I'd say so, especially if you start on desktop and have them watch the 2-minute onboarding video. We are satisfied with what we see with our internal usability studies with nontechnical users.

Among customers, one reference that I can quickly cite is this one:

https://zulip.com/case-studies/gut-contact/

> Agents at GUT contact use Zulip every day to communicate with their team leads. “Most of our agents are in their 60s or 70s, so the software must be as simple as possible. That’s why we love Zulip,” says Erik Dittert, who’s been leading GUT contact’s IT team for the past 20 years.

I would recommend doing a little training/handholding call/video when moving over a community -- but this is true for any new app.

My mom needed training to do basic things in Squarespace, and I had a friend who worked at Slack whose manager started every chat message with "Hi <name>" and ended it with a signature, like you would an email. :)

▲ areoform 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

    > and have them watch the 2-minute onboarding video

I'm going to be very honest here. The jock ain't watching no video. Dude has (possibly) early CTE. Do you think he has the attention span to sit through a two minute video? For a messaging app??

That's an automatic fail.

▲ skeeter2020 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

First, quarterbacks are not typically the concerning position with respect to CTE. Second, because he plays football he doesn't have a 2-minute attention span? "Dumb jock" is about as accurate as "ignorant HN poster". Third, he either spent 2 minutes learning how to use discord, or stumbled through it long enough to learn, why can't he do the same thing with Zulip? Would it help if they chopped it into a dozen TicToks?

▲ savanaly 2 hours ago | parent [-]

They were needlessly inflammatory, but none of that changes the fact that something requiring you to watch a 2-min video to get started does not pass the [non-inflammatory term for non-technical person but you know what I mean]-test.

▲ areoform an hour ago | parent | next [-]

I'm saying this in a jocular tone, because - otherwise - the reality is too depressing. But I know people like this.

Anyone with a large enough social group will have some people like this. These are people who've engaged in football, boxing or contact sports like rugby. Or, people with severe ADHD. Or have had some kind of traumatic brain injury. These are real users and they're my friends.

I won't switch to using your application if they're going to be left out in the cold.

If a messaging application can't be used by that person, then that's a default fail. I'm not going to expose them to it.

▲ crabmusket an hour ago | parent [-]

But you will expose them to Discord's nagging popups for random quest thingies, animated emojis, disorganised channels, etc.? It sounds like you've already decided it's a foregone conclusion.

I am not arguing from a particular desire to get your jock friends on Zulip. Like I said in another subthread, I consider Zulip to be mainly for people who want to achieve things together, not just hang out. It's a productivity app. I wouldn't recommend it as a social app. Why I'm replying is because I feel your approach to the discussion is a little... uncharitable?

	▲	areoform 36 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		They're already using discord. It's a single click. I think you're misunderstanding me. I'm not here to argue particulars. I'm sharing my reality as a user. A user who runs multiple communities. Including one for my friends. And my friend group extends to 2k+ people (my friends, their friends, their friend of friends... It adds up). It's not fair that the CTE friend uses discord out of the box, but that's the power of network effects. Any competing solution needs to be 10x better to incentivise the switch. I can setup a new discord server in a click. Versus, `Sponsorship and discounts Contact sales@zulip.com with any questions. Community plan eligibility Open-source projects Research in an academic setting Academic conferences and other non-profit events Many education and non-profit organizations Communities and personal organizations (clubs, groups of friends, volunteer groups, etc.)` Respectfully, I'm not emailing your sales team to create a movie night server. Or one for class / group notes. Actual use cases. https://zulip.com/plans/#self-hosted

▲ crabmusket 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

It's not required. It's just there if you want it. Zulip is easy enough to jump into, especially if you have friends who actually care to onboard you into a community.

Adminning a Zulip for a small community group, I've actually found I have better tools to help with this. E.g. in Slack, we had constant nags to "please reply in the thread!" In Zulip, I can just move messages where they belong, and either leave the automated notes there to show where the messages went, or DM the person to let them know what I did.

▲ addandsubtract 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Tbf, Discord takes way more than 2 minutes to understand.

	▲	pocksuppet an hour ago \| parent \| next [-]
		But reveals it step-by-step. When you click on a Discord link without an account, it says: Hello! What is your name? You check there are no faefolk around, and then type your name. Now you are in the chat room and you can chat to people.
	▲	LogicFailsMe an hour ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		discord lost me at having to use task manager to shut it down on Windows.

▲ crabmusket 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

> start on desktop

Echoing this. Navigation is better and clearer on desktop. The mobile apps works really well once you know what you're doing. Part of onboarding into Zulip is being able to get an "overview" of the community and the discussions that are currently happening, and this is easier on desktop.

▲

guhidalg 3 hours ago | parent [-]

In my experience, the median user for communication apps is mobile _only_. Before that, it better be a website that works well on phones, and decently on desktop.

As a developer I don't like it, but reality doesn't have to appease me.

	▲	crabmusket 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		This is a case where people can start talking past each other. In my view and experience, Zulip is a collaboration platform for groups who want to get shit done. I wouldn't recommend it for a "place to hang out". People who are serious about achieving something will use a laptop. Similarly, in a cousin comment - they will watch a short onboarding video. No platform is "intuitive" for everyone. WhatsApp and Signal are "basically just SMS" so they can lean on the knowledge phone users built in the 00s and 10s. Anything else is a new mental model and takes some adjustment. EDIT: also if you are an open source community, or a company, and you choose Discord for your support/project collab community... do better. (Looking at you CloudFlare)