Also what is the point of a native app for a website? Doesn't the browser do a better job already? Are they not just using a webview?
"But Our Company is different, and that's why we need %useless_feature_they_saw_in_another_app_unrelated_to_industry% to help hook users in."
Admittedly this thinking was a lot more common in the earlier half of the decade, but I've still seen it at other orgs.
I disagree. In the past decade companies have been collecting more data than ever and software actually became a lot worse than what we used to have. Now it’s all about catering to idiots (the lowest common denominator) and wasting user’s time.
One day I suppose Reddit will ban third-party apps for the same reason Twitter did: they're more usable than the official one and feed less surveillance back.
"Board meeting" was probably the wrong choice of words. I have in my career been a part of the kind of meeting I describe, but they weren't actual board meetings, I suppose.
I do agree that Reddit probably thinks their mobile app experience is better. The reason I don't think they have a good excuse is because their mobile site is a prime example of self-sabotage. If they actually wanted people to use it, they would have had just about any redditor tell them that the experience is crap and that it should be fixed. Instead, it comes off like they're intentionally making the web experience bad(or at least neglecting it) in order to convince people to install the mobile app. The way their little popup that they frequently show at the bottom of the screen presents itself even suggests that the native app is the proper way to view Reddit. It's bollocks because Reddit is completely text and image centric; if the web can't do its fundamental job to display those two things, then may God have mercy on our souls.
Don't get me wrong, because I don't think that those in charge at Reddit are doing this things out of ill intent. A bunch of people with good will can convince each other of bad ideas, especially the further removed they are from the front lines of engineering.
Many modern webpages are data extraction machines, which is why things got worse in many places. The design is still functional but the main function changed — where it was previously focused on the user and the content it is now clearly all about analytics and ads.
I’d like to say I can’t blame them, because the money needs to come from somewhere, but I am not sure if this is the long term sustainable decision they will praise themselves for when they look back onto things in a decade.
It’s been two years since I last used the native iOS Reddit client, even though I think the responsive web version is embarrassingly bad, because of one reason alone: battery life.
I doubled my screen-on battery life by abandoning the native client.
Maybe in the two year interval they found a way to not be battery vampires but I’m not particularly in the mood to give them the benefit of the doubt.
Keep in mind that just about two literal years ago, the mobile experience was pretty much exactly the same as it is today, if not worse.
I imagine I’m not alone in this perspective: the “smooth, slick, native” app is worse than the stuttering, crashing, mobile web version. Period. Because I value my battery life.
The best way to build something good is to have talent, intuition and ideas.
There are people creating wonderful things from a single idea without a minute of market research, and there are people just navigating blindly driven by a bunch of metrics they try to optimise separately.
Usually the latter are mediocre optimizations of mature products, and they often reduce its value for the user.
It is still worse than other reddit apps.
>Secondly, the best way to build something good is to have more data. This involves tracking people. I think most people have two opposing options: tracking people sucks, and making product decisions in a vacuum is wrong. It's a tough balance.
There is a difference between analytics that just track usage, and full blown tracking - but nowadays storing data is cheap so why not gather everything and then filter the rest for analysis...
The problem is that analytics, or i should say profiled user data is profitable to sell. Maybe not directly, but allow advertisers to serve ads to very specific users.
the main purpose of their app is to open third party links. that can't be a better experience in any native app imho
> the best way to build something good is to have more data. This involves tracking people.
This just leads to faster horses. The best way to build something good is to use it
I think it came from a genuine place. You may not agree, and I understand your perspective, but I think there's two things Reddit believes that explain everything you've complained about.
First, that their app is a better mobile experience. And I'd agree, actually, but I understand why someone would disagree. From their perspective it's an easy download and it's native app and it's way better.
Secondly, the best way to build something good is to have more data. This involves tracking people. I think most people have two opposing options: tracking people sucks, and making product decisions in a vacuum is wrong. It's a tough balance.
I think most decisions are done without malice and without "suits" involved.