FYI @Pginer-WMF

I discussed with @nettrom_WMF , and he shared the previous research we have around this:
https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T245369

Basically for wikis that have the Welcome survey enabled (which is now all wikis), the path from the Special:Contributions to the homepage isn't a main path for newcomers discovering their homepage.

Although that path is more common on mobile:

On mobile, the Special:Contributions button also leads to a lot of discovery. I'm not surprised to see that, because I think that the idea for this route was prompted by user research or analysis showing that many mobile users think that the "Contributions" menu option is how they should contribute.

It seems like T322740 is addressing that need, so I predict the "Go to your homepage" route from Special:Contributions will be less necessary and used even less often once the new Contribute entry point is added.

My suggestion is that we ensure that there is a helpful empty state for newcomers who land on Special:Contributions but have no contributions. But I think that could either be a route back to the Contribute entry point, a route to the newcomer homepage, or some other helpful guide for new contributors.

Do you think this analysis is needed, or perhaps the previous research is enough to help guide us? (I'm not opposed to this task getting worked on, I just know Morten's analysis backlog is already piling up and I want to be sure we know how the results of this will guide our decision-making).

In T337885#8897625, @KStoller-WMF wrote:

I discussed with @nettrom_WMF , and he shared the previous research we have around this:
https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T245369

Basically for wikis that have the Welcome survey enabled (which is now all wikis), the path from the Special:Contributions to the homepage isn't a main path for newcomers discovering their homepage.

Although that path is more common on mobile:

On mobile, the Special:Contributions button also leads to a lot of discovery. I'm not surprised to see that, because I think that the idea for this route was prompted by user research or analysis showing that many mobile users think that the "Contributions" menu option is how they should contribute.

It seems like T322740 is addressing that need, so I predict the "Go to your homepage" route from Special:Contributions will be less necessary and used even less often once the new Contribute entry point is added.

My suggestion is that we ensure that there is a helpful empty state for newcomers who land on Special:Contributions but have no contributions. But I think that could either be a route back to the Contribute entry point, a route to the newcomer homepage, or some other helpful guide for new contributors.

Do you think this analysis is needed, or perhaps the previous research is enough to help guide us? (I'm not opposed to this task getting worked on, I just know Morten's analysis backlog is already piling up and I want to be sure we know how the results of this will guide our decision-making).

hi @KStoller-WMF - it sounds like the previous analysis is sufficient for us to re-consider this particular empty state once incoming new contribute point appears (when presumably even less people will arrive here), is that correct? If so, could we perhaps repurpose this task to be about revising the empty state on Special:Contributions to work in conjunction with the new contribute page? Unless @Pginer-WMF you already have a task around this planned/in place?

In T337885#8898188, @RHo wrote:
it sounds like the previous analysis is sufficient for us to re-consider this particular empty state once incoming new contribute point appears (when presumably even less people will arrive here), is that correct? If so, could we perhaps repurpose this task to be about revising the empty state on Special:Contributions to work in conjunction with the new contribute page?

Correct. Yes, I think repurposing this task makes sense unless @Pginer-WMF disagrees.

Sounds good to me. I added the current ticket as a sub-task for T322740, and included a list of similar tasks in an "Avoiding redundancies" section in the parent ticket description.