Why not just make the LW2 site better, rather than make another site and have two sites that do the same thing?
A choice of clients is good for users. If an interface sucks, but multiple clients are available, you can switch to one with an interface that does not suck. If no clients have interfaces that do not suck, in principle you have the option of writing your own, which seems to be what happened here.
The best people at administering a service are not necessarily the best at programming a UI, and vice-versa. Allowing alternate clients lets you make use of comparative advantage.
Competition between clients is good for users for the same reasons it is good for customers in the market. New features are created for advantage; good ones are copied and spread. Niche preferences (especially those of power users) stand a chance of getting accounted for.
In short, multiple robust clients makes all clients better. If I may mount my hobby horse for a moment, the lack of client (and service) choice is part of why “modern” web clients still have not caught up to 90s-era newsreaders. This can only be a good thing for LW.
Why do more people need to know this particular email-password combination?
This one is a complaint I think I agree with, although the issue only affects web clients. From the LW2 thread it sounds like the author is working on it.
Yep, I agree with this. I’ve learned quite a few things from the GreaterWrong design and overall think that the LW2 UI will be significantly better because of that. It’s great to have a platform that experiments in a very different direction from the main site.
A choice of clients is good for users. If an interface sucks, but multiple clients are available, you can switch to one with an interface that does not suck. If no clients have interfaces that do not suck, in principle you have the option of writing your own, which seems to be what happened here.
The best people at administering a service are not necessarily the best at programming a UI, and vice-versa. Allowing alternate clients lets you make use of comparative advantage.
Competition between clients is good for users for the same reasons it is good for customers in the market. New features are created for advantage; good ones are copied and spread. Niche preferences (especially those of power users) stand a chance of getting accounted for.
In short, multiple robust clients makes all clients better. If I may mount my hobby horse for a moment, the lack of client (and service) choice is part of why “modern” web clients still have not caught up to 90s-era newsreaders. This can only be a good thing for LW.
This one is a complaint I think I agree with, although the issue only affects web clients. From the LW2 thread it sounds like the author is working on it.
Yep, I agree with this. I’ve learned quite a few things from the GreaterWrong design and overall think that the LW2 UI will be significantly better because of that. It’s great to have a platform that experiments in a very different direction from the main site.
How haven’t they caught up to 90s-era newsreaders.