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What is going on here? Mastodon does not come with features that enable the idea of "groups"? I just found issue 139 [0], but "mastodon groups" is an extraord
by softwarelimits 7y ago
What is going on here?
Mastodon does not come with features that enable the idea of "groups"?
I just found issue 139 [0], but "mastodon groups" is an extraordinary bad combination of search terms.
The author seems to dismiss the idea that "groups" are an obvious requirement (IMHO) for any "social" software. Instead he seems to be assuming that one instance of the software might serve one "group" - with no easy way to scale "instance" to many servers.
Pleroma seems to plan for a groups feature [2][3], also using a framework that might be much easier for scaling, but seems to be struggling with implementation.
I see GNU social seems to have groups [1], but in the linked issues people write about bugs with that.
I am not sure this is really how it is, so please correct me if I am wrong.
Would anybody with more knowledge please like to explain why such a basic feature is missing from "social" software alternatives?
I want to understand what the problem is here, I feel like this is the first feature that should be considered from day one. It seems to me trying to handle such a basic feature as an afterthought has a high potential for disaster score (PFD>80): will require a deep re-design and rewrite, trigger several different implementations, standards and endless discussions, in the end will destroy everything.
I understand that groups and p2p / federation is complicated - but is this not a solved problem?
If not, is it a good idea to put this on top of the agenda for "offer alternative for big social brother"?
[0] https://github.com/tootsuite/mastodon/issues/139 https://github.com/tootsuite/mastodon/issues/139
[1] https://gnusocial.net/doc/groups https://gnusocial.net/doc/groups
[2] https://git.pleroma.social/pleroma/pleroma/issues/656 https://git.pleroma.social/pleroma/pleroma/issues/656
[3] https://git.pleroma.social/pleroma/pleroma-fe/issues/625 https://git.pleroma.social/pleroma/pleroma-fe/issues/625
No, tags can not replace groups.
- princekolt 7y agoYou take this one "flaw" in your view and explode it into a major usability limitation that makes the whole software useless. If this was the case the platform would not be growing and developing as quickly as it is. So maybe it isn't really that big of a deal?
- softwarelimits 7y ago> You take this one "flaw" in your view and explode it into a major usability limitation that makes the whole software useless. No, I did not do that. I do not want to discuss if "groups" is a "big deal" or not. I am interested in the question if "groups" in distributed, federated systems is a solved problem or not.
- cheshire_cat 7y agoThere are people working on this. See for example https://github.com/wmurphyrd/guppe https://github.com/wmurphyrd/guppe. One of the creators had a conversation with kaniini, one of the pleroma devs, about this: https://social.coop/@datatitian/102893246730611249 https://social.coop/@datatitian/102893246730611249
- bovermyer 7y agoMastodon is an alternative to Twitter and not Facebook.
- gwd 7y ago> Mastodon is an alternative to Twitter and not Facebook. And that is the one reason I haven't already started a Mastodon instance and tried to talk all my family and friends into using it instead of Facebook. Some people like everything to be public; fine. But some people, like me, want to be able to control who sees stuff; as far as I can tell, the only platform which allows that at the moment is Facebook. Why not make "groups" an option, so that it can serve both kinds of people?
- bovermyer 7y ago...because Mastodon is an alternative to Twitter, and not Facebook? Last I checked, Twitter doesn't have groups.
- rvense 7y agoI think this is a very limited (and limiting!) view of the world, that it should be one or the other, and that features cannot be borrowed from both.
- bovermyer 7y agoLimiting scope is a very important part of delivering software.
- chme 7y agoThat like saying making a phone that can take pictures is insane, because it is a phone and those are just meant to make calls.
- DagAgren 7y agoOr, it's like saying that a browser that has a built-in email client is insane. Usually, focusing on doing one thing only is how you make good products.
- carry_bit 7y agoIf groups are what you want, why not use a fork that already has groups?
- softwarelimits 7y agowhich fork has groups?
- carry_bit 7y agoGab has groups at least.
- sixthhokage1 7y agoUsing the Gab fork is basically asking to be in as many instance blocklists as you can.
- geogra4 7y agoI agree this is really frustrating. Even twitter has group chats. How can you have a social app without groups? I also would love events - then I could get rid of facebook entirely.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- progval 7y agoTwitter's group chats are just DMs with multiple recipients, which Mastodon supports too. In Mastodon (or most ActivityPub software), a DM thread can even be splitted and recipients added/removed at any point.
- pferde 7y agoWell, there is Diaspora, which has had groups (they call them "aspects") for many years now. I like it more than Mastodon, which is about as useless as Twitter.