As a quick alternative, would it make sense to create a promoted top-level post containing the Sequences, and “sticky” that post so that it’s the first thing newcomers see?
You could create a preference to not display it for logged in users, if that’s an issue.
The current about less wrong page would make a decent front page. As it contains a brief description of the goals of the site, it’s systems and links to good sample articles.
You’ve been telling everyone at this cocktail party about this fantastic new rationality club, and how it’s changed your life. You manage to get a few people interested enough to actually listen to what you’re saying, a smaller subset to remember the name of the site, and a smaller subset to take the time to actually check out the site for an entire 90 seconds.
That’s all you got.
So, after telling a room full of people about the awesomeness of rationality, maybe you get one person who decides to visit the site. They are looking for a justification for why they should spend more time on your site. What do they see? What do you want them to see?
Hopefully something good. Something that will make them hunger for more. Something that will actually make them think (which is kind of the point of all this).
The about page is currently structured like this: Science is good. This site has science. Meta. Meta and code. Meta. Meta. Meta. Meta. Brought to you by viewers like you. Grid of juicy content. Link to Sequences. History. Code. Code.
The about page is great if you have been on LW already and want to know more about it. However, it is not a suitable front page. Unfortunately, it is not great even if you are already motivated to find out the core tenets of rationality.
I agree its not perfect, but it would still be a significant improvement on the current front page, which is almost always very brief comments about meet ups and tells you nothing about the content of the site or the community.
The ideal would be a post that combined some of the content from it, the ‘welcome to less wrong’ page and had a good list of introductory articles.
As a quick alternative, would it make sense to create a promoted top-level post containing the Sequences, and “sticky” that post so that it’s the first thing newcomers see?
You could create a preference to not display it for logged in users, if that’s an issue.
The current about less wrong page would make a decent front page. As it contains a brief description of the goals of the site, it’s systems and links to good sample articles.
You’ve been telling everyone at this cocktail party about this fantastic new rationality club, and how it’s changed your life. You manage to get a few people interested enough to actually listen to what you’re saying, a smaller subset to remember the name of the site, and a smaller subset to take the time to actually check out the site for an entire 90 seconds.
That’s all you got.
So, after telling a room full of people about the awesomeness of rationality, maybe you get one person who decides to visit the site. They are looking for a justification for why they should spend more time on your site. What do they see? What do you want them to see?
Hopefully something good. Something that will make them hunger for more. Something that will actually make them think (which is kind of the point of all this).
The about page is currently structured like this: Science is good. This site has science. Meta. Meta and code. Meta. Meta. Meta. Meta. Brought to you by viewers like you. Grid of juicy content. Link to Sequences. History. Code. Code.
The about page is great if you have been on LW already and want to know more about it. However, it is not a suitable front page. Unfortunately, it is not great even if you are already motivated to find out the core tenets of rationality.
I agree its not perfect, but it would still be a significant improvement on the current front page, which is almost always very brief comments about meet ups and tells you nothing about the content of the site or the community.
The ideal would be a post that combined some of the content from it, the ‘welcome to less wrong’ page and had a good list of introductory articles.