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Re: Slashdot's new interface could kill what keeps Slashdot relevan t

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> "Elizabeth T. Knuth" <eknuth@csbsju.edu> wrote:
>> Article today on Ars Technica, somewhat sympathetic to the refugees, with
>> comparative screenshots.
>>
>> http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2014/02/slashdots-new-
>> interface-could-kill-what-keeps-slashdot-relevant/
>>
>> Sort of tempting to post it to the firehose, but it would undoubtedly get
>> deleted or mysteriously modded way way down.
>>
>
>
> Thanks for the link.  The article is pretty interesting and would be a good
> read for the Dice people.
>
> I like your web page too - I guess I'm not the only lynx user left after
> all!
>

The comments were interesting too. The ones that were most illuminating for me were from people that had never really spent much time at Slashdot. They tended to look at the Beta site layout as a big improvement over the classic design - more inviting, more modern, easier to read - not necessarily great in comparison to other news aggregator sites, but an improv
ement. That's the way they saw Slashdot: as a news aggregator, not as a community discussion site. When these people even mentioned the community, they basically described as being old, curmudgeonly, and unreasonably resistant to change.

Then there were the people that had spent some time on Slashdot, but left for various reasons. Most of these people seemed to see the site and its content the way we do, i.e. that the discussions were the real content. Many of them seem to have been turned off by the chaotic nature of the discussions, and what they perceived as a low signal-to-noise ratio. Other
s seem to have wanted better and more frequent article summaries, possibly with more focused discussions regarding the article topics. Their reaction to Beta tended to be moderately negative... accepting of cosmetic change as long as functionality didn't suffer.

Finally, there were the people that (I assume) are more like us... they valued the free-wheeling nature of the discussions and how the community-driven moderation and meta-moderation system served to distill the chaos. These people frequently referred to the userbase as a community, and expressed anger or sadness at what the Beta redesign (and/or the backlash) w
ould ultimately do to the community. Some had been around from the old Chips and Dips days, i.e. proto-Slashdot, and more than a few commenters sported userid numbers in the 3 to 5 digit range. These folks had extremely negative opinions about Beta (haha, like that's news to us).

A couple other clusters could probably be identified, but the three above seem to include the vast majority. If I were to assign descriptive labels to these groups, they'd look like this:

1. Web 3.0 headline readers uninterested in what a bunch of old neckbeards think. They want tech news delivered in easily digestible chunks, and want the news source to be cool and modern.

2. Focused information seekers looking for community insight on major tech news. They want the insights behind the tech news, and believe that the community (old, grizzled,  and grumpy as it may be) can be a source of wisdom.

3. Core community members that see Slashdot as a long-term online home base. They want in-depth discussion of tech news and are willing to put up with chaos in order to get deep insights, but also enjoy (and are fiercely protective of) the community identity.

So, here's what I think, and it squares with what many people have been suggesting: Dice wants more of group 1 and are willing to dump group 3 to achieve that goal, and they're probably betting that group 2 won't decline too much as a result. Why? Probably because group 3 is not an important demographic in their primary line of business, and in addition, is only
 going to decline in size as time passes. Group 3 doesn't make them enough money, at least not directly... and if they can shift the site in such a way that *they* become the content creators instead of the community, they won't really need Group 3. They'll destroy the community to get where they want to go, because after all, we're just an audience to them.

Anyway, that's the way I see it.

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Ars: Slashdot's new interface could kill what keeps Slashdot relevant "Elizabeth T. Knuth" <eknuth@csbsju.edu> - 2014-02-12 14:54 -0600
  Re: Slashdot's new interface could kill what keeps Slashdot relevant Oregonian Haruspex <bob_davis_retired@yahoo.com> - 2014-02-13 02:30 +0000
    Re: Slashdot's new interface could kill what keeps Slashdot relevan t wjwlsn <ibillwilson@gmail.com> - 2014-02-13 01:20 +0000
      Re: Slashdot's new interface could kill what keeps Slashdot relevan t Koen Lefever <koen.lefever@gmail.com> - 2014-02-12 23:26 -0800
        Re: Slashdot's new interface could kill what keeps Slashdot relevan t John Brownalt <deconfliction@filteredperception.org> - 2014-02-14 02:58 +0000
      Re: Slashdot's new interface could kill what keeps Slashdot relevan   t RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> - 2014-02-13 07:35 +0000
      Re: Slashdot's new interface could kill what keeps Slashdot relevan   t True Satan <true_satan@fastmail.co.uk> - 2014-02-13 11:45 +0000
        Re: Slashdot's new interface could kill what keeps Slashdot relevan   t RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> - 2014-02-14 11:02 +0000
  Re: Ars: Slashdot's new interface could kill what keeps Slashdot relevant Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> - 2014-02-13 09:36 -0500

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