Yeah, and that’s fair enough. I hope it does get revisited.

Haha don’t put it on me, I’m merely a consumer!

You’ve already suggested feddit.uk, why not use that for UK Voyager installs? Anything that isn’t an instance that they can’t actually use would be good.

Speculatively, but it would assume prior research, which many people simply won’t do. If a de-facto app (say Voyager on iOS) offers a default option that’s unavailable for a selection of its potential users, it’s another hurdle within onboarding that is already the biggest barrier to entry. If we want to grow as a platform (more users equals more content), putting up a default wall saying “your kind aren’t welcome” to entire countries seems obtuse.

Yes, those potential new UK users can get around it by picking another instance, but the question is how many will give up if they can’t get over the first hurdle.

The suggestion of changing the default instance by region, where those instances prohibit specific regions seems logical enough to me.

It’s not actually complying with UK law, it’s removing it from the equation so it doesn’t have to. I don’t begrudge the decision though, it will have been a difficult choice to make. That said, it’s a sledgehammer approach to self-censorship, as a response to an inability to comply.

Like I say, I don’t have an issue with Lemmy.zip being unavailable in the UK. But I do think it is potentially damaging for Fediverse uptake to promote a default instance that is unavailable to such a large number of users.

For comparison purposes, the UK easily has the second highest number of Reddit users by country. It is a remarkable decision to exclude that potential market by default.

Yep, a region check that sets an alternative default for countries that are blocked by the default server makes way more sense than the default being inaccessible for them.

I’m not sure that the answer to a government’s regulation of the Internet should be an individual’s blocking of access for an entire country. Seems like 2 sides of the same coin to me.

Yeah I don’t blame you either. But I do think the default server should be more inclusive than less, particularly at the potential starting point of a user’s introduction to the fediverse.

Realistically that is never going to happen. The biggest issue the fediverse has is onboarding. People just looking to try out a reddit alternative aren’t going to bother emailing their fucking MP just because the default settings of an app won’t let them sign up. They’ll just give up and go elsewhere.

If we want to encourage growth, adding additional barriers isn’t the way to do it.

Bit shit for UK users though since lemmy.zip is blocked for them. Not exactly going to encourage new users from here.

Except they don’t use the space well do they, as you’ve said. Toolbars, menus, status bars, task bars etc all reside horizontally.

Most widescreen monitors in offices allow you to put two documents next to each other, but still don’t let you see the whole page and remain readable. There’s no question that a taller monitor wouldn’t solve that, because as you’ve said earlier, why not rotate your screen?

I wouldn’t have to if it was taller 😂

This makes no sense at all. UIs are justified in not making full use of a widescreen monitor because at some point someone might want to use another at the same time?

No I’m not upset by anything 😂

It sounds like you’re excusing poor UI design by saying “just use the extra space for something else”

If only those apps displayed even less content horizontally, we could get even more of them on the screen and be yet more productive, right!? 😂

As mentioned, this doesn’t solve the problem of apps not utilising the available space efficiently. “Just open another app” isn’t a solution to “Why doesn’t the app I’m working on appropriately use the available space”.

I think you might be missing the point though.

Not everyone needs to multitask in two apps simultaneously. In fact most of the time, most workers are only going to be working on a single application. If that application isn’t making full use of the widescreen, then saying “just fill that space with another app” doesn’t solve anything. In fact if anything, it potentially reduces the real estate the main app had.

Yes they now have two apps open, but they’re still only working on one. They don’t “need” the other one, so why not design the primary app or web page to more appropriately scale to the display?

It’s got absolutely fuck all to do with “what can the user do to better utilise the technology” and everything to do with UI design.

This is an unnecessarily patronising response.

Your answer to apps not utilising left and right space efficiently is “well you should do something else then”. It’s not the user’s fault.

Edit: Deleting this comment because I’m an idiot.

Can’t imagine there are too many traditional offices with 40" 6k screens.

As I say, I think it’s unfair to blame users for “not using the screen properly” when most office software is set up for portrait, while the screens are horizontal. Yes you can use multiple windows (assuming your widescreen display is big enough to allow productive working with two smaller windows), or multiple screens, or rotate them etc, but they feel like workarounds to get around the fact that the applications work naturally in portrait, and most laptop screens for example don’t easily accommodate any of those options. Which is probably why you see more 3:2 laptop displays than standalone monitors.

I don’t think widescreens exist “primarily for additional tasks in an office setting”. I think they’re the default because, as another user said, TVs were that ratio.

It’s weird that it’s fine for widescreens to have additional areas to the sides that aren’t used by many apps, but adding space vertically that would automatically be used by every office application isn’t fine.

Yes you can use two apps side by side, yes you can rotate your screen, but the software in general literally defaults to reducing that available space by putting the taskbar and menus where they are, while usually being full screen screen by default.

Saying “You’re using it wrong” is blaming the user for using the computer the way it was presented out of the box.

Genius.

Essentially if you want to use a monitor horizontally that’s fine, if you want to rotate it vertically that’s also fine, if you want to have equal horizontal and vertical real estate you’re out of your mind.