Agree 100%. You mentioned in another thread the lack of likes/reactions/boosts and that’s what’s keeping me glued to a Mastodon account. Each compliments the other but I wish I could just settle on one. I think every micro.blog user that also enjoys aspects of the mastodon specific experience struggles with this dilemma.
In some ways Micro.blog is VERY close to being 3 apps in one for me… blogging, fediverse/mastodon and RSS (because it allows for following most blogs). But I have to be able to organize feeds someway. I use folders/groups in both RSS and Mastodon.
Yeah, that’s what feels so frustrating: Micro.blog is so close to be an amazing service. That’s why I’m still investing in it (with both time and money, heh).
I’m trying to replace both WordPress and Mastodon, so pretty similar.
I’ll just register my general surprise at how concerned people are with the appearance of posts on the (very) tiny audience of Micro.blog followers on the timeline. For folks who are interested in MB at least in part because it’s not identical to other social media, there’s a lot of concern about optimizing views/clicks.
I cross post comfortably other places. I am confident based on analytics my stuff is seen far more other places. People on MB know how it works and choose to be there. That seems fine too.
My own use of an RSS reader means I always see full content of posts even if I don’t click through because of how Reeder and Feedbin work.
I think a lot of this concern I get, but also shows a lack of respect for the people reading. If they choose to follow you on MB it’s because that works for them. Other folks would prefer to follow via RSS. If you cross post maybe there works. One of the best things about Micro.blog is you only have to write things in one place, and then the service makes it super easy for people to read wherever they want.
I can’t speak for anyone else but I’m not the least bit concerned about optimizing views or clicks nor do I look at analytics. My concern is the reading experience. I really dislike seeing titled posts in the timeline as there’s no additional context. I often just scroll by. I think it would be a far better experience as a reader to see a title, a few sentences from the first paragraph or some other summary and a small thumbnail if an image is included.
I do follow a good number of folks via RSS but I find it’s often a bit of a hassle to comment via an RSS entry.
I’m not understanding your comment about respect for readers. But as a reader I’m suggesting I would likely read more titled posts if a better preview of the post were provided.
It’s fine that the micro.blog time line is oriented towards shorter status posts but that’s generally not what I’m interested in. I suspect though that my preferences don’t actually fit the micro.blog timeline very well.
To me, the issues are both as a reader and as a writer.
As a reader, I simply agree with all of this:
The thing is, I don’t want to cross-post - at least not to other places within the fediverse. (And I think I only want to bother with ActivityPub, RSS, email, and the website.) Why?
First of all, I just don’t think I should have to. Mastodon and (the microblogging part of) Micro.blog are so similar, that it really shouldn’t be necessary to keep both accounts. (Now if someone else wants to, that’s perfectly fine of course!)
Another reason I want to have only one of these accounts, is that one of the ways to get in touch with people, is through replying and having conversations. These often happen in conjunction with consuming content - and that is why I want that to be a good experience on Micro.blog as well. And if someone then checks my account, I want that to be my Micro.blog account (and that they don’t have to maybe click through from my Mastodon account).
Secondly, as a tiny, amateur writer, I neither want to fragment my (few) followers nor the conversations. Let’s say I write a “proper” blog post, with images, formatting, a title and the lot.
Micro.blog creates the dull timeline post with just the title + link,
I cross-post to my Mastodon account,
and maybe I’ll do what @sod does, and write a separate Micro.blog post with a summary, featured image and link to the blog post on my website.
So now we have three separate timeline posts for one blog post - and the problem, is that the people commenting on the different ones don’t see each others comments. And if I’m lucky enough to get some comments from either Mastodon or Micro.blog people, I want them to be able to converse between each other as well. Also, only the comments from post nr 1 (the least interesting looking one) gets pulled and added to the website - so that could remove the people visiting that way, from parts of the conversation as well.
I simply don’t see why it’s not a better experience for everyone, if there’s one timeline post to one blog post, and that that’s at least like this (which is within the current limits of micro posts on Micro.blog):
The thing is, though, that Micro.blog not only ruins the posts for Micro.blog followers. They do it for all parts of the fediverse.
This part also applies to followers on Mastodon, Firefish or whatever.
So that is one of the reasons why I don’t think this () is fair - I don’t want only Micro.blog users to follow my Micro.blog account. (That’s kinda the point of the Fediverse, no? I at least want to consolidate followers from microblogging services!)
The second reason, is that my main request is that timeline posts connected to blog posts gets the same affordances as regular microblog posts (300 characters, formatting and image support). When making the example above, I was allowed to post this as a micro post with the current display rules - so I wouldn’t call it “disrespectful” that a summary post would look the same way. If so, the post in question is also disrespectful, right?
Now, I also want to increase the 300 character limit a bit.
Reading intact lists is much easier than when the items gets put on a line, like in the image above.
And the reader can’t know that an image was removed in the middle of that summary.
Also, emphasis can change meaning, and also often makes things easier to read.
So I just don’t see how increasing that limit a bit is disrespectful to readers either.
I have zero plans to monetise my writing - this is just a hobby. I don’t have sponsored posts, or even affiliate links - so I don’t care about the number of clicks or anything. But I still shouldn’t have to feel bad for wanting people to read what I write, and engage in conversations. I mean, then I would just journal instead of having a blog as well, right?
Your first paragraph suggests that you’d be better off reading somewhere that is not the timeline, which is what I do and MB makes that easy and available.
Your second paragraph emphasizes that further, acknowledging you want to optimize for reading content that is not of the type literally in the name of the service.
Those are the places my posts go. But I add a mastodon account because ActivityPub discovery is very bad. And, for what it’s worth, cross posting to Mastodon generates the closest equivalent to native content there.
I just don’t think not doing open graph on the timeline on Micro.blog is that big a deal. I cross post in addition to AP, because non-stop people ask for all the Mastodon features like boosts and likes on MB, but they’re not a thing that’s coming here. Constantly, I hear people complain that any AP that isn’t a replica for the Mastodon experience means they’re freaked out someone’s like won’t reach them or that there’s some mutual expectation on Mastodon around interactions I don’t get. But in the end, people want to use Mastodon, not be a part of some technical project, so I just give them native posts to read as well.
Anyway, I just wanted to say people will read good content. And I think there’s so many ways to follow my blog and any Micro blog that I’m quite sure the timeline is not something worth worrying so much about.
I agree - but that is not what I’m asking for[1]. Because that would mean that you were right in saying that my wish only mattered to followers on Micro.blog. I’m asking for the timeline posts for “blog posts with a title” to at least have the same features as regular micro posts.
Yes, I agree: If you cross-post to Mastodon, that post will look better. But that’s only because MB has chosen to ruin the MB post - not because of any special Mastodon feature.
And speaking of: I don’t want “a replica of Mastodon”. If I wanted that, I wouldn’t be working on moving from Mastodon to Micro.blog! MB has some fantastic features, that Mastodon isn’t even close to having.
And MB shouldn’t uncritically implement every Mastodon feature “just because.” But it shouldn’t not implement them for the same reason!
If we take “likes” as an example: I’ve argued for Micro.blog implementing a private, unmetered “appreciation” a la Glass (so not like Mastodon). And the fact that that could map neatly to other AP services, is an argument for it - not against it.
Differentiation is important - but the need to be different shouldn’t keep you from implementing good ideas from other services. Now I’ve tried to make concrete arguments for why I think Micro.blog would be (even) better with a few changes. And it’s fair to think that it wouldn’t be better - but I’d rather see arguments for why, than “no, that’s not how we do it around here”. And I’ve yet to see an argument for who gets a better experience from long posts with a title having harsher timeline limits than regular micro posts.
Even though I personally think it should be user configurable - and the same with displaying boosts. (I’m not arguing for Micro.blog being able to give boosts.) Giving people the option to turn those things on, if they want to, would provide something for those who want it, without ruining the clean timeline of those who don’t. ↩︎
I’ll make the simple argument-- I don’t want to write summaries for posts and I don’t think the first X characters of a post with a title translates to the correct preview content. Showing a random 300-500 characters that start my post that is suddenly cutoff doesn’t seem great to me. I spend (minimal) time writing a title to let people know what it’s about. I don’t want to have a second step spending time writing another paragraph about what my two paragraph post is about. I don’t want to have to reread my post and figure out if the opening is the opening that many people may only see.
Well, I don’t see why you shouldn’t be able to turn off the feature if you wanted, though - even though I disagree that “just a title” is better than this.
Given what I know about Manton, I don’t think this is true. i.e., I don’t think Micro.blog is putting a finger on the scale for micro posts. The Community (Timeline) part sure makes it seem that way but the Hosting (business end) is not. Hence I’ve always sensed a struggle between those two parts.
I’m finally catching up on the more recent posts in this thread, and there’s a lot! Thank you everyone. I’m going to be thinking about this a little more.
There are also some long-standing issues that were not intended to be forever, such as stripping styling in a post when it is truncated. It was a technical shortcut to avoid accidentally truncating tags in the middle of a style run, or introducing related problems with lots of nested HTML tags. We have a lot more experience with this kind of thing now, so I’m ready to solve it.
Better display of multiple photos is another one. Basically, I think there’s some low-hanging fruit we can fix that should make a nice difference, even if it doesn’t significantly change the timeline for long titled posts, for now.
The bottom one is obviously how it is today - but I gotta say I prefer the top one. Not only does it take up even less space - it also makes it clear that the link takes you to the post, and not just the home page of the website.[2]
Having the first take on this feature be automatic and stick to the current timeline rules for posts without title, might not be optimal - but I imagine it’s way easier to implement.
The automation logic could go something like this:
Take the title, make it bold[3]and a clickable link to the full post.
Provide the start of the post, with formatting intact.[4]
Then, if the whole post didn’t fit, add (…)[5]as another clickable link to the whole post.[6]
Lastly, if there was no photos in step 2, provide the first image of the post.
I know I’m only one person - but as someone who really wants to merge my web presence into Micro.blog (and is fine with paying for it), I think I’m a member of a cohort where a bunch of potential MB customers are. And I know you value many things higher than “growth” - and that is one of the reasons I’m paying for MB!
But I still want you to understand, that when I’m considering clicking that big “Migrate” button from Mastodon, the fact that I know my Micro.blog posts will look terrible for the (few) people who follow me, does matter a bit.[7]
I’ll stick to things not requiring extra post UI. So even though being able to customise the timeline post would be neat, for instance, that’s something for later. ↩︎
As someone new to Micro.blog, I’ve found the latter a bit confusing - but this is far less important to me than being able to choose Option B! ↩︎
as headers isn’t supprted on the timeline - right? ↩︎
I’d go for 600 characters over 300 characters for the limit here. IMO, the most unique and important selling point of Micro.blog, as opposed to free things like Mastodon and Firefish, is in titled posts and longer writing. So I’d give those the treat of having the same limit as microposts with quotes. ↩︎
Add this after the more tag if there is one, and if not, after the limit. ↩︎
And here I’ll reinstate what I’ve said above: I have no plans to commercialise my writing or anything. But I still think it’s neat to have people read what I write and to have conversations about it! ↩︎
As long as options remain to have the timeline remain a minimal dashboard, as it is, then I have no issue with options to expand it, though some of that seems like it’s not in the spirit of what the timeline is–in part it feels like trying to change the timeline into an RSS Reader or something—and, most importantly, it is so far down the list of my priorities for where limited dev resources go that it might as well not exist.
If anything, the way the timeline works now, is more like an RSS reader (only showing the title of posts). And I’m suggesting making it a bit more like a social media timeline [1] - and let RSS readers be RSS readers.
To me, spending time in the timeline of Micro.blog is so much worse than other apps and services, that I don’t really touch it. And I think that should be a priority to improve, as we don’t only use social media to produce.
(But I love the blogging parts of MB, and the producing content through Ulysses.)
No, I don’t want it to be like Twitter/Instagram/TikTok… ↩︎
As I understand it, the Timeline is not intended to be the place for consumption of longer posts and it works well enough showing a minimal amount of content. Work spent making it something else, with expanded views for longer content, which RSS Readers already do well (if you are using one that only has one minimized viewing option, it sounds like you might want to change), and which I already use, is simply of a much lower priority for me than a very very long list of other improvements.
I understand what you are proposing, but since this is a thread where individuals are posting their opinions on an idea, I am merely sharing mine as one who doesn’t see things quite the same way you do and would prefer other development areas be prioritized.
What I meant about the RSS comparison, is that in a RSS reader, you get a list of posts (usually just the title and a very small preview), which you click to get the full article. And the Micro.blog kinda timeline works kinda like that now, since the long posts are just the title and a link, which then (on mobile) opens the browser (in-app or not) with the full content.
I’m not petitioning for it being the place to consume the longer post - but for it to be better for discovering longer posts. (And, I guess, for consuming medium posts (<600).)
In my suggestion for the expanded previews, there’s still a link-out! It’s just that it’s very easy to just scroll right by the minimal timeline posts long posts have now…
Yeah, absolutely! I find discussions like this both interesting and valuable.
I understand what you are proposing. Not sure what I can add to what I started with: those changes, if optional, wouldn’t bother me but I would rather see other development areas prioritized.
:
Not only does it take up even less space - it also makes it clear that the link takes you to the post, and not just the home page of the website.
