Hello, old journal
Jan. 23rd, 2019 09:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
quotidianIt's been a while, but hey. I could use a place to reflect on various projects and interests too nebulous, over-ambitious, or, well, quotidian to promote elsewhere. And this sure is a place!
Besides, I've been thinking lately about how unpleasant most social media is and how much I enjoyed LJ/DW back when I was active on these old platforms. Some of that was due to life stage, no doubt. However, I think the structure and interface of these sites was also a factor. I'd like to revisit these old UIs and see if I can use my much-improved HCI skills to suss out what it is about these old journaling sites that makes them so enjoyable. I'm also curious to explore whether it's possible to modernize these sites without losing whatever it is that makes them feel so cozy.
At the very least it seems possible to up the font size and spacing on this HTML editor a bit. It's so cramped compared to most modern sites!
Some other musing on the subject
... anyhow. More on this subject as it occurs to me. I'm going to check out the github repositories and see if I have the skills to actually mess around with some of this stuff.
Besides, I've been thinking lately about how unpleasant most social media is and how much I enjoyed LJ/DW back when I was active on these old platforms. Some of that was due to life stage, no doubt. However, I think the structure and interface of these sites was also a factor. I'd like to revisit these old UIs and see if I can use my much-improved HCI skills to suss out what it is about these old journaling sites that makes them so enjoyable. I'm also curious to explore whether it's possible to modernize these sites without losing whatever it is that makes them feel so cozy.
At the very least it seems possible to up the font size and spacing on this HTML editor a bit. It's so cramped compared to most modern sites!
Some other musing on the subject
- DW feels rather heavy and complicated. A little more progressive disclosure could help with that.
- The lack of defaults for things like userpics makes the barrier to entry feel higher than it really is.
- A smarter text-editor might be nice. For instance, it would be cool if the text editor picked up on the fact that I'm writing a bulleted list here, and formatted the text accordingly.
- And I hear that the image upload options are kind of a mess. Would it be possible to get to at least DeviantArt levels of ease?
- The mood selector is so nostalgic I can't even handle it.
- It feels like everything in DW is in tight little boxes. It should be possible to open things up a bit and let the layout breathe.
- More modern text fields, drop-downs, and buttons would go a long way
- The site is definitely not responsive. It all feels very pre-mobile.
- The site doesn't feel like it has much of a brand identity. There's something very generic about it. (Maybe I feel that way in part because the color scheme reminds me of Zellers?)
... anyhow. More on this subject as it occurs to me. I'm going to check out the github repositories and see if I have the skills to actually mess around with some of this stuff.
