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How shitty standards stick around
(lemmy.nz)
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this post was submitted on 21 Oct 2026
433 points (94.6% liked)
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Fediverse is better at everything except onboarding. The access methods are complicated and ill explained for users who expect an app and simple signup. Regular users have no idea what an instance is. Even people who are TRYING to join the fediverse willingly pile in lemmy.world because it’s the default on most apps. There needs to be a round robin assigner to instances that opt in in order to spread users around who don’t care which general instance they join.
The fediverse feels like old internet which I like but is also a barrier to people just looking for easy alternatives.
I love this round robin instance assigner idea.
I’m know there’s things I haven’t thought of but getting them in is most important.
Call it an incubator flag or whatever. Get them in so they can learn what all this has to offer. As they gain knowledge they can make a choice where they end up.
Presenting a user with a list of instances with weird dorky names is the fastest way to get a normie to delete an app. Unless that’s what you want: a fedi-filter
Onboarding is the same as for email, which most people seem to pass just fine. Fedi instance is analogous to an email provider. I would even vouch to move from the ' instance' hosting-based terminology to the ' provider' user-centric terminology.
IMO it's the content discovery across instances and the subtler implications of your chosen provider that are harder to grasp.
The average person has Gmail or Apple Mail because that's what their phone had them set up, or (unfortunately) just uses their work email for everything. They're not out there weighing alternatives.
Normies tend to stick with the first email they are signed up for. For a lot of younger Gen Z email is a non factor.
its great that you can explain that, its not at all obvious to people new to the space. email is way more common, too, so IMHO not really comparable.