the new channels remove the little accessibility warp once had for the everyday user 
 
as a new user, i can no longer join warp & simply cast in any topic of my interest…

now, on top of paying the registration fee, i must also (in most cases) pay a monthly channel subscription… 

no new users will deal with this; it was hard enough to get them past the $5 data fee 

the issues we’ve had with “cabals” & “it” crowds are now 10x more divisive & exclusionary & immediately work against new users

on top of these channel subscriptions adding friction, they force you to pay (in many cases) the /owner/ of the channel via their hypersub

now this owner may or may not have any experience or expertise in the channels topic at hand

more likely than not, they were just the first ones to want to talk about it on warp - it’s just an interest… so why make these people god?

it doesn’t matter if it’s a minimal cost, new users won’t pay 10-15 individual subscriptions to access channels of interest

1. Agree it’s hard for new users! But it’s always been hard for new users. We’re going to be adding “onboard directly to a channel” when joining Farcaster as the next big project for channels.

2. Channels as hashtags / topics did not work. We iterated for a year trying to make it work.

3. So we’re trying a new direction that is more like public group chats with a feed UX.

4. A reminder that casting in your home feed like Twitter is available to everyone.

Why does it need to be this hard for new users?

For a social product, the friction for new users really prevents network effects from helping grow the platform and spread across social circles

Stay Curious // iixii // Lazer Technologies // Prev: CoinDesk, Roc Nation // based

Public network social products like Twitter grow because of the 1% creators, not 99% of new users.

What network does this well other TikTok?

That’s true but they’re also accessible to users to easily onboard and access those creators

Instagram does this well. The onboarding to Farcaster is more difficult than most social platforms. It’s much closer to Bluesky/Mastodon than Twitter or IG or Discord or Telegram