terminology, functionality, and the way users think about social media platforms

[tielan]

Watching the DW vs Tumblr terminology/functionality discussion makes me feel like I'm at work.

It's like trying to explain why System A does items 1-9, but not item 5 because the architecture simply isn't capable of that. However System B is insisting that it absolutely needs item 5 because they do Thing Alpha and Thing Beta which is the core of their system functionality, but what they call Thing Beta in System B is actually Thing Gamma in System A, because Thing Beta means another set of processes entirely in System A...

I mean, I get that people are attached to the terminology, function, and culture they're used to, but when in Rome, etc., etc.

Comments

[kore]

....ahahahaha yup. I mean, I get that people want to feel comfortable in their new online home, but also, THE SITE YOU'RE ON NOW IS NOT EQUIPPED TO DO THAT. sigh.

[tielan]

I think the part that most irked me was the "don't ask me to give up the term 'reblogs' because it gives me the warm and fuzzies".

Like, you're not giving it up; but you have to learn what that term means here, and you have to be prepared for the shitstorm that you've called when you say you're going to 'reblog' something to people who don't play on tumblr and who are fiercely protective of their content - who are here on DW because they are fiercely protective of their content!

Features and bugs, bugs and features...

[kore]

I truly can't get over (I have said this everywhere) that the founder of Dreamwidth made a welcome post, people volunteered to make "welcome and how-to and welcome!" posts on their own and went out of their way to link them to new users from Tumblr, and not only did nothing like that ever happen on Tumblr, but all I ever got when I said I found it hard to make friends or even start conversations was "Ur doin it wrong just do it some more." It's not like people have been showing up and been forced into uniform Dreamwidth terminology or anything like that. Just, this is a different place, and it has different norms, and my fucking God don't people that age know that already? Would they act the same way in a fancy restaurant they do a shitty fast-food place? I guess so!

(The OTHER fucking annoying thing was "You don't understand how Tumblr works so -- " Bitch I had a Tumblr in 2010. I probably had a Tumblr before most of you did. Miss me with this "you don't know what reblogs are, you old person who cannot handle change and want all the houses on the street to be painted the same colour, that's why you're frightened" utter bullshit.)

[kore]

I mean, no, this site is not like Tumblr and Twitter. THAT'S A FUCKING PLUS. THAT'S WHY I'M HERE. THAT'S WHY I PAY MONEY FOR THE SITE TO KEEP BEING HERE. I swear, sometimes, with The Youngs, it's like the Facebookification of everything not only doesn't bother them, they lean way the fuck into it. "How about automatic notifications of @ mentions? That'd be neato keen peachy!"

[kore]

I've also said this too many places but I really think the only reason they're trying it on here is because Pillowfort's closed. Because Pillowfort was based on that bastard hybridization of Livejournal + Tumblr, somehow, of the idea you can have reblogs AND threaded comments AND granulated privacy AND a pony, only they didn't know what the fuck they were doing and had to essentially shut down. (Which should tell them something, right fucking there.) I think a lot of this idiocy would be going on over at PF, not here. But people are like "Cool this place is like Pillowfort I'm sure they will be into the idea of being able to reblog an entire post AND THEN the author who edits that post can also delete your commentary on it!" which was the latest idiocy I heard the PF founders dribbling on about.

//FROTH FROTH PANT PANT //DESTROYS CHEWTOY

[tielan]

Good point on Pillowfort - I didn't actually sign up for PF. After the way...that other site whose name I can't remember right now...so precipitously folded, I didn't bother.

I mean, there are things that I'd like to be able to do here - just 'like' a post, for instance. (The number of times I've gone looking for the 'like' butto-- Oh, hang on, it's DW. D'oh!) But the experiences between Tumblr and DW are very different - not just in the way we treat content and attribution, but in the heavy web/code based presence that DW relies on and the feelgood 'just reblog it' culture of Tumblr.

It's going to be a bit of a brain-breaker for the Tumblrites, I suspect.

[kore]

I just snagged an account on Imzy -- is that what you're thinking of? -- and PF itself in case you had to log in to see accounts, which indeed you do. (Now that's fucking annoying.)

I think the very weird thing about the reblogging was that potofsoup person was going on and on about how STRANGE and RUDE they would find it to just "leap in" to a "stranger's" discussion -- but you know, that happened on Tumblr when a friend would reblog something by someone I didn't know and it came across my dash. On Tumblr everything was binary -- public/private, on/off, and people got to know each other with private messages. (You see this on twitter with DMs and group chats, and it's happening again with Discord.) So sending someone you didn't know a private "ask" was OK, but leaving a comment to a post of someone you don't know is OMG WHAT HOW DO. (And because of e-stalkers I consider asks, especially anon asks, a hundred times more intrusive and offputting than comments I can screen or delete and users I can ban if they get abusive. But anyway.)

I gotta admit I loathe like buttons. I loathe them on Facebook, I loathe them on news stories, I loathe them on Twitter and Tumblr and AO3, I hope they never appear here. (People try to recreate them with textbox code and "Kudos" or "I like this" and I'm just like, WHY.) I am a grumpy old bat to be sure.

[tielan]

Imzy! That was the platform I was thinking of. I popped over a couple of times, but it didn't interest me and nobody seemed to talk to each other.

And yeah, that thing about leaping into a stranger's discussion seems most exceedingly odd to people who came to LJ/DW from mailing lists and newsgroups and forums/bulletin boards, where everything is just 'leap in and discuss with strangers'.

I guess to a generation accustomed to "my site" and "my tumblr post" and "my FB status", it might seem weird? To us, who were here before there was any kind of site personalisation possible, it's just the way internet conversations happen.

I gotta admit I loathe like buttons

You will loathe them on the beaches, in the trenches, in the fields, and streets, and hills? :)

On one hand, they do make 'interaction' (it's not actually interaction, but we'll call it that) easy. A quick approval, no actual human contact required! But I think it cheats both the person liking and the person liked by eliminating the possibility of any conversation, and not stretching people to actual interact.

Let's be real, I have never made a friend out of someone who merely 'liked' my fic, my tumblr posts, or my FB statuses. I've made friends by talking to strangers (hi there!) on the intarwebs, many of whom I've never met in person and never will meet but with whom I've taken a risk and shared stuff about me, my opinions, and my life that sit out there for people to judge.

[kore]

Imzy! That was the platform I was thinking of. I popped over a couple of times, but it didn't interest me and nobody seemed to talk to each other.

A whole lot of people put effort into some communities, like flash fiction and so on, and then it (utterly predictably) tanked. (I looked at the blog of one of the guys who started it, and he was very very weird.) And the people behind Imzy had a helluva lot more experience and insight than the two or three kids trying to re-invent the wheel at Pillowfort. (Seriously, the main experience of the person who had the idea seems to be that she went to a coding camp.) And then a lot of people got very bitter and wary about putting a lot of effort into a site that was going to fold without warning, and it's hard to blame them.

I guess to a generation accustomed to "my site" and "my tumblr post" and "my FB status", it might seem weird? To us, who were here before there was any kind of site personalisation possible, it's just the way internet conversations happen.

Yeah, and I found Tumblr very strange in that you didn't have a site exactly -- everyone went through their dash, which was sort of like the friends feed on DW, except you didn't go any different places to talk to people; you reblogged or commented or whatever onto your dash, and you also need that xkit tag viewer to see what people might say. So there is this "my dash" space that is a little like "my feed," except I think people typically visit the DW blog to comment. (Even though you can comment now without leaving the feed.)

You will loathe them on the beaches, in the trenches, in the fields, and streets, and hills? :)

I SHALL NEVER GIVE UP, NEVER SURRENDER -- wait that turned into a weird mashup

But I think it cheats both the person liking and the person liked by eliminating the possibility of any conversation, and not stretching people to actual interact.
Let's be real, I have never made a friend out of someone who merely 'liked' my fic, my tumblr posts, or my FB statuses. I've made friends by talking to strangers (hi there!) on the intarwebs, many of whom I've never met in person and never will meet but with whom I've taken a risk and shared stuff about me, my opinions, and my life that sit out there for people to judge.

YES, and that is precisely exactly why I LOATHE them. It's not real human interaction, it's a cheap substitute, and it's also this kind of high like the lab rat getting a food pellet. -- And yet I'm as guilty as other people of kudosing rather than commenting on AO3. Does FF.net have like buttons? I can't remember....

[tielan]

BY GRABTHAR'S HAMMER...

(I just went back and rewatched that scene.)

FF.net has the ability to 'favourite'. Which, yes. Lacks interaction.

[kore]

....WHAT A SAVINGS.

I hear people say they get more comments on FF.net, but fewer likes, while AO3 is the opposite.

[tjs_whatnot]

My head hurts just reading that, let alone thinking about it. ;)

[tielan]

Now think of trying to explain that to a bunch of teenagers/twenty-somethings who are panicking that you're trying to 'take away' their internet experience as defined by the terms that they use to describe that experience...

[tjs_whatnot]