling, though I've taken my own spin on that: http://stylebot.me/styles/9519 http://stylebot.me/styles/9519 (You'll need to have an account to use that as unauthenticated Ello sessions still default to the Ello v1 style: http://stylebot.me/styles/8070 http://stylebot.me/styles/8070) Basically: with a slew of embeds (video, audio, codepen, and others), graphics, and a decent (though still somewhat flawed) Markdown support (biggest omissions are blockquotes and lack of distinguished headers, though a few other glitches annoy me), it's possible to create well-structured long-form documents. Yes, there's quite the artistic community there, and no, discussion's not yet up to the level I'd like to see it, though I'm finding a few interesting voices. One thing Ello's taken to heart is hacking around the very small social graph (~6-12k daily viewing users, estimated, around 100k monthly), by providing curated communities and integrated re-shares, so that popular content gathers rather than splits discussion as it's re-shared. The company's done a really good job of not repeating the glaring faux pas of Google+ which alienated much of its core community early on (myself included, though I remain active there), and has been highly responsive to user suggestions, picking up quite a few of the ones I've made over the past months. There's more I'd like to see, but progress has been impressive and in the right directions, generally. You'll find me there as @dredmorbius.

teaneedz 11y ago

I'm not so sure about that. I recently wondered if the mundane would be accepted on Ello. I've seen that everyday plain text is quite ok with the community. You get what you put into it though. With smaller numbers, you have to reach out and comment on other posts. Eventually, people find you and decide to follow or not if they click with your previous posts too. In many ways, people on Ello take a follow decision more seriously than elsewhere I think. Someone said Ello is Twitter's overflow. When you want more than 140 chars (not that Twitter should ever change that), Ello is a great place for the long form.

jszymborski 11y ago

>resist any non-artsy content like an immune system warding off a plague I might be being pedantic, but the immune system didn't do a very good job of resisting the plague, in fact it mostly let it do it's thing...