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Sign Up Forms Must Die

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Re: Sign Up Forms Must Die

#21

Post by TrevorJ »

staunch wrote: post #8

How would you make this site have a gentler slope? Let the user post a comment and then say "Thanks for the comment, now you just need an account to publish this. Enter your username/password."? Some of the sites that do "gradual engagement" piss me off when they let me believe I'm about to do something and then surprise me with a sign up form. It strikes me as tricky and I very frequently walk away. I certainly beli…

Seems harder to do with something as granular as posting permissions, I agree.

Re: Sign Up Forms Must Die

#22

Post by bayareaguy »

staunch wrote: post #8

How would you make this site have a gentler slope? Let the user post a comment and then say "Thanks for the comment, now you just need an account to publish this. Enter your username/password."? Some of the sites that do "gradual engagement" piss me off when they let me believe I'm about to do something and then surprise me with a sign up form. It strikes me as tricky and I very frequently walk away. I certainly beli…

http://jottit.com has a nearly frictionless scheme.

Re: Sign Up Forms Must Die

#23

Post by jgill »

If you really want to get rid of sign up forms, having a large scale trusted and secure central repository for unique IDs/logins and 'commonly requested' information would eliminate the need for many sign up forms. The majority of web based applications, services, etc. ask you for the same information repeatedly without any actual need or use for the information as a value add in the functionality of the application. Why is that? Why hasn't this been done/worked in the past?

Re: Sign Up Forms Must Die

#24

Post by naxxtor »

mwmanning wrote: post #17

My current project involves interacting with a chat bot. We could require users to sign up on a form and make sure we have a boatload of data from them upfront before opening up the service to them. Instead what we do is tell them to add a bot to their buddy list and send it a greeting. In doing this, they've already engaged in the service, and we have created an entry in our users database based on their buddy name…

I think there is a fine balance between being "strung along" and gradual engagement.

For instance, if I were to use an app to share photos (a la flickr), and I was invited to upload a bunch of photos then be presented with "Ok, now you've got to sign up RIGHT NOW or we'll delete everything you just did" - that's sorta missing the point. That's less gradual engagement and more impending doom.

The implementation of the chatbot above seems to be more along the right lines, though. The holy grail perhaps would be allowing the user to fully engage with the service without even realising it.

Re: Sign Up Forms Must Die

#25

Post by chengmi »

mwmanning wrote: post #17

My current project involves interacting with a chat bot. We could require users to sign up on a form and make sure we have a boatload of data from them upfront before opening up the service to them. Instead what we do is tell them to add a bot to their buddy list and send it a greeting. In doing this, they've already engaged in the service, and we have created an entry in our users database based on their buddy name…

The issue isn't necessarily collecting "boatloads of data"; rather, the problem is making sure I have a way to contact this person who is potentially interested in my product. For you, this is conveniently solved through their screen name and network. However, how would you go about contacting someone who stumbles upon your website (without explicitly asking them for contact info)?

Another issue is accountability. If someone is abusing my service, I want to be able to ban them from ruining things for everyone else. If you look at sign up forms in terms of security, the psychological acceptability of filling out a form and providing an e-mail address is actually quite high compared to more robust ways of verifying identity (driver's license, social security number, etc).

Re: Sign Up Forms Must Die

#26

Post by jraines »

bayareaguy wrote: post #22
staunch wrote: post #8

How would you make this site have a gentler slope? Let the user post a comment and then say "Thanks for the comment, now you just need an account to publish this. Enter your username/password."? Some of the sites that do "gradual engagement" piss me off when they let me believe I'm about to do something and then surprise me with a sign up form. It strikes me as tricky and I very frequently walk away. I certainly beli…

http://jottit.com has a nearly frictionless scheme.

Yeah, it really hooked me -- even though I haven't used it for much, every time I have a simple, quick task where I just need to get a little info online fast I think of jottit

Re: Sign Up Forms Must Die

#27

Post by huhtenberg »

bayareaguy wrote: post #22
staunch wrote: post #8

How would you make this site have a gentler slope? Let the user post a comment and then say "Thanks for the comment, now you just need an account to publish this. Enter your username/password."? Some of the sites that do "gradual engagement" piss me off when they let me believe I'm about to do something and then surprise me with a sign up form. It strikes me as tricky and I very frequently walk away. I certainly beli…

http://jottit.com has a nearly frictionless scheme.

I am looking at their front page and I have no idea what they expect me to type in a very large unlabeled text entry field.

And if I click on Create, it say "see, that was easy". It certainly was, but what was IT exactly ? :)

Re: Sign Up Forms Must Die

#28

Post by apgwoz »

marrone wrote: post #9
serhei wrote: post #4

Use OpenID, perhaps? Add a ClickPass widget?

OpenID currently only speeds up the registration process, not replace it

But, how much "extra" information is really required for these services? Do they really need me to fill out my address or some other thing? Can't they just link my openid to a username of my choosing?

If that's the case, it speeds up the registration process by a lot, and _nearly_ replaces it. (not quite since I'd need a username)

Re: Sign Up Forms Must Die

#29

Post by jgill »

apgwoz wrote: post #28
marrone wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OpenID currently only speeds up the registration process, not replace it

But, how much "extra" information is really required for these services? Do they really need me to fill out my address or some other thing? Can't they just link my openid to a username of my choosing? If that's the case, it speeds up the registration process by a lot, and _nearly_ replaces it. (not quite since I'd need a username)

Open ID would be a good solution if it was adopted on a wider scale and was more on it's way to becoming a trusted standard.

I think many sites require extranenous registration information just because other sites request the same information. It also gives them the option of analysis at a later date.

Some companies may actually use the information they collect for data mining or to resell. Even though this can sometimes have evil purposes, sometimes it can be beneficial for a company to say Paul Graham really likes chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream and its his birthday, but for most places collecting this information is of little use. It's just annoying for the user, as the many replies to this news posting can attest to.

Re: Sign Up Forms Must Die

#30

Post by notauser »

mojuba wrote: post #15

How does gradual engagement work precisely? If this is based entirely on cookies, which seems to be the only possibility, then: what if I started the process, posted something - my video, a blog post, etc - then got my cookies deleted? Or moved to another computer?

It would depend on your product. I think the key UI principle to remember is that if user work is not saved, make it obvious that this is the case. They way they can decide when they want to keep their data enough to save it.

If the data is impersonal enough you can add a "Whoops, lost you work? Click here to see recent orphans" link.

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