More seriously: the goal of the main page should be to give honest image of the website. The main page is optimal when people like the homepage if and only if they would like participating in LessWrong. We don’t have to attract everyone. We should just make sure that the main page does not send away people who would have stayed if they were exposed to some other LW stuff instead.
Yes, with the caveat that a person who is captivated by the front page eventually deciding that LW is not for them is not as big a deal as a person who would like participating walking away upon seeing the front page: the former just wastes a couple of hours and is disappointed, the latter misses out the chance of finding valuable stuff and becoming a valuable contributor.
We don’t have to attract everyone. We should just make sure that the main page does not send away people who would have stayed if they were exposed to some other LW stuff instead.
That’s a good point. However, I think there is not much we can do about it by refining the main page. More precisely, I doubt that even a remotely interested in rationality and intelligent person can leave “a community blog devoted to refining the art of human rationality” without at least taking a look at some of the blog posts, irrespective of the contents of the main page itself. We all know examples of internet sites with poor design, but great information content.
So the question of refining the main page, I think, really comes down to selecting the right articles for the Recent Promoted Articles and Featured Articles sections. The rest is already there.
Problem 1: If the person has already done work to refine their skill with rationality on their own, they may figure the blog is likely to be more of the same old stuff. LessWrong would love to have more of that type of person, don’t you think? They’re not going to be interested in the topic of rationality presented plainly all by itself. You have to immediately prove to them that the particular collection of information is fresh and exciting, or they slot you away in the “already read about it” category.
Problem 2: A random post isn’t necessarily going to be a good post. I did random post several times before I found one that excited me and made me realize that LW is awesome, and the ONLY reason why I kept trying was because so many friends had referred me to LW that I was starting to think I was missing something.
Problem 3: A lot of users are busy and don’t take their time with new sites. They usually will not read an entire front page. You have a few seconds to interest them. You either put something awesome in their face, or they’re lost.
Just don’t forget to do A/B testing!
More seriously: the goal of the main page should be to give honest image of the website. The main page is optimal when people like the homepage if and only if they would like participating in LessWrong. We don’t have to attract everyone. We should just make sure that the main page does not send away people who would have stayed if they were exposed to some other LW stuff instead.
Yes, with the caveat that a person who is captivated by the front page eventually deciding that LW is not for them is not as big a deal as a person who would like participating walking away upon seeing the front page: the former just wastes a couple of hours and is disappointed, the latter misses out the chance of finding valuable stuff and becoming a valuable contributor.
That’s a good point. However, I think there is not much we can do about it by refining the main page. More precisely, I doubt that even a remotely interested in rationality and intelligent person can leave “a community blog devoted to refining the art of human rationality” without at least taking a look at some of the blog posts, irrespective of the contents of the main page itself. We all know examples of internet sites with poor design, but great information content.
So the question of refining the main page, I think, really comes down to selecting the right articles for the Recent Promoted Articles and Featured Articles sections. The rest is already there.
Problem 1: If the person has already done work to refine their skill with rationality on their own, they may figure the blog is likely to be more of the same old stuff. LessWrong would love to have more of that type of person, don’t you think? They’re not going to be interested in the topic of rationality presented plainly all by itself. You have to immediately prove to them that the particular collection of information is fresh and exciting, or they slot you away in the “already read about it” category.
Problem 2: A random post isn’t necessarily going to be a good post. I did random post several times before I found one that excited me and made me realize that LW is awesome, and the ONLY reason why I kept trying was because so many friends had referred me to LW that I was starting to think I was missing something.
Problem 3: A lot of users are busy and don’t take their time with new sites. They usually will not read an entire front page. You have a few seconds to interest them. You either put something awesome in their face, or they’re lost.