Please stop asking me to use the app • Hacker News Board

Re: Please stop asking me to use the app

#41

Post by tgtweak » Tue, Jul 03, 2018, 2:11 AM UTC

The app doesn't have ad blockers and they can spam notifications, hence the push.

Also I'm sure somewhere "mobile users" is a metric in a company valuation equation. Pinterest is the worst offender of a mobile app that doesn't need to exist since the web counterpart can do 100% of the job. This being a product that leveraged JavaScript in browser bookmarks to get "pins" without an app or extension.

When Reddit stopped allowing non-email-verified signups and conveniently locked everyone out who did have a non-email legacy account, the writing was on the wall. They didn't even have their own mobile app for years after the "mobile first" rhetoric and guess what... It still grew to the #3 website in the world.

Re: Please stop asking me to use the app

#42

Post by bobbles » Tue, Jul 03, 2018, 2:11 AM UTC

Ancalagon wrote: post #3

And please go back to the old reddit, before the redesign. I can't stand it.

You can use old.reddit.com

Re: Please stop asking me to use the app

#43

Post by RobertRoberts » Tue, Jul 03, 2018, 2:12 AM UTC

Finally, the needed re-branding/re-naming for the ambiguous "Dark Patterns" is "Asshole Design".

https://old.reddit.com/r/assholedesign/

Re: Please stop asking me to use the app

#44

Post by myf01d » Tue, Jul 03, 2018, 2:13 AM UTC

myf01d wrote: post #2

Please stop forcing the old.reddit.com subdomain on us

Even though I don't give a single fuck about the downvotes, I really don't understand the extent of downvoting abuse on this website. And for some reason, I am unable to do downvotes. OP clearly messed with the original link and added the "old" subdomain. What the fuck am I being downvoted here for?

Re: Please stop asking me to use the app

#45

Post by Ancalagon » Tue, Jul 03, 2018, 2:13 AM UTC

doodhwala wrote: post #25

Ancalagon wrote: post #3

And please go back to the old reddit, before the redesign. I can't stand it.

I hope you are aware that you can opt out of the redesign.

Yeah I am. But im not always logged in (such as on my work laptop), and the redesign blasts ads and is much less useable than the old design.

Re: Please stop asking me to use the app

#46

Post by throwawayqdhd » Tue, Jul 03, 2018, 2:14 AM UTC

For some reason, I can't log into my Reddit account on the new design. I have to go back to old.reddit.com to log in.

Not that I'm complaining. The new design is just...weird?

Re: Please stop asking me to use the app

#47

Post by jakelarkin » Tue, Jul 03, 2018, 2:15 AM UTC

mobile app installs growth must be a KPI for pitch decks / funding.

Re: Please stop asking me to use the app

#48

Post by zmmmmm » Tue, Jul 03, 2018, 2:15 AM UTC

It's kind of fascinating that seems like there is some kind of force that drives popular web sites to eventually self-sabotage themselves out of existence. Reddit seems to be having a good go at it now.

I sort of get how it happens but I can't quite understand how the level of stupidity required by management is achieved in practice to actually do it.

Re: Please stop asking me to use the app

#49

Post by geofft » Tue, Jul 03, 2018, 2:16 AM UTC

kirubakaran wrote: post #10

I'm thankful for their new design, actually. After many years of trying, I have now managed to successfully kick my Reddit habit completely and have gained precious hours in my day.

Yeah - the redesign had a fantastic feature that it wouldn't let me log in successfully, so I'm gone now.

Re: Please stop asking me to use the app

#50

Post by tgtweak » Tue, Jul 03, 2018, 2:16 AM UTC

underwater wrote: post #11

colanderman wrote: post #7

I'm surprised that's their only problem with the mobile site. I purposely do not follow Reddit links because they show me a spinner for 7 seconds before showing the text of self posts. I can only assume that this delay to show a kilobyte of text is purposeful and meant to further steer users to the app, and not simply gross engineering incompetence, since the desktop site loads instantly. (Though, thank you to the OP…

Ironically the mobile site is a full single page app, while the desktop site (or at least the old one) was mostly server rendered. It's not impossible to create a fast mobile client rendered site (Twitter have done well) but it's certainly not as easy as it is with plain old HTML.

Twitter is the other major "use our app" and "please register to continue" abuser. The mobile website shows trimmed comments and the original post that cannot even be followed or scrolled through without a forced register-wall appearing.