0.21% sounds low but my initial thought is "I don't know if they are making the point they think they are". Conversion rates are always pretty low.

That said, I've never clicked on a share button mostly because:

- I don't know what it will do, it's not consistent at all

- It might add extra crap "Your friend shared 'Story Title' with you!"

- It will probably try/want to add tracking crap

I always just copy the URL and send it however I want to send it. People aren't stupid when it comes to sharing, they understand how to accomplish what they want, we don't need a dedicated share button.

What we don't have, and hopefully never will, is the number of people who click the share button verses the people that copy/paste the URL which I assume 90% of people who want to share do. It's universal, it "just works".

Clicking the share button means I'm at the mercy of the site operator, copying the URL puts me in control.

▲ theturtletalks 9 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Exactly but companies have started hijacking the copy icon button as well. You’d think that would just copy what’s in the text box, but they add tracking and other stuff.

The worst is the YouTube share button. You can share the button with the exact second mark in the video and I would do that. Then one time I noticed the URL was shortened and added a lot of tracking.

▲ joshstrange 9 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Nothing bugs me more than copy/pasting some text from an article and getting:

    "Text that you copied"
    
    - From XYZ Times (httx://abc123.tld/path/to/article)

Apple Books does that nonsense as well and it drives me up a wall.

I'm sure there are browser extensions to tame but this thankfully there aren't many website that do this that I care to visit often.

> Then one time I noticed the URL was shortened and added a lot of tracking.

Ugh, yeah, this is really annoying as well. When a dedicated share button is my only option (like in a mobile app) I often open an incognito/private browsers window and paste it in so I can get redirected and then rip off all the tracking crap. Back when I used TikTok I had an iOS shortcut that I would "share" to which would rip off all the tracking for me. I always would feel gross when someone "anonymous" would share a TikTok or similar link and there would be a banner at the top of the page "Real Name shared this with you, follow them?".

▲ spockz 9 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

It’s even weirder now. When you share a video through the button (which is the only way in the app) and another person opens the link while logged in you will now be linked in YouTube and you can share “directly” to the other’s YouTube. …

	▲	theturtletalks 9 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Google Maps share button is filled with tracking too, now I just copy the address and send it. I fear it’s all futile because even if we are privacy focused, if our friends and families are sharing links like this, Google knows how all of us are connected to each other in the real world.

▲ iknowstuff 9 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I agree, I do the same thing, but e.g. my parents still don't understand copy&paste. For all of us who do, there's the other ~half (total guess) of people who don't, and will benefit from the share UI. It's sad but real.

> a 2023 peer-reviewed survey of 124 geriatric computer users, mean age about 80.6, found that 59% were unfamiliar with the copy/paste function. That is among older adults who were already computer users, so it probably understates the issue for all elderly people.