Channels re-design

petitminion

This is a to do after we finish speaking about the collection design.

Channels confusions exist probably because there is various content-type within channels. We need to make content-type distinctions clear, by using specific wording for each of them.
The left menu could be used to get a view of new posted content, we could use "feeds" instead of "channels" to make this clear :

Drop the actual "Channels" section in the sidebar and replace it with "Podcasts feed" and "Music feed"
Create a new feed section when we implement a new content-type.

Other :

Allow to pass content from collection to channels, both ways

mjourdan

What is it you call "channels confusions"? Do you have examples of it?

I get the idea to have separate sections to distinguish between podcasts and music. However I don't get how changing the wording "channels" for "feeds" will make anything clearer?

petitminion

mjourdan channels can refer to various content types, its confusing when I got to the channel section : what I'm expected to find there ? podcast or music ? When I subscribe to a feed (on the channel page) are we speaking about podcast or music feed ?

mjourdan I get the idea to have separate sections to distinguish between podcasts and music. However I don't get how changing the wording "channels" for "feeds" will make anything clearer?

you are right the main point is to be specific about the content type . But impov "feeds" is a more general concept than "channel" : it could include our subscriptions (aka based on channels) but also other source of content based on our follows (user follow, library follow)

mjourdan

petitminion

channels can refer to various content types, its confusing when I got to the channel section : what I'm expected to find there ? podcast or music ?

Agreed. For what it's worth we had (low-fidelity) mockups for "subscriptions overview" for like 2 1/2 years.

When I subscribe to a feed (on the channel page) are we speaking about podcast or music feed ?

This should be automatically detected from the feed. Also I very much would like to make this weird modal that asks people about technical stuff disappear, and let Funkwhale check by itself:

[upl-image-preview url=https://forum.funkwhale.audio/assets/files/2022-12-14/1671030169-130592-image.png]

But impov "feeds" is a more general concept than "channel" : it could include our subscriptions (aka based on channels) but also other source of content based on our follows (user follow, library follow)

I am not certain feed is more general than channel, and not sure about other content that could/should appear there, but I like the idea of having something less restrictive. Thus, we could change the wording for something focusing more on the person (that follows and subscribe), rather than on the technical medium (channel, feed).

So I updated the mockups to reflect that. Any thoughts?

petitminion

mjourdan Agreed. For what it's worth we had (low-fidelity) mockups for "subscriptions overview" for like 2 1/2 years.

In the mockups the menu show "channel", isn't that what is confusing?

mjourdan Thus, we could change the wording for something focusing more on the person (that follows and subscribe), rather than on the technical medium (channel, feed).

What wording are you speaking about ? I think channel describe what it is so it'd good to keep it in channel pages or in upload process. But in the menu in the left panel I think we should change the wording and the triaging (separate content type) and use another wording if we want to integrate other content that's channels

petitminion

mjourdan So I updated the mockups to reflect that. Any thoughts?

its great ! The wording is perfect. But instead of having channels suggestions in the sub-menu and, at the end, the "all subscription" sub-menu, I would put theses sub-menu on that order :

"Recent content" or "feed" : a link to the "overview" page you've made with some radio or play all button to play the content
artist channels : a link to the artist subcription page youve made
podcasts : a link the the podcast page you've made
a list of channels if we have space

mjourdan

petitminion

In the mockups the menu show "channel", isn't that what is confusing?

You tell me, that's you who speaks of confusion! What I wanted to show on the old mockup was not the sidebar but the page with its tab bar. Those tabs never got implemented and were supposed to inform about the content types.

What wording are you speaking about ?

This time I was speaking about the sidebar. ^^

petitminion

I will finish to reply later 🙂

mjourdan

petitminion

That would end up with "artist" twice in the sidebar (both under library and subscriptions), same for "podcasts", which would only make things more confusing. On another note, progressive disclosure seems more indicated for what we want to achieve with this section, ie keeping people aware of new releases.

petitminion

mjourdan

I can't see the music and podcast menu in your mockup : https://design.funkwhale.audio/#/view/e3a187f0-0f5e-11ed-adb9-fff9e854a67c?page-id=6ca536f0-0f5f-11ed-adb9-fff9e854a67c&section=interactions&index=1&share-id=eca59bf0-3832-11ed-86ac-c19cdb5a453b
I suppose :

Explore is for all content type discovery*
music is for music content discovery*
podcast for podast discovery*

*Discovery as a mix of know and unknown content, base on federation activity and algorithm recommendation ? (except for podcast maybe where we could exclude podcast a user already listened to ? )

Podcast will appears twice :

"podcast" menu as a exploration of all podcast available (with recommendations)
Sub-menu "Recently updated podcast" : to listen to the podcast I subcribed, to be updated of new episodes.

Indeed artist would appears twice :

one submenu "artist" under "my library" : the artist I uploaded, to listen to my content.
one submenu "Artists channels" : the artists channels I subscribed to, to get update of new things.
-> I don't think its confusing, but if this feature is present in the music section it might be useless to put it here to.
I think I we could include in the artist channels, artist song published on public library, but its another issue.

mjourdan On another note, progressive disclosure seems more indicated for what we want to achieve with this section, ie keeping people aware of new releases.

I agree and I don't hard-fully want the too sub-menues I speak about. But I'm convinced we shouldn't mix channel of different content types in the lefts panels. So at least have some visual information to create a distinction , a discrete line for example or whatever

mjourdan

Details for Explore/Music/Podcasts are described here (you'll have to scroll both horizontal and vertically).

Under the subscriptions section, we have the picture shape to distinguish between artists and podcasts, but I'll see to make a stronger difference.

petitminion

mjourdan perfect o/

mjourdan

Here is a bunch of experiments. Feel free to share your thoughts!

petitminion

mjourdan about the subscriptions submenu A1 and A3 are my prefered options.

petitminion

mjourdan you say the music and podcast link to a page with uploads and user subscriptions. I think if we do this the "explore" section should be divided between content types so we can explore music or podcast : the default page would be music content but on the top you could select podcast content.

thx a lot for this it's beautiful o/

mjourdan

Please find an additional page with new designs:
https://design.funkwhale.audio/#/view/e3a187f0-0f5e-11ed-adb9-fff9e854a67c?page-id=ff46b693-74d0-8061-8001-d91afd83f681&section=interactions&index=0&share-id=0b1bb873-5fc1-8192-8002-fd9057d05a87

I would be curious to read your thoughts!