New homepage under testing

[Casey Ho]

On Fri, Dec 12, 2008 at 5:09 AM, Kevin Stange <kstange at pidgin.im> wrote:
> The main problem with the screenshot on the front page is emphasizes a
> non-default configuration with protocol icons and the "small list" view,
> both of which are not our recommendations.  Several of the screenshots
> are taken with non-default settings, which is misleading since the
> screenshots do not specifically promote the alternative settings used
> within them.  This includes the appearance Facebook plugin which Pidgin
> actively recommends against using due to stability issues and which does
> not ship with Pidgin.

The reason the screenshot shows protocol icons/small view is because I
wanted to emphasize the fact that Pidgin connects to multiple
protocols.  That's the #1 reason why people use Pidgin.

> I also find the new home page reads like marketing material, provides
> less information in the initial view than the original text we had
> there, requires more vertical space, and now requires javascript to view
> additional information.  If you have Javascript off (or attempt to
> middle click for a new tab) the "View Screenshots" link does something
> unintuitive.

I made sure the non-JS version degraded perfectly- if this is a
problem it shouldn't be hard to stick a <noscript> tag in there.
There is indeed more vertical space, but the download button is
visible if the window is 800x600.  And the removal of information is
intentional- judging from my earlier changes, people didn't care at
all for the removed info.

> "No ads
> "100% free and actively supported by the open source community"
>
> This makes it sound like Pidgin is something that just came into being
> and then a mysterious "open source community" found it and decided to
> promote its use.  "Maintained as free software by an active open source
> community" is more accurate, but I question the need for "NO ADS!!!"
> marketing text on the front page of our web site.  Our old text on the
> matter explained that the program was free to both use and modify and
> indicated what open source was, which I thought preferable.

"No ads" is verbatim with the second most popular reason for why
people use Pidgin (judging from other websites).

"Free" is important, but it has less meaning because almost every
single other client save for Trillian Pro is free.

Also, just saying "open source" is a more succinct way of implying
that it's free to modify, etc.  On a second read though, I agree the
sentence is mildly awkward, so I'll look at fixing it.

> I do not like the way the download link box looks compared to the
> softness of the old download box and the upper part of the box does not
> connect to the middle and lower sections in my browser, Firefox 2.x
> under Linux.

I'll test the browser.  And the button is #1 on my list of things to
change once the A/B test is done.

> Several of the captions for screenshots are somewhat misleading:
>
> - "Set your status across all IM networks with a single click"
>
> You need to click twice or click and drag at minimum to change your
> status.  I'd rather just say "quickly change your status across all IM
> networks directly from the buddy list."

Sure, consider it done once the test is finished.

> - "Hundreds of plugins are available to help tweak every aspect of Pidgin"
>
> I am not sure we have evidence to indicate there are hundreds of plugins
> available.  We certainly don't list hundreds on our wiki.  While
> promoting Pidgin's extensibility with plugins is arguably a good thing,
> this screenshot lists many plugins we do not ship with Pidgin, which
> could lead to confusion.  The caption does not make this clear and some
> of those plugins may even be among those we recommend users not use for
> various reasons.

Hah, I committed a change to the "hundreds of plugins" phrase (someone
else already pointed that out), but it looks like I forgot to update
the server itself.  It'll be there on the next update.

> - "Pidgin supports these IM networks. Additional protocols are available
> through plugins."
>
> This screenshot lists two networks which we may implicitly support, but
> we do not show in our UI which will only serve to confuse new users, and
> it doesn't list facebook, accurately which may confuse those who see its
> logo listed elsewhere in the screenshots.  IRC is conspicuously missing.

IRC is a boo-boo on my part, I brain-farted on that.  I added the
implicit support for things like Livejournal because Adium does the
same.

> Basically, there is nothing I like about the new home page that wasn't
> an element of the old home page.  Honestly, I find most of these changes
> fairly disturbing and I am resisting the urge to disapprove them and go
> back to what we had.  I see haven't seen a compelling reason for making
> these changes other than to mislead potential users into thinking Pidgin
> is something slightly other than what it actually is and simply get as
> many users to use Pidgin as possible.  I don't think any developer of
> Pidgin has ever expressed concern that we don't have enough users or
> that having a small number of happy users would really do us any harm.
> I tend to think we sort of dread the prospect of a large influx if users
> with improper expectations of Pidgin.

Well yes, my goal was not to throw the old design or elements out the
door- it's not like it was fatally flawed.  The real changes are 1)
making the download button more obvious (though it will need further
improvement) 2) removing the redundant "Pidgin"/bird logo, which is
already in the header and 3) making room for a screenshot, which was
probably the most requested change.

As for problems with the number of users, that's why I wanted to
become a developer- to put things in place to help deal with a large
influx of users, including those that are annoying.  Frankly, I think
this is a case of the cat being out of the bag because Pidgin already
has already crossed the threshold of having a ludicrous amount of
users to support.  A 5% increase isn't going to hurt.  I'll be adding
in some things tonight to help deal with existing users better.

-Casey