Thinking about the common complaint of guides, downloads, etc. being hidden in a Discord server instead of available directly on a webpage, and trying to view it from a different angle than just "people do this and it's so stupid" (which is just venting and/or shaming, neither of which actually solves the problem) or "discord locks so much away from the public internet which is why getting these is so difficult" (which is functionally true but for important social reasons I strongly believe content on a Discord server should be private and unindexed in almost all circumstances).
What I really wanna ask is "Why would I, as a server owner, decide to put the link to the most important file people want to see inside my Discord server and not link it anywhere else?" The possibilities that come to mind are:
- My Discord server is the only platform for my community. I don't have a website, or a Twitter account, or a wiki, or anything and I don't know how to set those up.
- I want more people to join my Discord and putting the file there will increase the likelihood that people stick around.
- I want to gate the download behind a question / survey of some kind, and I don't know how to do that except with a Discord bot.
- People often ask questions or need help and they get mad when they can't find that help easily, so I want to make sure they're already in the server where they can ask questions before they get the download.
- I am going to update the file a lot and I'm probably gonna forget to update a website or wiki, but I'm already on Discord all the time / announce updates on Discord and so it's easier to just make that the only place to get it.
- I want to see who is using my file, hosting it on Discord allows me to get an idea of how many and who is using my file.
- I want boosts for my server / want people to subscribe to me and they're more likely to do so through my server if they've already joined.
I'm sure there's more. Most of these seem to be either ignorance or difficulty in using better options (i.e. it's harder to make a website that feels legit than it is to make a Discord server that feels legit) or specifically leveraging high-value files to get more people to join your server for varying reasons.
There is, of course, also just not thinking joining a Discord server is a big deal and not even understanding that there might be a problem. This is actually the only case in which I think making it known that it's annoying can help, the other two aren't really addressable by pointing out why it's frustrating.
This is where I wish I was a PM at Discord and could just run a survey to figure out the distribution of these three groups to figure out which to prioritize addressing. Alas, I am but an unemployed engineer thinking out loud. Oh well.