Bad UX is keeping the majority of people away from Lemmy
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To the guy in here going "UX != UI!!!" Sure, but you can't design UX, especially for the unwashed masses. "Tried cutting toenails with lawnmower; severed foot. 0/10 bad user experience."
Lemmy has a "have our cake and eat it too" problem. It offers two mutually exclusive promises:
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Each instance is its own independent self-contained little Reddit with their own communities, culture, code of conduct etc. so that individuals can find a place that suits them or make one if none is available, and
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All the servers are part of one great big federated system where all users have access to content on all instances so it doesn't matter which instance you sign up for, you can access it all.
In practice, the former is more or less true, the latter really isn't.
First there's the obvious topic of defederation, which makes the "join one server, access all of them" an outright lie. On the one hand, I think everyone here will agree this platform requires defederation to function so that we can kick out instances like lolli.rape or whatever, which thank you admins and mods for dealing with. But what about Hexbear, or Truth Social (which as I understand it is running on Mastodon software). The only honest answer to "where do we draw that line?" is "somewhere in the middle of that slap fight over there."
It is intellectually dishonest to say that Lemmy has this problem and Reddit doesn't. Post in r/mensrights and an automod bans you from r/twoxchromosomes. Do basically anything anywhere on the platform and get banned from r/conservative. They managed to implement "It's a different platform depending on who you are" on a monolithic service.
All that crap aside, the average user has a more limited perspective on the rest of the fediverse than his home instance. Often, the UI defaults to viewing only local posts, you have to tell it to give you a global feed. You can browse a list of your local communities, you can browse a list of global communities, you can't browse a list of communities on a given foreign instance. 'Show me everything on lemmy.sports' or indeed 'show me a list of communities on lemmy.nsfw.' You cannot create (or moderate?) communities on instances you aren't a member of. It is, if only slightly, easier to participate on your home instance than elsewhere.
Either your choice of server does matter, or it doesn't.
If it does matter, we shouldn't have so many general purpose instances, it should be lemmy.music and lemmy.art and lemmy.uk. Then newcomers are presented a meaningful choice. Are you mostly interested in discussions pertaining to your country? Your hobby? Your career? Sign up here to mostly participate in that, and no matter which you pick you can visit the rest of the Lemmyverse, too."
If it doesn't matter, then design it such that instances are entirely transparent to users; eliminate the possibility of [email protected] and [email protected] coexisting, and make all instances lemmy1.world lemmy2.world, issue credentials centrally and then just spread the load in the background.
I don't think you can have both at the same time.
First there’s the obvious topic of defederation, which makes the “join one server, access all of them” an outright lie.
- https://lemmy.sdf.org/instances blocks one outdated Kbin instance
- https://lemmy.today/instances blocklist is empty
Still those two instances aren't that popular
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The main reason why I still prefer Reddit, is content. Even though I am subscribed to similar subs/communities/magazines/whatever on Reddit/Lemmy, the content of my Reddit home screen is filled with interesting content compared to Lemmy. And, I never had to ban/hide anything/anyone on Reddit.
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I would hundred percent agree with that!
Lemmy we need a app/website with a better UI -
Well, when I started to use lemmy I had a few problems:
- I read something on the landing page about "Mastodon account works too" so tried that, so basically confused fediverse, activitypub, mastodon and lemmy and wondered why nothing worked. Oops.
- I tried to join a community that was meant to migrate away from reddit, but found two duplicates. So I wasn't sure which one was the correct one. Ultimately the migration failed, even though it was a software oriented community
- Then I soon wanted to make a new account on a server that doesn't require an email. Because emails today are basically personally identifiable for security agencies.
- Then I found out that socialists are called tankies on lemmy and some of the main socialist instances are banned by the limbrols. So I made a new account and posted a little and had an interesting discussion about voting in proto-fascist democracies and promptly got banned by the tankies. Oh well.
- Then I had a discussion about how calling russian people "orcs" is racist. You guessed it, banned.
- Well several accounts later, here I am, the last sane man on the internet and you all fucking suck hahaha
I do think lemmy is worthwhile and can be fun, but as a reddit alternative it has already failed. You cannot purge insanity by splitting it up into smaller insanlets. That's just schizophrenia.
I tried to join a community that was meant to migrate away from reddit, but found two duplicates. So I wasn’t sure which one was the correct one. Ultimately the migration failed, even though it was a software oriented community
Which community was it?
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You can choose the light theme in your settings
Oh dang, after switching the themes back and forth it now actually follows system settings. Cookies/cache are a strange thing I guess. Thanks!
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Yep. I came, couldn't get into it, https://lemmy.world/post/1388830 and unfortunately went back to Reddit.
Nowadays, [email protected] has daily threads promoting active communities
Also what client where you using for that screenshot? Clients usually show instances after the communities name
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Oh dang, after switching the themes back and forth it now actually follows system settings. Cookies/cache are a strange thing I guess. Thanks!
You're welcome, that's probably going to be much more pleasant for you ha ha
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Nowadays, [email protected] has daily threads promoting active communities
Also what client where you using for that screenshot? Clients usually show instances after the communities name
Boost. That was 1 year ago.
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Most businesses also use outlook or gmail
This is fair, however, not ubiquitous and all their servers are expected to place nice with others.
Thank god email is federated, and not locked down to a particular company
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"Lemmy has 47k monthly active users
- https://discuss.online/ if you want a server located in the USA (content is still accessible from any server, the most difference latency)
- https://sopuli.xyz/ if you want a server located in the EU
- https://vger.app/ if you want an app
Feel free if you have any questions"
Pinned post on [email protected]
I think, you didn't get my point. Everything you mentioned.
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That's UI. What they're talking about is the barrier to entry for new users, which falls under User eXperience
I don’t really get that either. New users are immediately presented with posts and communities they can interact with, and all of the functions are familiar to anyone who has used reddit or forums. The interface is straightforward and uncluttered, as far as what that contributes to the user experience. Also I have never found federation confusing.
I guess OP is talking about the attitude of personality of lemmy members and I don’t agree with that, either. The 2-3 people on reddit quoted in the post are clueless and there’s no indication they represent a significant and amount of people’s perceptions. “Endless wars about federation” - what? There was controversy for like 1 week several months ago.
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The main reason why I still prefer Reddit, is content. Even though I am subscribed to similar subs/communities/magazines/whatever on Reddit/Lemmy, the content of my Reddit home screen is filled with interesting content compared to Lemmy. And, I never had to ban/hide anything/anyone on Reddit.
That problem will go away if we get more people to join lemmy by providing good smooth UX
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This reddit post likely has tens if not hundreds of thousands of views, look at the top comment.
Lemmy is losing so many potential new users because the UX sucks for the vast majority of people.
What can we do?
I totally disagree.
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Lemmy is too right wing to serve as a good Reddit replacement. The queer communities on Reddit don't want to move here because their members will be harassed.
Political literacy classes are available online… the idea of anybody thinking Lemmy is right wing (whether it’s code or the majority of its user base) is hilarious and a bit sad at the same time.
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I tried, but I like information density and the new UI is a horrible waste of space. I get why people like it and it's way more modern, I'm saying loads of people who used reddit from the start will probably never get used to the new UI, mostly because of the customizability and open API.
Reddit didn't have apps in the beginning, so we made them over the years perfecting the UI. I settled on baconreader with a compact view, but it and so many others died when the API was purged. I patched my app and can still use it to this day, but I don't because fuck them.
Oh yeah absolutely the app purge is why I'm here. I absolutely despise their mobile app; but on desktop I don't mind.
The information density isn't that important to me on desktop since my screen is plenty large and scrolling (or collapsing) comments is easy.
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Where they are is having spent most of their life in a walled garden corporate internet. What you need to understand is that all new things have a learning curve, and the process of learning needs to be accepted - rather than trying to pressure free systems into being the very thing everyone is wanting to get away from.
Freedom means having choice. Sometimes a lot of it. Sometimes that's scary. But it's worth embracing.
If any of that were true there wouldn't be posts and comments here and elsewhere from professional programmers who gave up on the registration process because of bad UX. I was one of them. People don't give up on registering here because it's "scary".
If you're one of the many people here happy for this to remain a niche for tech people then that's different.
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Political literacy classes are available online… the idea of anybody thinking Lemmy is right wing (whether it’s code or the majority of its user base) is hilarious and a bit sad at the same time.
Spacetime is relative. If we're putting directions on politics, then politics has to be relative too.
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Spacetime is relative. If we're putting directions on politics, then politics has to be relative too.
Well, right is a term relative to centre which is relative to left.
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If any of that were true there wouldn't be posts and comments here and elsewhere from professional programmers who gave up on the registration process because of bad UX. I was one of them. People don't give up on registering here because it's "scary".
If you're one of the many people here happy for this to remain a niche for tech people then that's different.
If somebody gave up on the registration, how would you know? They wouldn't be here to say it.
If you gave up on the registration, then how are you here? You're inventing impossible physics to support your arguments. Are you a professional programmer for doge?
Here's what your expert opinion is really about:
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I've decided this is good and want a Lemmy that is restricted to just the nerdiest of nerds.
These little spaces are cool without all those horrible reddit users.I like this idea! I still don’t see how the more narrowly focussed servers would benefit me. I went with Lemmy.world because size matters in a forum, and the admins have been outstanding with reliability. The most likely reason for me to jump ship would be if that reliability fell.
That being said when I was new I had no idea what hexbear was or Lemmy.ml or whatever, and there’s only so much a description can do. I know the difference after reading many discussion threads
But I so would have jumped on Lemmy.nerds over Lemmy.jocks or Lemmy.preppies. Multiple servers with clearer sub communities may help make onboarding easier. That being said, I realize I could just do that if I wanted to. I also realize that may just amplify the echo chamber effect
