I think the apps and the web ui should increase the size of the users avatars and make the username a bit bigger so it’s easier for people to start recognizing eachother and grow a sense of community. Back in the forum days people would remember eachother’s usernames/avatars for their contributions and it would be easier to grow a sense of community making things less hostile and easier to create community events
While I agree, I’d like to add that it’s not hard to recognize and remember the very active and/or notable posters.
Actually for the fun of it, I’ll name a few on top of my head:
QuentinCallaghan: Sopuli founder and avid commenter.
Ategon: Hot in the tech subs, seems like a really nice fella.
Picard Maneuver: Memelord and legend
Flying Squid: Meme master and commenter
Dessalines: Dev for Lemmy, Jerboa (and the keyboard I use, thanks this is great).
Ruut: Lemmyworld founder.
And some more whose username I can’t recall at the moment.
Also it’d be fun if you commnted some more. :D
Since you mentioned “forum days”, I’m still wondering when did we decided we should get rid of those blinking gifs with our usernames we used as a signature for every post! I hate them, but I also miss them…
I agree, back in the day my “attention removed” avatar had much more impact.