Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Sign Up Forms Must Die

alistapart.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–37 of 37 posts

Re: Sign Up Forms Must Die

#31

Post by aykall »

huhtenberg wrote: post #27
bayareaguy wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 ? :)

I have to agree with huhtenberg, I never heard about Jottit and I went there to check it out but a big blank field with a "create a site" button tells me nothing. Honestly, that is a lot missing in there...

Re: Sign Up Forms Must Die

#32

Post by aykall »

jgill wrote: post #23

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.…

Sounds like you are describing OpenID. Once i thought about a little software that would work like a real world id. Every time a web service ask you for personal info you would just click on a icon and show them your id (that means that the software would pass all the details to the service). Would that work? It sounds a lot like google checkout...

Re: Sign Up Forms Must Die

#33

Post by jgill »

aykall wrote: post #32
jgill wrote: post #23

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.…

Sounds like you are describing OpenID. Once i thought about a little software that would work like a real world id. Every time a web service ask you for personal info you would just click on a icon and show them your id (that means that the software would pass all the details to the service). Would that work? It sounds a lot like google checkout...

Yes, something similar to OpenID and Googlecheckout. The problem would be that the Yahoo!'s, Microsoft's, and AOL's of the world would not allow Google to centrally manage all user IDs and registration information on the web (or they would not be willing participants in the centralization of the information to another for profit company).

Re: Sign Up Forms Must Die

#34

Post by albertcardona »

huhtenberg wrote: post #27
bayareaguy wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 ? :)

Well: a webpage is created with whatever you typed, and an unique URL assigned.

Then at top left there is a "claim this site" to declare your ownership on it -but you don't have to.

Jottit: a great paste bin. Among other things.

Re: Sign Up Forms Must Die

#35

Post by cstejerean »

boredguy8 wrote: post #10

"Upon arriving at [Google Video], they found a link to share their video and what happened next? They got the form in Figure 13.1." "It’s only when you want to publish or share your movie that Jumpcut asks for your name and email so you and others can access the movie you just made." I -hate- the web experience this article describes. If you're going to make me sign up to use your service, tell me. Don't string me al…

Google Video is not a good counter example to Jumpcut. I think Google Video works perfectly. The point of Google Video is to view videos, which it allows you to do without an account. To share a video you need to have an account, same as in Jumpcut. (Typically you have to make users create an account to post content otherwise a never ending stream of spam is likely to follow, degrading the quality of the service for legitimate users)

For Jumpcut, the real value in letting the user upload and edit a video is to get a feel for the video editing functionality without having to sign up, (since the video editing is really their selling point). If the user likes what they've created they can sign up to post it. This is key. Let the user try out the idea of your site without signing up. You can then require them to signup if they like it and want to keep their work.

Recently there was another post where somebody had a startup that had some cool way to learn a foreign language http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=144998

I wanted to check it out but had to sign up to really see how it all worked. So I left.

Re: Sign Up Forms Must Die

#36

Post by cstejerean »

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…

Requiring users to sign up before they know if the service is valuable is wrong. Prove to them what you did is worth their time first, then require them to sign up if they want to continue using it.

You get a pretty good idea if HN is worth it by reading the posts and comments from others. If you like what you see and would like to contribute then sign up. Nothing wrong with that. It would be great to allow anonymous submissions and comments but unfortunately this is very likely to lead to abuse.

Re: Sign Up Forms Must Die

#37

Post by petenixey »

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

You can completely replace the registration process as long as the application doesn't need any data from the user. If the app needs data then you can pre-fill it (as we do at Clickpass). Even pre-filled though you still need to confirm with the user that they're happy to send it (you can't allow an app to call any data it wants from a user without asking them first)
Post reply on HN