I think you're doing it in reverse, and that doing so is likely to scare off a vast number of potential users.
You should have some initial filters in place, that the user can then optionally remove as they gradually dip their toes in the water.
There will be no meaningful content created until you do that, because the chat will just always be initially flooded for everyone with the worst kind of vile trash. The first impression will be very bad, and that'll be that.
I don't think content will be an issue if sharing is handled through linking to specific tags (hashtags.chat/NotReallyPrivate instead of hashtags.chat) because of the built in lack of discoverability.
I think I see the points that both @_aaya & @adventured are trying to make.(Either of you guys please correct my recapitulations if I misunderstood.)
I think @_aaya is saying that: while the initial landing may be intimidating for any given visitor, those who are able to take control of the chaos via his/her features will have a rich experience.
I think @adventured is talking about the "customer-lifecycle"(to use a fun buzzword.) since "customer lifecycle" is measured in seconds/milliseconds on the internet, the already important nature of first-impressions get magnified due to the smaller volume of opinions that can be garnered before people just leave.
My opinion: First impressions are critical, especially on the internet. This site clearly has a lot of promise, but may catch on better/faster if there were some tweaks to the beginning of the user-experience.
Maybe it's due to lack of experience, but I guess I didn't consider adoption from a business perspective when designing the initial experience.
Do you think a separate landing page or series of blog posts on Medium could lead to a better first impression? That way I could direct new users to specific tags and bypass the default channel altogether.
I don't know if anonymity is supposed to be the differentiator here, but true anonymity is not delivered by an end product -- it's essentially a "client side" concern.
This is really fun. Suggestion: make it more obvious when someone tags me in a message. Since my tag is always changing, it's hard to tell when someone is talking to specifically _me_. Maybe you could make messages tagged with any of your past tags a different color or highlight or something?
I'm not trying to defend them, I'm more curious what your definition of anonymous would be? Eg, they could say anonymous and not store any data either, but potentially you can still be identified through an oversight - meaning even if they attempt to be anonymous, you might still not be anonymous. If taken far enough, only the most rigid, hardened and secured communication seems well vetted to keep you anonymous - but then we can't even trust them running it either.
So yea, I'm just curious what's reasonable here. What would make you feel good when associated with the word anonymous?
If they advertise a software as an "Anonymous Discussion Platform", the minimum standard that I think of is a P2P network built on top of GNUnet, Tor, or other similar networks.
I'm still experimenting with finding the right balance between convenience and making users conscious of the decision to censor others. For now you can use the settings in the sidebar to filter words and message IDs.
cool concept. I actually wrote basically the exact same thing in PHP as my final project for CS50X (nowhere near as polished as this of course). guess I can scrap plans for ever updating it :)
one thing that would be nice: a built-in profanity filter library. I see you have the ability to add words to a blacklist, but it'd be nice to just flick a switch and get rid of the garbage.
I disagree. Growing up I've had plenty of positive experiences with various anonymous communities online.
I do think that giving IDs to individual messages (instead of individual people) and not having an upvote/like system will go a long way in reducing the kind of toxic behavior you have in mind though.
