In comment sections or in community pages, it’s mostly an ocean of default avatars.

As a UI developer, that’s always been a gripe because I put a lot of effort into making them look good and scale properly, etc. When I see 60-70% or more accounts sporting the default avatar, it makes me wonder why I even bother.

So, since this bugs me so much, figured I’d just ask.

Lemm.ee users I can understand because of the waiting period for uploads, but AFAIK, most instances don’t have that restriction. Even then, there are plenty of .ee accounts that never bother to go back and set one.

    • moodymellodrone@sopuli.xyz
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      1 month ago

      Yeah I put avatars on my early Lemmy accounts, but then switched to Voyager. Now I don’t care because you don’t see avatars on Voyager anyway. Plus I kind of like the old school feel.

      I think it’d be nice if apps could let choose show or hide avatars in the settings.

    • Empricorn@feddit.nl
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      1 month ago

      I’m still on Sync for now and same. But I don’t think I saw them even on desktop…?

    • SatyrSack@lemmy.sdf.org
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      1 month ago

      Wow, I cannot even find a setting to enable it. I used to have a very high opinion of Voyager, but I am finding recently that it is missing a lot of features.

        • SatyrSack@lemmy.sdf.org
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          1 month ago

          Sure, it’s just that in the early days when we started getting more Lemmy apps than just Jerboa/Lemmur, Voyager tended to be on the forefront of adding new features not found in other apps. But nowadays, as the landscape of Lemmy apps has matured, Voyager has fallen behind as its philosophy seems to be stuck at “be a clone of Apollo”. It is by no means a bad Lemmy app; it is just no longer at the same relative level compared to other competing Lemmy apps.

      • Rai@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        1 month ago

        It’s built on the ethos of Apollo. Apollo’s dev had no interest in supporting avatars because they make for a shitty, cluttered experience and I FULLY stand by that decision.

  • Asafum@feddit.nl
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    1 month ago

    Even though I tend to comment somewhat frequently, I prefer to be just “another voice in the crowd” I don’t really want to be more easily recognized lol

  • roofuskit@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    I don’t see avatars in my app and I don’t really care to. Never had them in early reddit and that’s what I’m trying to replicate.

  • junkthief@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    1 month ago

    Lemmy is a place I prefer to be as anonymous as I can while still participating so I don’t set one for myself and I use voyager the vast majority of the time so I don’t see anyone else’s. I personally don’t find profile pictures/avatars add anything to the experience for me.

  • 🇰 🌀 🇱 🇦 🇳 🇦 🇰 🇮 @pawb.social
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    1 month ago

    Almost every app for Lemmy I have tried does not even have them visible by default and require you to manually turn them on. If their only experience is using an app, they might not even know you can have an avatar.

    • P1nkman@lemmy.world
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      1 month ago

      What? I use voyager, and had no idea. Not that I want to turn it on, I’m just surprised it’s an option (haven’t checked though).

        • AstralPath@lemmy.ca
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          1 month ago

          I will now judge you harshly for your transgression. Simply unforgivable. Smh

          Wait, your profile says you’ve only been around for 8 months. I swear I’ve been seeing you around for at least a couple years now…

        • nagaram@startrek.website
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          1 month ago

          My avatar is also partially AI generated. I GIMPed the Zizek face from one of his movie posters though.

          I’m used to people calling me out for the Zizek part and that hasn’t happened on Lemmy ever lol.

          • I don’t remember what I used for mine, but I remember the prompt was just “a husky dog anthro but the fur that is normally black is green” it gave me 50 different things and this one was the only decent looking image in the whole batch.

  • Casanunda@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    I don’t care about mine or anybody elses avatar, also profiles with avatar usually are: selling something (OF) or company profiles or bot accounts, so any account with an avatar is kinda sus to me.

  • ValiantDust@feddit.org
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    1 month ago

    I think many use apps that don’t show avatars. I usually browse lemmy with Eternity and sometimes forget they even exist.

  • owenfromcanada@lemmy.ca
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    1 month ago

    One of the harsh lessons in software is learning that users sometimes have different wants and expectations than the developer. Gold-plating is a constant temptation, and it usually leads to frustration and resentment.

    At the end of the day, if 60-70% of people don’t care, either do it for the 30-40%, or do it for your own enjoyment, or put your efforts elsewhere. In any case, don’t fall into a pit of resentment just because lots of users are approaching a platform differently than you.