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Smule blog: News: Upcoming Smule Profile Enhancements

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_SingSalon_
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In the coming days, you can expect to see the newer profile layout return without any noticeable changes. We understand that may be frustrating to some of you but please know we’re making tweaks in the background. 

Over the next few weeks, you’ll see the following adjustments. Keep in mind, you’ll need the latest version of Smule on your phone to enjoy these new Smule profile enhancements: 

  • Added timestamp to performances and invites list
  • Improved visibility of pinned performances 
  • Ability to access your joins from the invites tab 
  • Added labels, identifying duet and group performances

View the full article on the Smule blog

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realyquick

What?? I thought this was already settled.. we got the old list view profile layout back, it's perfect and we love it. No need to bring back the new picture gallery one. Nobody wants it.

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DuetWithAlli

Wait … what? I don’t know if it will help, but there is a survey on the blog post that you can fill out to tell Smule your thoughts on the profile page. I told them I liked the old profile and begged them not to change back to the awful picture format … unless they can include all of the pertinent information about the recordings that is available on the old profile.

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realyquick

If you have an iPhone: Do not, Repeat Do not, update your app. It will go back to the ugly new picture gallery layout. I have two iPhones including a retired one that I use only for smule, and the one I updated went back to the ugly new look. The one I haven't updated - and will not ever update - has the beautiful old list layout😄

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opentype
8 hours ago, DuetWithAlli said:

unless they can include all of the pertinent information about the recordings that is available on the old profile.

I guess that’s what they are trying. Push forward with the new layout but address the biggest concerns at the same time. The result will likely be a design that will still be terrible, but a little less terrible than the first version. I guess they just aren’t willing to cut their losses and give it up. 

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realyquick
1 hour ago, opentype said:

I guess that’s what they are trying. Push forward with the new layout but address the biggest concerns at the same time. The result will likely be a design that will still be terrible, but a little less terrible than the first version. I guess they just aren’t willing to cut their losses and give it up. 

Precisely. Things the old layout showed for each collab which the new one doesn't include: who the two singers are; how many gifts; how old the recording is in days or hours, for an invite how many joins it has, the big pinned song, etc. But, it's not just that! There are lots of other nice things about the nice layout. When you go to "Invites", you see your own invites, and when you click on one you see all the joins in it. You can listen to the joins one at a time, and when you're done listening to a join, you come back to the list of joins.

In the new layout, you can't even see the joins when you click on an invite! You have to go to the channel and scroll through all the collabs until you find the invite, then click on a specific tiny corner of it to see how many joins there are. Once there, you click on a join to listen. But when you're done listening, you don't return to the join screen.. it has disappeared and you're back at the top of the channel! You now need to scroll through the channel again, find that invite in it, and go through the whole painful process again. It is so obvious whoever designed this layout does not actually use it. The previous designer (who is probably no longer with the company) used it, and knew how to optimize every part of the layout.

To put it simply, it is impossible to fix this layout. To add all that info on top of the big song pics will make the screen even more unwieldy and clunky. But all the other top-level features explained above will also have to be changed.

The only way to fix all this is to just go back to the old way of showing things. But the layout clearly seems to have become a political football in the smule organization. There's a very obstinate software designer who is insisting on the new layout he's worked for many months on, regardless of what the customers wants, or he will quit. And he seems to have got his way, after a temporary restoration of what customers wanted.

It's amazing to me that a money-making organization would behave in such an irresponsible way. Experimenting with the main user interface constantly, while customers pay big bucks and have to deal with a constantly changing (for the worse) UI.

These guys are just trolling the customers, big time. I'm on the verge of quitting smule, as so many have done recently. I might continue to use it but not as a subscriber, when it's time to pay my next annual subscription.

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sdr
11 minutes ago, realyquick said:

It is so obvious whoever designed this layout does not actually use it.

I had expressed the same opinion sometime ago. That's the best guess of it.

And remembering scroll positions seems to be the one thing they just don't get right. Even in the old profile! It's endless scrolling through hundreds of recordings. The moment you press on a record and come back, you are at the top again.🙄👇

19 minutes ago, realyquick said:

But when you're done listening, you don't return to the join screen.. it has disappeared and you're back at the top of the channel! You now need to scroll through the channel again

 

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realyquick
39 minutes ago, sdr said:

I had expressed the same opinion sometime ago. That's the best guess of it.

And remembering scroll positions seems to be the one thing they just don't get right. Even in the old profile! It's endless scrolling through hundreds of recordings. The moment you press on a record and come back, you are at the top again.🙄👇

 

Right, so it's not as simple as just adding this other info they've mentioned in this blog. There's other usability features like the one you're talking about. Also, the old layout used to show a play or pause sign in each collab to let you know which song out of the many shown on the screen is the one playing currently. That's gone too. So many other things have been removed with the new code. Btw these sorts of usability issues occur when there isn't good communication between the designer and the coders. I bet they've outsourced most of the coding and aren't making an effort to connect with them.

One thing I was impressed with is how easily they made the original layout come back again. It just happened one fine day with the flip of a switch from the server (without even updating the app!) That tells me all the good old code is still there.. they just added some trashy new code alongside. Just create an option in settings which can deploy either the old layout code or the new code.

Being a software designer myself, I can think of so many ways they could've improved upon the original design without sacrificing the elegance. Instead they bring in a new guy who decides to change everything. The only new feature that's been added compared to the old design is "Styles" but to me that's a bogus gimmicky feature which I never use, designed in a tacky way requiring a new separate app.

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DuetWithAlli

@realyquick oh, I had totally forgotten about the inconvenience of trying to listen to your joins since I canceled my vip last year. It was a major headache, that’s for sure. But I think Smule is totally focused on their rising artists and power users, and they don’t realize that there is also a real community of users who actually listen to all the joins on their invites.

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DuetWithAlli
13 hours ago, opentype said:

I guess that’s what they are trying. Push forward with the new layout but address the biggest concerns at the same time. The result will likely be a design that will still be terrible, but a little less terrible than the first version. I guess they just aren’t willing to cut their losses and give it up. 

You are one hundred percent right about that. And that is what I’m hoping for, a more functional version of the new format, which is the best we can hope for at this point.

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sdr
On 3/25/2022 at 9:41 PM, _SingSalon_ said:

Added timestamp to performances and invites list

This should have been present in their version 0.0! And what do they mean by timestamp? The 5s, 7m, 10d, 4mo, 3y kind of expired time tags? These are the worst timestamps they could use! What is the point of knowing that you sang a song 5y ago when there are another ten thousand songs with the same timestamp? Instead, they should use the UTC or similar format. 

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sdr
On 3/25/2022 at 9:41 PM, _SingSalon_ said:

Improved visibility of pinned performances 

Not just visibility but smule should notify every participant that someone has pinned their recording. They notify when recs are added to Favorites. Pin  is a more prominent spot in the profile but smule is silent about it!

Not only when adding, but when removing also the singer should be notified. This is needed for other such activities also, when unfollowed,  join deleted,  unpinned etc.

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sdr
On 3/25/2022 at 9:41 PM, _SingSalon_ said:

Keep in mind, you’ll need the latest version of Smule on your phone to enjoy these new Smule profile

A ray of hope there!🤪 Do not ever update smule.😂

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realyquick

Up until Smule version 10.4.6 shows the original list layout. Starting with 10.4.7 (released a couple days back) the horrible new profile shows up.

They could've at least kept the old layout until the new one was changed, which they say will take a few more weeks. We all know it's unfixable, as you said it might become a little less terrible, I think there's actually a better chance it'll become more terrible after they add more info on top of those huge picture icons.

I'm canceling my subscription on Smule. They've shown so much disrespect to their users, they don't deserve my subscription fees - or anyone else's for that matter.

Edited by realyquick
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