I hate the damage that Apple seems to have done in this regard. I also hate it when apps hide features because “they’re for power users and regular users won’t understand them”.

Sure, there’s a difference between UX being so bad that it’s frustrating to use and “we need to simplify things because we don’t want to scare the users”.

Lemmy UI has its problems to solve and features to add, but it’s not bad, even on mobile. I’ve been using it extensively and it does fine all things considered.

Anyways, at this point I believe there’s even a benefit to making a UI a bit ugly and scary, so you end up with a higher quality of users instead of quantity, as cold as it might sound.

Edit: I didn’t mean to just talk about Lemmy. That was just an example and I understand that for a social platform numbers are important. My rant was more general in regards to the dumbing down of UI in all areas.

Edit2: I’m sorry. I didn’t want to come off as elitist. I’m actually concerned about the loss of power user features more than non-tech savvy users having a bad time.

  • jayEnglish
    1•2 years ago

    I understand. I saw somebody else post about how the search feature is going to drive off refugees, which made me feel conflicted.

    I think patience is the most important thing to be practiced at a time like this. Patience for Lemmy, patience for this process of transition, and patience with ourselves.

    Lemmy as a whole is a much newer place, and reminds me in a lot of ways i’d what Reddit was like 12 years ago when I started there. In some ways, the esoteric account creation product, the beta iOS app that needs Test Flight, the much more personal, smaller user experience, all come together to make something reminiscent of the good old days.

    We need to show patience to of us are reeling the loss of decade+ old communities. It’s going to be natural to go through a lot as we adjust.

      • jayEnglish
        2•2 years ago

        it didn’t come off that way to me - just more so that the high quality users may be the more technical ones who put effort into understanding and acclimating to a new site.

        Having new people come in and expand the culture of this new place is good!

        However, having there be a little bit of a barrier to entry that requires people to read and think to understand isn’t a terrible thing. It’s always a balance.