Some ideas: For number 2: I don't know if you guys have used StumbleUpon, but to begin is a huge list of categories and subcategories where a user checks off what kinds of stuff they'd like to see. Might something like that be done with a number of tags? For example, if after registering, the user was presented with a tag list, in addition to users to follow. For numbers 3 and 4: I'm not a huge fan of programs where things tell you what to do, like older versions of MS-Word with the paperclip thingy (or was it a dog?) but what if on registering for hubski, the user's first post were "guided" in some subtle way?
I completely agree. That's why I want show people sort of how to accomplish things without telling them how to click things. For example, I think if we cover how to follow people via the tag page, they will understand tags and we can avoid covering "Now, type in a tag for your post." It's a fine line though. forwardslash has a nifty link too: http://usablica.github.io/intro.js/ Perhaps 3 and 4 can be on a bulleted text page that links from the guide so at the end they can click it to get even more detail about specific pages, etc or they can just jump right in.For numbers 3 and 4: I'm not a huge fan of programs where things tell you what to do, like older versions of MS-Word with the paperclip thingy (or was it a dog?) but what if on registering for hubski, the user's first post were "guided" in some subtle way?