100WattWalrus

Screenshot, as requested. v.2.29.0. The answer field is a little more distinct here than when I last looked at it — at night, with my blue-screen filter on. But I think it's still fairly clear that the text box and the background are too similar in color.

Uploaded to Imgur because the [upload image] button here doesn't work. I select an image, I see the progress spinner gif, then...nothing.

Done!

Done. BTW, still don't understand the reason for/necessity of the "!"

I do mention instances — couched in familiar context clues that help to both define and plant the seed that it's Lemmy lingo. And as I said, this was off the top of my head. It's a starting point. :)

Decent point about r/nba — although that at least looks like part of a URL, which is more of a clue than, say, nba@lemmy.dbzer0.com, which looks like it's going to send an email to some seemingly random domain that is not related to the URL currently in my address bar.

I'm not saying it's not possible, I'm saying its an unnecessarily steep learning curve. :)

BTW, if anyone here has any connection with Voyager, let them know that their sign-up/application page needs different coloring. On my phone, the "Application answer" box — that the page says must be filled out — is literally invisible because the box is black, and the background is...basically black. I had to tap, and tap, and tap, and tap around before I got a cursor.

OK, so here's the thing: I follow this link...

https://lemm.ee/post/33870928 ...and I see that it's from 10 months ago, and I see above you say "they're still there, keeping the community active" — which is nice to hear... But looking at that page, I don't have the slightest idea how to get from that post to the rest of that community. Apparently, I click "thebirdspapaya_snark@lemmy.ca" at the top of the sidebar — but that's not readily apparent. There's no name for the community that I can see — only what looks like an email addy, which is meaningless to me as a casual visitor. And while you say the community is "active," when I do click that link, I see only 4 posts in the last month. Those posts do seem to have pretty good engagement, and lots of activity today, so I guess weekly threads are just how they roll.

But it doesn't, on the surface, look like a place where there's engaging new content on the regular. And the fact that the community name looks like an email address is just confusing — especially since both the community's header and subhead are exactly the same address.

I can see how to you this might look like thriving example of average users on Lemmy. But what I see is everything that makes Lemmy confusing and off-putting.

There needs to be some kind of group effort — some kind of committee or something. Create couple general instances "co-owned" by 50 admins from 50 instances — something like that.

How the handful of "introductory" instances are created, chosen, and maintained is definitely an issue that needs to be worked out. But they could be instances that are deliberately as general-interest as possible, but feature content (possible in different colors?) from other instances. New users get their bearings, get a taste for what's out there, and slowly wander away from the "museum lobby" to start exploring different "galleries."

Ooo. I feel a metaphor coming on! going to do some brainstorming here:

• Facebook, Reddit, Twitter, et al are like a huge Walmart — you can find a little of everything there, but the experience is uninspiring and uniform, and the people running it are all about the profit, not about quality or a good experience, or customer care, and a single point of entry and exit
• The Fediverse is like a big farmer's market — a lot of independent merchants coming together with their different booths, and food trucks, and stages, and all kinds of different merchandise and services. You can come into the farmer's market from a bunch of different directions, and wander around or make a beeline for your favorite booths and hang out there all day.

Of course, that's somewhat undercuts my suggestion of having a general-interest instance, but maybe it's a farmer's market with a main entrance or something...

/work in progress

That's not bad. The graphics are immediately distracting, and if you don't understand what they're meant to symbolize, they're just annoying. I still think a just a handful of general instances is a better idea because most people don't think of social media a place they go for one or two interests, but a place they go for everything including those interests. Having said that, it's a good flow...until you drill down far enough for it to become a cul-de-sac problem:

• Entertainment — OK, sounds good
• Movies & TV — so far so good
• Star Trek (and nothing else) — well, no, so...now what? I guess this isn't for me

Yes, you can go back to the previous screen, but now you know there's nothing here specific to your interests, so if you do stick around, you're stuck just casting about for something to latch on to.

This is why it would be better to just have a couple general instances, get people onboard, then have them start exploring.

Good idea!

Federation can be explained at the 10,000-foot level by just saying something like, "You know how Reddit subs are moderated by volunteer from the community, and Wikipedia is edited by volunteers? Lemmy has volunteers all the way down. It's coded by volunteers, it's hosted by hundreds of volunteers, and all those independent instances connect together to make a whole that serves the same purpose as a Reddit or Facebook." That's just off the top of my head. I was toying with a a simile about cruise ships vs. a flotilla of fishing boats, but that one got a way from me. I'll come up with better descriptions later. It's something I'm fairly good at.

Very much agree with this. Multiple onboarding instances that all work basically the same way, routing new users to them based on geography and language to start, and maybe when the sign-up in complete, the first post they see is an automated very basic primer that includes something about that Lemmy isn't owned by anyone, let alone by a giant corporation that wants to collect and sell their identity.