Lesson
Two users asked the same question
A small TodayMet activation lesson this week. Publishing a profile seemed completely obvious to me. At the top of the editor there's a status control: Draft → Published → Paused I built it, so naturally I knew exactly what it meant. Then one user created a profile and asked how to publish it. I noticed the problem, but initially thought clearer guidance around the status control would probably be enough. Then a second user independently went through the same flow and asked: “How do I publish?” At that point it stopped being an isolated confusion and became a UX problem. The fix was deliberately small. The status dropdown stays because it makes sense for ongoing profile management. But while a profile is still a draft, the editor now shows an explicit activation step: Your profile is ready to share. Publish it to make your public profile available. Publish profile → Once published, that prompt disappears and the normal sharing controls take over. No onboarding wizard. No tutorial explaining where the dropdown is. Just make the thing the user needs to do next obvious. The useful lesson for me is how easy it is to become blind to your own interface. I know TodayMet's state model. I know why something says Draft. I know which control changes it. So my brain fills in all the missing information automatically. A new user doesn't have any of that context. And this is another reason I'm increasingly interested in getting more people through the product rather than polishing it alone: one confused user can be an accident. two independently confused at the same step is a signal. Fix it, send more people through, and see if the question disappears.
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