Posterous Swaps Blog Platform for Social Network
mashable.com
mashable.com
When I signed up in the early days, it was awesome. They were the simple and concise, yet ridiculously powerful alternative to tumblr - email post@posterous.com, get a blog. I loved showing it to people because it was so amazingly simple.
I understand that wasn't quite enough to draw users in and they needed to evolve the product, but especially with this latest revision, my initial reaction was that I have no idea what Posterous is anymore. The messaging on the home page is terrible - "What's a space? A place for whatever!", and nowhere is the product itself shown.
As an existing user, my first reaction was to check my existing Posterous sites to make sure they were still blogs, and not Google+/Facebook-style Pages. And as a new user, I don't think I'd understand why I'd want Posterous in addition to Google+ or Facebook. (I understand that Posterous is better about privacy, but the competitors all claim that too, and Facebook never gave a shit about privacy - why would a new user believe Posterous?)
Again, I get they need to change their core product (or at least how it's positioned). I'm just really not sure a psuedo-social-network is the right way to go about it.
Even more than that, I miss the simplicity of "E-mail us anything. We'll post it for you."
Personally, I almost never interact with posterous through the dashboard, but this move makes it seem that I'm either very much in the minority of their user base, or that they're no longer interested in serving my use case. Possibly both.
The net result is that where I would likely have used them without hesitation for another project I was planning on before these changes, now I feel like I need to look around and explore alternatives (including possibly reverting to a self-hosted WordPress blog).
They all have their own standalone sites just as they always did and are just as customizable as before. The main difference is that interacting with content across multiple sites is much more streamlined through the new interface.
EDIT: Lots of people want sites, lots of people want private groups, but no one wants a space simply because they don't know what that is.
We found our users loved having more control over how they share online. So instead of having 2 products, we simplified into one to rule them all.
The good:
So... the new dashboard view is better for presenting data that they already had "verbs" for. You can see new hearts (likes) to your posts much more easily, the default view is your subscriptions, not your own old posts (as it was previously).
Still needs work:
Discovery. There is no "regular" search, there is no tag search. The Find Friends just spins into time out for me. There is no directory or recommended Posterous spaces either.
[edit: Added everything below this line]
I'm generally hopeful. But I'm bummed that they really steer away from using the word blog/setting expectations for blog feature development. The "Sharing stuff socially" space is crowded and well served at a rapid pace with Path, Google+, Facebook, Dropbox, Instagram, etc.
I really want blog services to have a modern social lens (like Tumblr). Right now Tumblr is the only place that comes close.
I think there's room for more than one social blog platform (there's clearly room for more than one social photo sharing site, music sharing site, etc).
Posterous initially seemed to be a social blog platform that wanted to build out some of the "regular" (WordPress) features missing from Tumblr, like commenting.
I wanted to live in a world where there was a minimal, control freak, beautiful platform like Tumblr... AND a more "swiss army knife" social blog platform like Posterous.
Since then, Posterous has done so many about faces (getting really email-centric among other things), that I have lost my initial read on them, but I like these new changes despite the fact that they're inching away from blogdom.
(sidebar: it's worth noting here that there is a 3rd social blog platform, http://soup.io. Soup.io, like Posterous, has long seemed to be on the verge of dropping another shoe.)
Not sure what it is now. That's a problem. I've stopped recommending it to people because I can't summarize it like this anymore.
just checked, and it still loses photos. I guess they were to busy being social to care about it.
At first glance things look quite a few of the options and features were stripped out and the whole experience has now become more complicated...
I understand the need to pivot and change their business model, but moves like this make me wonder if it was a good idea for them to do something this drastic (only because from all I've heard about the services it was primarily about its blogging features and its ability to share via other social networks) and if I should consider looking for alternatives to what was (and may still be?) a simple blog...
If you're having questions or doubts regarding your switch, feel free to shoot me a line by email.
For all the talk about simplicity, I find these things do not fit my workflow very well, which is just write a post, add some tags, add some audio. I would be looking for a new platform except I don't want to have to upload all my audio files on a new site again.
I never used Posterous for blogging anyway, but surely this is bound to piss off the bloggers already using their service? Unless "Spaces" is just an extension to their blogging platform, and the title is misleading.
We're solving a similar problem as google circles. The basic difference is that Posterous Spaces are symmetric sharing so all members of a space can post.
Sure these changes may still allow them to do the same thing but the shift in terminology and organisation will be hinting to people the direct things are going which is away from their use case.
Granted this new niche might be a good direction, the HN crowd are hardly a good sample of opinions for something like this.
Compare: https://posterous.com/
I asked - "Can I ask why not just have a "manage Posts" button, menu item, or tab on the opening page after signin? Thought the idea was "ease of use"."
The response - "We do appreciate the feedback and will consider it for future updates, but it is not the direction the developers have chosen to take at this time."
Puzzling because I've never heard a company say that "ease of use" was NOT the direction they intended to go.
Disappointed blogger, looking to move on.
Posterous had a few good ideas, but as far as blog platforms go, it was too limiting. They should have focused on improving their core business, instead of transforming it into a half-assed Google+.
I can't even delete a page. Gutted because I moved a lot of stuff here from Slinkset (which was awesome, although not a blogging platform). I had to because Slinkset closed down after being bought up by Posterous (why buy something so you can destroy it ? What am I missing here ?). Now I have to work out how to move everything on again. Let's hope Posterous are as amenable about you exporting your blogs to other platforms as they are about you importing them.
I'm tired of this sort of thing.
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
Posterous should have taken notes from previous sharing sites/functions: Facebook, Digg, MySpace, Google Buzz, etc.
If you change things drastically, your userbase gets mad, and they seek out alternatives. I tend to see social sharing sites as a home online. You put many of your meaningful items there, and you get comfortable with a certain layout, a given set of functionalities, etc. If someone were to come and redecorate/reorganize your room or house without your permission, you'd probably be a little upset.
Facebook eventually mastered the art of introducing change into its site. Nudging the user to try something new ("X of your friends are using the new layout. Join them!") instead of forcing it on them seems to be a better policy.
(I don't try to sound funny, I really am curious what you have to say about these two services.)