Crowdsourcing featured applications - proposal

This is a proposal for discussion. It’s not implemented, and may not be, I just wanted us to have a discussion about this.

Some background.

Over the last 3 years (!) the Snap Advocacy Team have selected applications to appear in the “Featured” section of the Snap Store. We usually do this every couple of weeks, but sometimes leave the featured set alone for longer.

The process for this typically entails human beings looking for new and interesting applications, as well as existing favourites applications. We select 28 applications which are exposed to more eyeballs in 3 places:

GNOME Software / Ubuntu Software / Snap Store

Screenshot%20from%202020-09-17%2013-59-27

snapcraft.io/store

Screenshot%20from%202020-09-17%2013-59-40

snap find

Screenshot%20from%202020-09-17%2014-01-04

Applications which feature in this list will often get a bump in installs as a result. Featuring applications is good for developers, who get more users, and good for users, who discover software they may not have known about.

Screenshot%20from%202020-09-17%2014-05-06

I’d like for us to more openly select the set of featured applications. Not fully open in a “Boaty McBoatFace” way where the list gets fully crowdsourced. But I’d like for us to get suggestions for applications to include in the featured list. We can then review the suggestions and have final say on what goes in and what may not. For applications which aren’t included, it may be we can provide feedback to the developer / publisher on improving the user experience so it could be featured later.

The proposal

I propose that we start a new thread on alternate Mondays here on the forum. In it, we request suggestions for that Friday’s featured updates. Publishers, developers and enthusiasts are welcome to suggest applications for consideration. Some suggested rules:

  • Applications suggested must be available in the stable channel in the Snap Store
  • Each person in the thread can suggest up to 3 applications per thread (no flooding)
  • Developers & publishers can suggest their own applications
  • Enthusiasts / the wider community can suggest applications they like too
  • All participants should participate in a respectful way (no bashing other applications you think shouldn’t be featured)
  • Not every application suggested will be included
  • Applications which weren’t suggested may also be included (developers often reach out to us privately, which I don’t want to discourage)

On the Friday, I’ll close the thread, prepare the final list and submit it to the store. The selections stay in place for 2 weeks until the next thread starts, and we go again. Closing the thread ensures we don’t have people suggesting apps for weeks that have already passed.

How does that sound?
Will it work?
Any ways we can improve it?

13 Likes

It is an interesting idea. There’s a lot of snaps out there, now, and it’d be nice for some of the less famous ones to have some time in the sun.

Mini reviews with the nominations would be nice.

You might struggle to get repeat engagement unless there’s an incentive. Prizes are fun :slight_smile:

3 Likes

That would be delightful.

1 Like

Would 1 suggestion per post work? Count the replies with the most <3’s? Harder to police the 3 suggestions per person however.

Is there a plugin for polls?

1 Like

Fair point. We may get weeks where a bunch of apps are recommended, and another, lighter week where only a couple of suggestions are given. That’s fine I think. We’re still going to be doing the job anyway, and we will ensure there’s a full compliment of featured applications every time.

Not sure we’ll have to ‘vote’ or collate + and - to determine who goes in - because that way lies Boaty McBoatface. I suspect we’ll only get a few suggestions, and that helps us anyway. Obviously if lots of people organically <3 a post then that’s a hint :slight_smile: But I don’t think we should codify that.

1 Like

Ok, nobody seems to have objected fiercely so I’m gonna kick this off today, in readiness for updating the store featured category on Friday. I’ll start a new thread for that.

1 Like

A post was merged into an existing topic: Call for Suggestions: Featured snaps Friday 25th September 2020