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Why projects start with a Discord and not an alternative - Comment found on Mastodon (beehaw.org)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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Original comment, copy-pasted for convenience:

why do so many projects start with a discord and not with a wiki, or github, or web presence?

simply, discord is the fastest, most frictionless way to do the following:

garner a community of support ensuring that there is an audience for the project

provide access to idea validation for the creators of that project. rapid feedback for their project = rapid progress

provide the easy creation of (not necessarily accessible nor good, but) quick resources for the project

forums, websites, hell even github can only hope to match the value proposition of discord, and it's something people fail to take into account when they criticise the move to discord as a file host/forum/wiki/project website

if you want people to make a file host/forum/wiki/project website, they're directly competing with the frictionless, fast, yet unsustainable and frankly web-shit discord. the fast, frictionless nature is enough for people to use and accept, hell, even to make infrastructural to their project

a platform that could create a non-webshit, easy way to provide the value that discord provides, all while being just as fast and frictionless if not faster/more lubricated, would absolutely blow discord out the water

I am a sysadmin and my level of tech friction tolerance is different from the people referenced here leading projects, but I'd like to gather opinions on this, the fact that this regularly happens as described suggests there's a whole lot of truth to it, but i feel like it's overstating the friction, am i wrong here?

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Network effects have always been strong with online services.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

It’s also a matter of retention rate. I might make a new account on a forum and make one post or comment, but what are the chances I come back to the forum or build community there after I close out the page?

With discord, previous communities you’ve interacted with are stickied to the side and thus get totally forgotten about less easily.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I feel its the reverse, most people I know on discord mute most of the discord servers they are in. I put most of the discord servers I'm in into folders so that its easier to find the people I actually talk to and ignore all of the ones I joined for asking questions or downloading files.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

The thing is, you have that option, and have a central system to do that management, rather than a hundred different sights that it is hard to maintain contact networks across.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Good point. The single account for multiple "servers" contributes to that as well.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

It would be nice if it was on an open protocol rather than a proprietary platform, but it is what it is.