Comment by kemayo
18 hours ago
Looking at ShareOpenly, I think this is basically a reaction to "Mastodon instances make social sharing complicated from the web". A "share to Mastodon" button is impossible, and a button for every Mastodon instance in existence is impractical. Thus a "fuck it, I guess just put in a URL and we'll work out how to send something to it" solution.
Speaking as someone who never ever uses a share button I think this is misguided, we should just remove that entire class of widget from the web, and people who want to share things can copy-paste the URL into their platforms of choice.
I agree. Except we aren't there with web literacy and having that integrated UX is significant.
I think the sort of person who would paste/type the URL for another social service into the freeform "or some other service" input on ShareOpenly is exactly the sort of person who has that web literacy, though. Which I guess doesn't support my "delete them all!" desire, but rather sadly reinforces keeping the status quo.