I don't know if my experience with the new FC beta site is uniquely problematic, or if others are having the same problems, but I'm finding it frustrating enough that I can't see myself engaging much - if at all - with the community. I belong to a few social networks, run a couple of multi-blog sites, have a conference site that has a social networking component, and so on, so I'm not a newbie. On the other hand, I'm willing to concded if I've overlooked something obvious.

Problem 1: I want to log in but can't remember my password, but in the process of trying to retrieve my password, I'm asked to follow a link and reset it but first must enter my OLD password. Which I don't know. So once I close out this session, I may never get back in, because ...

Problem 2: I can't find a Help/Contact Support button anywhere.  I found this feedback link, but am not so sure that this is the right forum for such a specific request. I know that logins are one of the trickiest parts of user experience, but really - now that all sites have them, you'd think everyone had gotten it down by now?

Problem 3: When following the link to reset my password, a "Resest Password" screen should have been created, instead of sending the user to a screen, to have to scan the many options to figure out where the password reset is hidden. My intuitive sense was to look where the Search/Advanced Search was, and it was after some serious cognitive processing and snippy consultation with spouse that I realized it was under "Settings" - only to discover that it wouldn't work for me.

So the bottom line, even if I remind myself to take the time to use a "pull" model instead of a "push" model to get information (I also can't get the blog posts to integrate with my other regular Google Reader feeds but that's another issue), I probably couldn't get in to participate.

Rahel Anne Bailie