Why this isn't soup.io clone UX-wise.
I'd like to say few things about why Loforo isn't a clone of soup.io.
Loforo seems to be closer to Tumblr than to soup.io actually.
This will be a rant about User eXperience.
Soup.io:
The very basis of the soup.io phenomenon is the continuity of focus.
You are always in the same space: On a timeline. Either /everyone or /friends or /fof or a particular user.
You scroll the timeline and no action except explicitely clicking on a permalink takes you away.
- Repost is a one-click operation - and was the main driver of the user engagement on soup.io - after you click the button, everything is done in the background.
It adds the post to your timeline. There is no editing stage. You can always edit posts in your timeline later, if you want. - React is an in-place operation, adding a reaction within a static popup panel, without going away to a different page.
- There is no "Like", as when you like something - you just repost it.
- There are tag and group systems
Meantime, on Tumblr:
- Reblog loads a popup for few seconds, where you need to click "save", you can add additional caption. After clicking "Reblog" it then closes, the timeline you're browsing is still underneath. Still, that is a click, waiting for the popup panel to load, then click to actually reblog. 2 clicks and few seconds for a repost, awful.
Alt+Clicking the reblog button, passess around the entire process, which then works exactly as the soup.io repost.
Thing is, you need two hands for that. What if you hold a slice of pizza? - Comment is also in-place but text only, located in a loaded popup panel, similar to soup.io react panel.
- Like is a one-click action, and adds stuff to a "liked" list, like a soup.io repost, but adds a post to a "liked" list, which is separate from "reblogged" and "posted" posts in the timeline of the user.
This creates a different experience, as when browsing a user, you have two lists: one has posts and reblogs, and then the other has likes. - There are tag and group systems
Loforo currently:
- Repost opens a new tab, where you need to click "Save Post" and then you end up in the list of posts, so you need to close the tab. So that is 2 clicks and a new tab to close, for every repost - an operation that is a one-click on soup.io
- Comment is in place, but text only as well.
- Likes - just counts likes on the post, there is no list of the posts you "liked" anywhere. There is also no list of people who liked a given post, so is this just a raw number then?
- No tag or group systems yet.
Really, to achieve anything close to what made soup.io unique, you would need to remove all the obstacles from the user experience. Opening a new tab, or loading a popup window that loads for few seconds is a major disruption in the feed scrolling process.
A repost needs to be one-click operation.
Yes, it would be nice to have tags and groups and whatnot, but truly, the most basic thing one does on a microblogging platform is reposting and untill this can be handled with a single click. For now, I'd rather be alt+clicking on Tumblr than closing a tab every repost.
-- zEver.soup.io / sEver.loforo.com
I think you are very right about this but I'm sure making repost obe-click-buy is in their Dev Timeline. Given the amount of Features and the Speed they are getting Them Out there I believe that polishing them will come later.
At least i Hope so. But given that we have a new Home AT ALL that embraces the Community for what IT IS the Guys from loforo are next to holy for me right now anyways
Also, when browsing /everyone on Loforo, I see a lot of repetitions due to reposts. I believe that didn't happen in soup, or did it? I think in soup I only saw the last repost, mentioning all others' reposts.
There is a lot more here than I can respond to in a comment but I appreciate the very detailed feedback and I've made notes to keep these things in mind as we develop it further. We wanted to get a basic reblog functionality out quickly so it literally just copies the existing post to a new post at the moment.
.. Likes are already tracked at a per-user level but I have plans to do the same for reblogs in the same way so we can both de-deplicate the reposts on /everyone and so we can show who liked/reblogged each post.
When we refine the reblog system, I'll also try make it as easy / fewer clicks as possible -- your point about just reposting then letting the user go back to edit it if necessary from the posts page is a good point.
Note that we don't intend to be a Soup clone. We plan to listen to feedback like this one and do what we believe is in the interests of our users.
@edelbert I commented on this above -- we plan to deduplicate when we redo the reblog system (coming soon)
I'm reposting this mainly to reinforce the continuity aspect. New tabs opening left and right really discourage me from using loforo.
What keeps me here, however, is that @loforo Admin(s?) do a damn good job in listening to the community and add/refine feaures insanely fast. Big props to the devs!
(this is probably because Loforo devs used Tumblr more than Soup)