How do you know that Google logins fail on the third point?
On the balance of probabilities, adding a new way for people to sign into a site that they can already sign into, isn't going to make more people sign in...it will only give existing users a different way to sign in.
And why do you think any Monastery change whatsoever would make a difference as far as the first two points go? Surely those are more down to Perl's own feature's vs other languages?
Not at all!
The appeal of a language is not just the features of the language itself. There is the perception of "relevance", "employability" and what my generation would have called "coolness".
More recent languages have slicker, more user-friendly forums and support sites.
Perl Monks is a part of the Perl infrastructure whether we like it or not. I don't believe it portrays Perl as a relevant or cool language...
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More recent languages have slicker, more user-friendly forums and support sites.
Slickness and user-friendliness are in the eye of the user. I have not, to my recollection, used a slicker forum than this. It is much, much faster and easier to use than the vast majority of other user fora I inhabit. It is easily user-customisable and user-extensible. I can use it in any browser of my choice and with JavaScript fully disabled if I so choose. It doesn't have pop-ups obscuring the content for any reason (cookies, subscriptions, other legal notices, etc.), it doesn't have inactivity timeouts, doesn't force its choice of font or style or anything on me.
Don't go chasing new blood with "shiny". The old blood might just up sticks for pastures new instead.
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Slickness and user-friendliness are in the eye of the user. I have not, to my recollection, used a slicker forum than this.
Your second sentence definitely validates the first.
Personally, this is the least slick forum I use (albeit I don't use many). Having to type in HTML markup is tedious, especially on mobile.
I totally agree with your point about pop-ups. However, PM does store a cookie so should have a cookie pop-up...for stupid regulations but rules are rules!
I've not used it enough to be sure, but I suspect Everything2 has all the advantages you quote without the hassle of having to use HTML markup and with better security.
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adding a new way for people to sign into a site that they can already sign into ...
There's a much larger group of people who can't already sign in, i.e. those with Google accounts who don't have a PM account. Now imagine they could just use their Google login here - would that not make it more inviting for them to do so?
More recent languages have slicker, more user-friendly forums and support sites.
I'd agree that's part of the solution, but sadly I doubt it'd be enough (to change perceptions). Being more recent already gives them a significant head start in looking more relevant/cool, and on top of that, these languages tend to be more actively developed as well.
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