ProdigalFrog

This feature has been available to all kbin/Mbin users since the beginning, btw.

That’s a fair point, actually. I suppose as long as an algorithm doesn’t prioritize engagement at all costs, it could be a worthy addition.

Not a bad idea!

As someone who has had to explain to longtime Linux users why and how some arcane aspect of package management isn’t grok-able by the common user, I understand where you’re coming from with that point.

However, while I do agree the overall experience could be more intuitive and easier, if the first concepts of federation and picking a server is too much for someone, I don’t know if that is possible to overcome since it’s fundamental to this whole citizen controlled media experiment. Hopefully at some point in the future it becomes more popular, and thus the concept becomes more understandable and less scary due to seeing others get on with it, just like email.

I don’t think the existence of a second solarpunk instance would negate my experience with the first instance. It would still apply, there would just be another place where that same phenomena is happening for a different group of people.

That’s not to say that I couldn’t subscribe to their communities and get to know the regulars there too, but it would be more norrowed since I would only see the ones I specifically subscribe to, where as with my local tab I see the totality of what’s posted to my ‘home’.

If you personally don’t care about that specific experience that a local tab can bring and think your curated subscriptions is just as good if not better, awesome, more power to you.

But for me specifically, and possibly for others as well, it’s a noticeable difference and a welcome addition to our experience :)

I’m not entirely sure if this is how it works, but I believe the instance that disables down votes does not federate downvotes from other instances. So if a downvote enabled instance downvotes a post from the non downvoting instance, other users on the same instance as the downvoter will see downvotes, but other instances will not see them.

Could be totally wrong about that though!

It’s not that the local tab replaces your home ‘subscriptions’ tab, it’s that it’s nice to have in addition to it.

My instance, slrpnk.net, caters to solarpunk topics only, and we’re small enough that it has a tight community of regular posters whom I recognize. In my local tab I can see at a glance just the stuff posted to my community, with my other subscriptions not mixed in and cluttering it up. I also see in my local tab what’s being posted in communities I’m not subscribed to, but will often have comments from our members since we all collectively view our local tab. It’s like a sort’ve town square feel that my all and subscriptions tab don’t have.

I like having access to both.

Voting being disabled is an option built into Lemmy that the admins can activate, though only a few choose to. I know Blahaj disabled down votes but not upvotes.

Also I can’t test this immediately, but at least on reddit, if you highlighted text from someone’s comment before hitting the reply button, it would automatically put that in quotes in your comment box.

AFAIK, you’re able to see pretty much everything on your instance, but Beehaw did defederate from your instance, so I think you can see their posts, but they can’t see yours.

About the lack of an algorithm: do we really want to recreate the addictiveness of for-profit platforms? Is that actually a healthy feature? Perhaps it’s better for society if our social media isn’t as addictive as possible.

And on manual validation for sign-ups: before the mass migration from Reddit, most instances didn’t seem to have validation, and then as it became popular, we got hit with trolls mass creating accounts posting CP and racist images, making it a game of whack-a-mole to stop it. As Lemmy is all volunteer run, we don’t have paid content moderators always watching for that stuff, nor did they have an automated content filter. The main solution is to validate sign-ups so that the moderators and admins are not overwhelmed with spam and illegal content (which they could be legally liable for if not dealt with properly).

Lemmyverse.net is the best way to search across all instances for communities that would interest you.

I could see merit to that argilument if the sign-ups process was kind’ve a pain, but honestly it’s so easy to create an account on Lemmy it’s hard to give that too much credence. Most servers just want a username and a password, and many don’t even require an email to verify. If putting in a username and password somewhere else because they didn’t like their first instance is too much for them, that’s a pretty flighty user to begin with, and they would probably leave for a host of other reasons too.

Saying that, a better way to narrow down that initial choice of server would not go amiss, but ultimately people will need to understand that this is all run by volunteers and there may be more bumps than a corporate controlled platform, but the other advantages (if they appeal to this theoretical user) are worth it.

Even with a better server picking tool, and even if they pick a server they like the first time, it’s possible that server has to shut down some day due to unforeseen circumstances, and that user will have to either accept that they have to create a new account somewhere, or decide that’s not an ideal UX and never come back, which would be a shame, but impossible to prevent.

You can experience each server before making an account, you just can’t post or subscribe. If someone is afraid of creating am account on an instance they may not like (which if I’m being honest is a slightly strange worry, as it costs nothing to sign up, and they can delete the account if they don’t like it), they can spend as much time lurking without an account as they need.

Different instances that have a unique interest or theme will determine the type and feel of content in your local feed, and can have a tangible community as you recognize names from your instance. That’s the main difference.

Greenleaf is pretty massively exaggerating about the extent of defederation, as only a handful ever get defederated regularly, certainly not enough to call it ‘wars’.

As for UX, there’s definitely room for lots of improvements, especially in making it easier to explore another instances local communities from within your own insinstance without explicitly subbing to them all or using lemmyverse.net.

But I don’t think the very concept of different instances is truly a barrier or bad UX, that other user is just giving lazy excuses for not switching away from Reddit.

If that was a legitimate issue, MMO’s (which also often have servers the player needs to choose) wouldn’t have the userbase they do. Nor would Email have taken off.

Even if Lemmy was one big simple centralized server, that user would just come up with another reason they couldn’t switch.

“Oh, it’s too small, my niche communities aren’t there”

“The UI isn’t as nice”

“The mod tools aren’t as good”

Etc.

Yay! Wonder what caused the outage.

There was a bug that prevented instances running old versions from showing up, perhaps it’s back?

The easier way is to use lemmyverse.net’s search after you set your home Instance, then when you open a link, it’ll open it from your instance which triggers it to federate.

You might want to consider cross posting this to !growthefediverse@slrpnk.net too :)

That would be rad if true ^^