2w ago

/r/buyfromEU "Europe keeps building social apps no one wants", "No "pick your fediverse server,” no confusion. It’s one big centralized thing, and that’s part of why posts can go viral"

old.reddit.com

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I tried to correct them there: https://old.reddit.com/r/BuyFromEU/comments/1jtooq4/europe_keeps_building_social_apps_no_one_wants/mlvrugy/

BuyFromEU @europe.pub

tfm @europe.pub

2w ago

/r/buyfromEU "Europe keeps building social apps no one wants", "No "pick your fediverse server,” no confusion. It’s one big centralized thing, and that’s part of why posts can go viral"

old.reddit.com /r/BuyFromEU/comments/1jtooq4/europe_keeps_building_social_apps_no_one_wants/

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36 comments

Monetarization and politics aside, he got some valid points surrounding usability, ease of use and content.
The majority of the fediverse project's fail at onboarding user with simplicity. Modern third party clients (mastodon, pixelfeld, lemmy aswell) do that better, even par excellence. But if we keep referring people to websites with server lists, we'll lose them at that point already.
Federation and lengthy explanations (wall of texts) and tutorials (sorry @blaze@feddit.nl) are no selling-point for everybody. It caters the nerd in us, but average joe is not a nerd but a simple user with little interest for these details. You could better refer them to an App that works without account and say: hit the explore button to see communities/contents/hashtags (what ever drives the particular network). In my opinion the old principle KISS (keep it stupid simple) is what needs to be followed, so we cann pull people in.
- No worries, the actual consensus is actually to do it is in a one-liner, similar to what you're saying
  What is Lemmy in one sentence?
  Lemmy is an alternative to Reddit, you can visit https://phtn.app/ to have a look at the content, and install an app using https://vger.app/settings/install.
  https://old.reddit.com/r/BoycottUnitedStates/comments/1jrcrh6/lemmy_as_an_nonus_alternative_to_red_dit_using/
  The issue is that if you just give them the one-liner with a "trust me, it's better, but you won't know why" will raise a lot of questions. Hence all of the explanations after the one-liner. But I make sure to insist that most people shouldn't read those
  If you are still reading, it means that you want to know more about how things are running.
  
  Yea, if it takes more than three steps, and five minutes to get started, you are loosing people
  Also you would have to have a sharepic with three major platforms (mastodon, pixelfed, lemmy) in parallel.
  
  Trying to mention Maston, Pixelfed and Lemmy at once seems confusing and to go against the KISS principle. Usually, people are looking for an alternative to one of the three, so pointing them to the one makes more sense.
  However, talking about pics, https://fedecan.ca/en/guide/get-started is a cool guide with cute illustrations. I usually refer to it when people are already on Lemmy and ask questions on how federation works
  
  I mean a little sharepic with three columns, nothing fancy or bloated.
  X → Mastodon (logos)
  Insta → Pixelfeld (logos)
  Reddit → Lemmy (logo)
  In each of the columns not more than three small bullet points. Preferably the first one "Install xyz" and the second one "hit explore" followed by a graphically detached third one "Join the network" or "learn more". Don't even dare to mention servers or federation or instances and AcitivityPub.
  
  Ah, I see. That could work. Maybe post this idea on !fedibridge@lemmy.dbzer0.com to see if someone can come up with a nice infographic
  
  Exactly this, I only went to Lemmy because I got shadowbanned on reddit. Specifically because every time someone mentions it its always "hur dur choose server, federation, bla bla" made it 100x more complicated than it had to be and made me not even want to check it out. I tried convincing a friend of mine to switch from reddit to here and they didn't want to even after me explaining its just creating an account on feddit.nl, their reasoning was that they heard something about federation and decentralized stuff and because of that it was too complicated and he wasn't interested. You lost that user entirely because someone mentioned it instead of keeping it simple.
  I will agree with the annoyance they share on the post of having multiple communities about the same subject having bad cross-posting (due to no comment sharing) to reach everyone and that we should have a solution for that. Although I do not see a direct solution, their idea is good but I don't really understand how moderation would work in that sense. Also blaze's argument "just post it on the largest server everybody is there anyways" is in my opinion exactly against what lemmy stands for and makes everybody depended on that 1 community/host/whatever we wanna call it.
  
  Also blaze’s argument “just post it on the largest server everybody is there anyways” is in my opinion exactly against what lemmy stands for and makes everybody depended on that 1 community/host/whatever we wanna call it.
  I said the most active community, not the largest server, otherwise I would just post to all the Lemmy.world communities, which is the opposite of what I stand for
  !movies@lemm.ee vs !movies@lemmy.world
  !android@lemdro.id vs !android@lemmy.world
  !privacy@lemmy.dbzer0.com vs !privacy@lemmy.world
  !linux@programming.dev vs !linux@lemmy.world
  What happens however is that you need a certain number of people to keep a community active. I was trying to keep !photography@discuss.online alive for a bit, but the most active community is by far !photography@lemmy.world.
  makes everybody depended on that 1 community/host/whatever we wanna call it.
  As it currently stands, for a conversation to happens in the comments, it needs to be on one post, on the same community. I know Piefed kind of proposes a workaround with the merged comments section, but still, if you see an interesting comment and reply to it, you are going to reply to it in the community the comment is hosted on, contributing to "consolidation", as that community is now more active by one comment that the others.
  That's just inherent to the Reddit-like format.
  
  I can only speak for my experience, but cross posting works best if OP does it. That way he gets notified about responses.
  Second best is, if someone cross posts content to discuss it with people he shares a community with. In that case reposter should make clear where the original content comes from and that he is not OP. That way informed readers can choose to answer in the community of their liking.
  
  In that case reposter should make clear where the original content comes from and that he is not OP.
  Feel free to share with the mod of !BuyFromEU@europe.pub, they literally crossposted your post without any of the comments who make the post interesting: https://europe.pub/post/158763
  
  Yea. I've seen that. In my opinion the person bringing content into the community has the responsibility to make something meaningful with it. E.g. start a conversation or get information and engage with the people.
  If you're just adding links, thats fine, too. In the end, links are a way to bring attention to something worthy or funny.
  
  Links are valuable, but there needs to be some comments with them to make it feel like it's worth sharing.
  I've noticed a trend on the europe.pub community, it has literally only crossposts from other communities and 0 comments
  Examples:
  https://feddit.nl/post/31756346
  https://europe.pub/post/140516
  https://feddit.nl/post/31722849
  https://europe.pub/post/140516
  
  For now it is only one person trying to generate content to be attractive. I'm sure strategy will change in time.
- YES, indeed @Senor Mono You are right. That's what's making a good app... good :-) A simple stupid Graphic User Interface. The fact that we are here on Lemmy means (most likely) that we are some kind of "nerds", because Average Joe will not come here, unless he/she can use an app without hassle and is able to discover the Lemmy communities with even 10 brain cells (or less). I know, I'm making a parody of it, but in fact that's exactely why apps like Insta, FB, etc are so popular. To end with a "free version" of Trump's words... even the uneducated must be able to use it without tariff barriers, LOL. Conclusion to be plain and simple: In my opinion (feel free to disagree)...We need to rethink the GUI of Lemmy and everything will be fine.
  
  Are you ever used Voyager (https://vger.app/ https://vger.app/settings/install) ? Seems quite easy to use, there is even a tool to discover similar communities to your Reddit subscriptions when you first start the app.
  I regularly see people saying they just use Voyager, they don't even know what instance they are using.
  
  Yes, I have Voyager myself (little mouse icon) and I'm using it, but still I find it quite confusing for non-tech people. I try to explain. I'm a High School teacher in graphic design and crossmedia. I work mostly with teenagers between 14-18yo. They can work very well with the software, but don't try to explain the technology behind it. They don't wanna know or they don't care, as long as the software works and the program does what they want it to do. I also spend years educating adults to work with new technology. When I look at the Voyager interface, I see: Home, All, Local. I see lemmy.wtf; feddit.uk; feddit.org; lemmy.world, etc... Maybe people think that I'm just crazy and/or overreacting, but I can guarantee you that alot of people don't understand all the tech things behind it. Only 0.1% of the users of FB, Insta, TikTok, etc... have a clue (or are interested) in the tech behind the apps.
  
  Home, All, Local. I see lemmy.wtf; feddit.uk; feddit.org; lemmy.world, etc…
  What is confusing about Home? The description says "Posts from subscriptions"
  I see lemmy.wtf; feddit.uk; feddit.org; lemmy.world, etc…
  You mean thet community names have the @instance at the end? It is more confusing than an email address that is johndoe@mailservice.com?
  
  Yep. To be clear... for me that's OK, bc I understand it, but I showed it to my wife and daughter and they were thinking... "that looks complicated". So... if we would be able to mask the @xxxxx things, it would look more "simple" and clean.
  
  But then it would look even more confusing. The picture above shows !android@lemmy.world, !android@lemdro.id and !android@programming.dev . Those are three different communities, not showing it would make it more confusing.
  Do people think that bob@company.com and bob@footballclub.com are the same email addresses?
  
  OK... whatever. I rest my case and I move on.
  
  I see where the confusion can come from, but there is really no way around it unfortunately.
  I keep bringing the email example because that has been known by pretty much everyone for decades that the complete email address is name@emailprovider
  
  My 9.5 brain cells found the way 🙂
  
  Hahaha. That's great LOL. More than welcome. :-)

36 comments