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Tell HN: Twitter is growing increasingly unusable without an account

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Re: Tell HN: Twitter is growing increasingly unusable without an account

#31

Post by xg15 »

jevoten wrote: post #29
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #5

> Unfortunately twitter is going the direction of quora, pinterest, facebook, and medium Don’t forget Reddit. Reddit’s login pop-ups are more aggressive than Twitter’s for me. > Now you can perhaps read ten tweets or replies to a linked tweet without an account before the same thing occurs Perhaps an unpopular opinion, but I don’t think any company is obligated to provide unlimited access for free without an account.…

> Perhaps an unpopular opinion, but I don’t think any company is obligated to provide unlimited access for free without an account. If you’re trying to scroll deep into conversations or someone’s Tweets, it’s reasonable to expect that you’d need to become a user of the website. Oh of course. But then it should have been that way from the start . Instead they were user-friendly at first, and only once they'd grown eno…

Yes. Also called "growth engineering" and pretty much the basic mode of operation of silicon valley companies.

Re: Tell HN: Twitter is growing increasingly unusable without an account

#34

Post by AutumnCurtain »

digitalsushi wrote: post #25
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #5

> Unfortunately twitter is going the direction of quora, pinterest, facebook, and medium Don’t forget Reddit. Reddit’s login pop-ups are more aggressive than Twitter’s for me. > Now you can perhaps read ten tweets or replies to a linked tweet without an account before the same thing occurs Perhaps an unpopular opinion, but I don’t think any company is obligated to provide unlimited access for free without an account.…

On a cell phone, I can type "best driveway shovel" on my phone, and it will take me to google. Google will have an overlay that tells me searching for the best driveway shovels is better in an app. I close that overlay. The first hit is twitter. The second is reddit. I skip twitter. I get an overlay telling me to install a reddit app, or continue in the website. I click continue in website. There is an overlay tellin…

Old.reddit.com is the only remotely usable form of the website and seems to have none of the obnoxious popups.

Re: Tell HN: Twitter is growing increasingly unusable without an account

#35

Post by Wiseacre »

digitalsushi wrote: post #25
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #5

> Unfortunately twitter is going the direction of quora, pinterest, facebook, and medium Don’t forget Reddit. Reddit’s login pop-ups are more aggressive than Twitter’s for me. > Now you can perhaps read ten tweets or replies to a linked tweet without an account before the same thing occurs Perhaps an unpopular opinion, but I don’t think any company is obligated to provide unlimited access for free without an account.…

On a cell phone, I can type "best driveway shovel" on my phone, and it will take me to google. Google will have an overlay that tells me searching for the best driveway shovels is better in an app. I close that overlay. The first hit is twitter. The second is reddit. I skip twitter. I get an overlay telling me to install a reddit app, or continue in the website. I click continue in website. There is an overlay tellin…

The fourth hit is Pinterest and the fifth hit is LinkedIn...

Re: Tell HN: Twitter is growing increasingly unusable without an account

#36

Post by eCa »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #5

> Unfortunately twitter is going the direction of quora, pinterest, facebook, and medium Don’t forget Reddit. Reddit’s login pop-ups are more aggressive than Twitter’s for me. > Now you can perhaps read ten tweets or replies to a linked tweet without an account before the same thing occurs Perhaps an unpopular opinion, but I don’t think any company is obligated to provide unlimited access for free without an account.…

> If you’re trying to scroll deep into conversations or someone’s Tweets, it’s reasonable to expect that you’d need to become a user of the website.

This change happened during last summer. Funilly enough it was just ad I considered getting an account to share a bike trip live, but:

1. I didn’t want my new account to help their A/B-testing.

2. I didn’t want family and friends to have to sign up to follow my trip.

End result: No account, and I read twitter less since they don’t value my passive engagement.

Re: Tell HN: Twitter is growing increasingly unusable without an account

#37

Post by GreggHyram »

xg15 wrote: post #31
jevoten wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Perhaps an unpopular opinion, but I don’t think any company is obligated to provide unlimited access for free without an account. If you’re trying to scroll deep into conversations or someone’s Tweets, it’s reasonable to expect that you’d need to become a user of the website. Oh of course. But then it should have been that way from the start . Instead they were user-friendly at first, and only once they'd grown eno…

Yes. Also called "growth engineering" and pretty much the basic mode of operation of silicon valley companies.

ackshually we call it "growth hacking". sounds better to investors ;)

Re: Tell HN: Twitter is growing increasingly unusable without an account

#38

Post by beardedetim »

Retric wrote: post #21
gezfrg321 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It will make their metrics look better

That might help some middle managers at Twitter but it’s irrelevant to the company. If anything adding such pop up’s just costs them views and thus revenue.

The company _is_ middle management. Those are the people being served by the company the most.

Re: Tell HN: Twitter is growing increasingly unusable without an account

#39

Post by goodpoint »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #5

> Unfortunately twitter is going the direction of quora, pinterest, facebook, and medium Don’t forget Reddit. Reddit’s login pop-ups are more aggressive than Twitter’s for me. > Now you can perhaps read ten tweets or replies to a linked tweet without an account before the same thing occurs Perhaps an unpopular opinion, but I don’t think any company is obligated to provide unlimited access for free without an account.…

> I don’t think any company is obligated to provide unlimited access for free without an account

No no no, companies should not be allowed to this kind of bait and switch:

1) provide a free service

2) gain market dominance, push out competitors, and turn into a necessity for millions of users

3) create lock-in and exploit the userbase

Essential public utilities are regulated (properly, in many countries) to avoid this.

In 2022 services like ISP, mobile carriers, email and instant messaging are almost essential. Millions of people need them to work, buy food, have access to health and government services.

And yet tech companies are never held responsible.

Re: Tell HN: Twitter is growing increasingly unusable without an account

#40

Post by NoGravitas »

AutumnCurtain wrote: post #34
digitalsushi wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On a cell phone, I can type "best driveway shovel" on my phone, and it will take me to google. Google will have an overlay that tells me searching for the best driveway shovels is better in an app. I close that overlay. The first hit is twitter. The second is reddit. I skip twitter. I get an overlay telling me to install a reddit app, or continue in the website. I click continue in website. There is an overlay tellin…

Old.reddit.com is the only remotely usable form of the website and seems to have none of the obnoxious popups.

If you don't need to comment, libreddit is significantly better, especially on mobile, than old.reddit.com.
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