If the fediverse is to be adopted by the masses, the onboarding experience needs to change. A new user can’t be presented with a choice of instances as part of signing up or at least the process of making the choice needs to dumbed down a lot. I don’t know how or if this can be solved, I just know as someone involved in app development and UX that the current experience won’t work.

My mother would not know how to handle this paragraph: “Lemmy.world is one node in a network of hundreds of Lemmy instances. Before you sign up here, take a moment to explore all the instances at https://lemmyverse.net/. You may find an instance with a regional or topical emphasis that speaks to you! Don’t worry about being left out; Lemmy instances are interconnected so users from each instance can participate with communities on other instances.”

For mass adoption it needs to be so simple that even non-techie older people can get through it without feeling like they might be doing something wrong.

  • .Donuts@lemmy.worldEnglish
    10·
    10 days ago

    This keeps coming back from time to time. imo we need an instance or method to sandbox newbies.

    My old comment:

    A custom feed that allows new members to see a variety of the best that Lemmy has to offer would be a good start. Then, when they are comfortable with the platform and its dynamics, they can customise it further, or swap the newbie feed for their own custom filter (which practically would come down to community subscriptions, I suppose?)

    Now instead of making this comment very long, I’ll put in an video game anology to make it a bit more digestible:

    What we need is a tutorial area that showcases all the different things that the Lemmy endgame has to offer. Creating memes, sharing news, the art of shitposting, being a lurker, actual discussions vs just scrolling to see the funnies: all these things are enjoyed by different types of people, and before they can reclass and enjoy the wild open world of Lemmy, it would be good for them to get comfortable with the controls and settings in a relative safe space.

  • Blaze (he/him) @lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
    81·
    10 days ago

    "Lemmy has 47k monthly active users

    Feel free if you have any questions"

    Edit: voyager link

  • TORFdot0@lemmy.worldEnglish
    81·
    10 days ago

    If people can’t understand what federation is then just send them directly to .world or lemm.ee or another big instance. If they have common sense then send them to join-lemmy and let them pick an instance. If someone is unable or unwilling to learn a very basic concept then they probably are not going to be a very good neighbor to have on the fediverse.

    I agree that the discoverability of communities needs improvement. I think that most instances should add starter pack like features with the most popular communities for people to choose to subscribe to when onboarding new users.

    In my opinion, finding the right and active communities to subscribe to is the biggest onboarding hurdle, not picking an instance. If picking an instance is a hurdle, that person wasn’t willing to try another site in the first place

  • Glitterkoe@lemmy.worldEnglish
    6·
    10 days ago

    I think they should stick to the “email provider” analogy. Whole paragraph should be something like:

    The only thing you need to start interacting with the Fediverse is an account with one of the many providers, just like with email! Providers are freely available across the globe: pick one that suits your location or interests best! You can start browsing the content of nearly the entire Fediverse from whatever provider you choose. Don’t worry, you can always create an account with a different provider later.

    You could add a sentence or two about where to find sensible defaults or link an article that explains the more subtle things.

    I think the emphasis on instances (and not naming them the more familiar providers) hinders adoption.

  • Richard@lemmy.worldEnglish
    5·
    10 days ago

    It just isn’t possible, and we should want to dumb down the introduction too much. The Fediverse is not a centralised medium, and to participate in it, its users should understand that, analogous to how you would instruct people before using motor vehicles. Some things are just essential and need to be taught. Not teaching the stuff doesn’t make it disappear. If some people cannot get behind the idea, then either find novel, intuitive ways of conveying it, or just accept that they cannot be a part of the Fediverse.

    • Blaze (he/him) @lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
      61·
      10 days ago

      I’ve seen people using Voyager for a year and not even knowing what their instance is. They seem content, vote, post just like on Reddit.

      People can drive a car without knowing what type of engine it is. They turn the wheel, it turns.

  • ekZepp@lemmy.worldEnglish
    4·
    10 days ago

    They should just add an automatic joining option based by location for the Lazy ass new users with the option to manually join any instances.

  • Landless2029@lemmy.worldEnglish
    4·
    10 days ago

    What if instances could be tagged with their focus?

    Then during an app user creation they could click a few “topics” and narrow down the choices to a much shorter list including member counts?

  • nutomic@lemmy.mlEnglish
    2·
    9 days ago

    You’re welcome to improve the text. That said the site is in large part aimed at instance admins and technical people. For normal users it’s better to link them directly to a specific instance.