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Lemmy – A link aggregator for the fediverse

223 points by Apocalypsenear 5y ago

darthrupert 5y ago
Lemmy's default instance leans heavily to the contemporary american idea of leftism. This doesn't affect the actual software in any way, only that community is a bit disturbing.
- rektide 5y ago
  not disturbing. good.
  - rektide 5y ago
    i genuinely think this sort of good, do for ourselves, improve the world attempt- software as public good- is something that the left has a far far stronger bead on. the right, for all their history of rugged individualism, doesn't have a participatory background, doesn't have techno-inclusivity & open cyber-frontiers in their value-system. it's unastounding to me in the extreme that the right has very little presence on most of the fediverse.
- LeoPanthera 5y ago
  You're being rapidly downvoted but to play devil's advocate I wonder if you could explain why you think "American leftism" is "disturbing".
  - iszomer 5y ago
    For me, it wasn't a place to satisfy my intellectual curiosity.
    - s5300 5y ago
      American rightism essentially leans towards Christian theocracy. Does that lend itself more to your intellectual curiosity? There are obviously other political spectrums, but those are all extremely insignificant minorities. Surely you don't only find satiation to your curiosities in said extreme minorities, that seems rather unfulfilling as any meaningful advancement in them is highly statistically unlikely in you or your direct childrens lifetimes.
  - alex_munroe 5y ago
    For the same reason all the orthodox authoritarian ideologies are disturbing. Why would I want to join an online discussion forum where free thought isn't welcome? Having "leftist" in the description makes people (at least myself) automatically jump to the conclusion that one can get cancelled/banned/deplatformed for posting any thought or argument that disagrees with the mainstream. I'm not a conservative or anti-vaxxer or anything like that, but this culture really creeps me out. Also in the About page the author of the software says things like: > [Reddit's] libertarian founders have allowed some of the most racist and sexist online communities to fester on reddit for years (Implying that this community wouldn't permit certain types of discussion, defined by very broad and ambiguous terms that were weaponized such that they can be used against anyone who disagrees with the leftist ideology in any way). And criticizes reddit for being: > liberal, and pro-US, not left (leftism referring to the broad category of anti-capitalism) I wouldn't be comfortable with participating in a discussion moderated by a person who says things like that. Also, as a person who grew up in a country ruined by "anti-capitalism", I find that trend in American culture extremely disturbing. Can you think of any anti-capitalist country (now, or at any point in history) that you'd like to live in? Luckily this is a free software and anyone is free to run their own instance. Politics aside - I wonder if it would be possible to create an instance focused on free speech, without automatically attracting all the worst people?
    - smt88 5y ago
      You seem to place authoritarianism and capitalism on opposite ends of some spectrum, but they're unrelated. Russia, for example, is both authoritarian and capitalist. Capitalism != individual freedom != democracy. Those are all separate axes. > Having "leftist" in the description makes people (at least myself) automatically jump to the conclusion that one can get cancelled/banned/deplatformed for posting any thought or argument that disagrees with the mainstream. I'm not a conservative or anti-vaxxer or anything like that, but this culture really creeps me out. Outside of maybe 8chan, what is a community that won't ban you for saying something they find harmful? Left/right/liberal/conservative communities all have this. It's totally fine if a self-described left-leaning community is not for you, but there's nothing weird or creepy about it.
  - JohnHaugeland 5y ago
    if he uses the word "leftism" he can't say anything coherent about politics
    - jayd16 5y ago
      Tbf, the sub-lemmy(?) seems to describe itself as leftist.
    - darthrupert 5y ago
      What would you call it?
      - JohnHaugeland 5y ago
        I don't reduce myself to cliches, so, I wouldn't "call it" anything
        zepto 5y ago
        That doesn’t seem coherent.
        JohnHaugeland 5y ago
        That's cute. I haven't said anything meaningful about politics. What I said, perhaps a bit too abruptly to be well understood, was "the use of a non-meaningful piece of slang that is almost entirely held by a specific group of poorly informed folks is a red flag that any attempt to discuss politics will end in a likely mix of muh jerbs and dumbocrats." The phrase "leftist" properly applies to a group of people who essentially haven't existed in the United States in around 80 years. It would be like if someone went to a baseball stadium and started calling people soccer hooligans. That is not a person from whom to learn sports. Thanks for the attempt at a table turn. You've been a delight
        zepto 5y ago
        > The phrase "leftist" properly applies to a group of people who essentially haven't existed in the United States. There are large numbers of people who describe themselves today as leftists, and there have been for the past 80 years. People across the political spectrum, academics, and the news media use the term in relation to contemporary politics. If you are using a definition that stopped being relevant 80 years ago, it will be hard for you to have a coherent discussion with people today.
  - fcklckdwns 5y ago
    The "American leftism" that promotes universal healthcare and reining in Wall Street is shared by a large chunk of the population of Western nations. The "American leftism" that promotes changing the genitals of 3-year-old children is completely alien to 99.99% of human experience throughout time and space. Hope that clarifies it.
    - jayd16 5y ago
      Er, hmm, circumcision is very common. Maybe you mean something else?
      - onlyrealcuzzo 5y ago
        My understanding is that the far left is anti-circumcision.
        zapzupnz 5y ago
        More to do with anti-unnecessary-medical-procedures-with-no-benefit-yet-lifelong-consequences-performed-on-infants-without-consent. It’s a question of body autonomy rather than circumcision as a practice unto itself; obviously, it’s medically necessary for many people later in life. My understanding is circumcision is just seen as the ‘done thing’ in the US whereas it’s not as common elsewhere. Certainly not as common in New Zealand.
    - smt88 5y ago
      > The "American leftism" that promotes changing the genitals of 3-year-old children is completely alien to 99.99% of human experience throughout time and space. This is utter nonsense and fear-mongering. There is no organized movement promoting changing genitals of 3-year-olds.
      - zepto 5y ago
        Not 3 year olds perhaps, but there is definitely an organized movement to promote early gender affirmation surgery.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
    - deleted 5y ago
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  - jim-jim-jim 5y ago
    Somebody can correct me if my timeline is off, but I think Lemmy was largely embraced by exiled Chapos, much like Voat became a Groyper den. I don't think it's even worth considering such a community left-wing. They're more like an anime poisoned grooming circle that embraced red aesthetics for shock value. However pathetic that sounds though, I'm the bigger loser for even being familiar with this nonsense.
    - sudosysgen 5y ago
      No, you're thinking of Hexbear. Chapos didn't go to Lemmygrad.
    - SerLava 5y ago
      Sure I'll bite, none of what you said is true, in either timing or circumstances. -They didn't go to Lemmygrad -No definition of leftism would exclude the very leftist people who went over to Hexbear, the Lemmy instance for exiled r/Chapotraphouse posters -they don't seem to be particularly into anime -they are very into left politics, socialism, trade unionism, anti-imperialism, and so on. So like they are left-wing
  - lmm 5y ago
    I'm not the person you replied to, but today's American leftism practically mandates a belief in blank-slatism on race, gender, and IQ, to an extent that’s inimical to sincere science in those areas. And that ends up having a wide impact on science generally and policy generally.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - iszomer 5y ago
      "I don't want to be a product of my environment, I want the environment to be a product of me." ^So that's where this quote came from, TIL.. https://quillette.com/2017/01/12/the-blank-slateism-of-the-right/ https://quillette.com/2017/01/12/the-blank-slateism-of-the-r...
    - SerLava 5y ago
      Oh they don't like it when you repeatedly point out your favorite very sincere scientific facts collected by sincere scientists with the best calipers?
  - pugets 5y ago
    Modern American leftism, at least on social media, is really weird. You have a lot of these so-called leftists rebelling against the philosophies of Marx and other communist philosophers on very fundamental issues (e.g. gun ownership for the proletariat, or the freedom of speech) all because of the current political climate in America. At the same time, these people will support and protect Big Tech and other capitalist interests when it is politically convenient to do so. I've heard American leftism once jokingly called Socialism with Silicon Valley Characteristics. Ask any one of these new-age leftists what they think of Alex Jones' YouTube channel being banned, and they will hit you with a response that would disturb any of the Gen X leftists who grew up in an era where Communist was a dirty word and the protection of free speech was a top-most necessity. New-age leftists have grown up in the left-sympathetic social media era and cannot conceptualize the pendulum ever swinging the opposite direction.
    - jim-jim-jim 5y ago
      In practice I think mainstream liberals are the gleefully censorious ones, not leftists. In a sibling comment I called these guys losers, but you can't argue that they're not walking the walk by setting up their own platforms. The people in these alt communities have been kicked off Reddit for rightfully pointing out how astroturfed it is by advertisers, police, and military agencies, so I'm not sure if you'd find much love for big tech among their ranks. Setting up your own community with specific standards is totally fine imo.
      - Saptarishi 5y ago
        >Setting up your community with specific standards is totally fine imo In some sense I agree, but what happens when these communities begin to overflow with people, and chaos increases? It leads to opinion suppression( no I'm not talking about extreme opinions on any side of the political spectrum , I'm talking about opinions which differ from the status quo ), echo-chamber creation, and worst of all, unnecessary aggressive behaviour and mud slinging.
        uabstraction 5y ago
  - the_third_wave 5y ago
    The American left manages to combine the worst of the traditional far left - authoritarianism, enforced collectivism, a total lack of ideological flexibility combined with an as total lack of historical insight - with a willingness, nay eagerness to use non-state commercial actors to enforce their doctrine. It is as if they read Ayn Rand and decided that she got everything backwards so they made their own philosophy of Subjectivism, with a sprinkling of critical theory and a dash of Maoism.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- ddingus 5y ago
  So join them. I do not mean ideologically. Just in conversation. More of us learning to talk with one another better is a really good thing. The American idea of leftism varies widely, and on all axis too. A similar thing can be found in the right. Both have populist factions that have a lot in common. Many identify as indie too. They lack a solid party home. Both have moderate and conservative factions too. Authoritarianism is also on the rise generally. All of this can be disturbing. I find the economic policy that way right now myself. Labor seems to be organizing though. Others see that as disturbing! What I know, having had a ton of conversations in various venues around the nation is the body politic is far more complex. Everyone is listening to some loud or compelling voices and not talking with one another near enough to garner a better sense of where people are at and how policy might make a whole lot better sense. It does not have to be disturbing. Shouldn't in my view.
  - LAC-Tech 5y ago
    > I do not mean ideologically. Just in conversation. More of us learning to talk with one another better is a really good thing. The vast majority of people do not want to have that conversation (hence the flagged post of the grandparent).
    - ddingus 5y ago
      Why? I find the answer in most cases is worries over personal judgement. More of us quit doing that and more people will have that conversation. I usually lead with, "ignore the talking heads on TV." Worked wonders for me. I enjoy politics and culture again as do others I talk to. The other basic worry is inability to manage a conversation coupled with the idea of ideology being the means to better ends rather than the reasoning tool it really is. A person who maintains one ideology, sans a working understanding of others, will feel threatened when its merit is challenged. Fact is we have many solutions to the problems we face with no requirement they all conform to a single ideological frame.
  - unraveller 5y ago
    The creators say they don't want people not of their ilk joining so this idea that open debate is welcome is disingenuous. They don't allow anyone to federate with the main instance either if they don't also toe the political line.
- dflock 5y ago
  So? Early reddit was also quite left-ish.
  - onionisafruit 5y ago
    Early reddit seemed more libertarian to me. They couldn’t get enough of Ron Paul. I’m not a libertarian, but I kind of miss those days on reddit.
- guerrilla 5y ago
  You mean lemmy.ml? All I see is a bunch of science, privacy and climate stuff right now.
  - fulafel 5y ago
    Sounds like themes counter to the american right.
- s5300 5y ago
  Hmm... disturbing? The United States leftism leans heavily to the contemporary idea of all other developed western nations rightism... so are we to be seen as a bit disturbing by the rest of our nation peers? (hint, they mostly seem to :D )
  - darthrupert 5y ago
    I'm an european center/leftist and I have no idea what you're talking about.
    - s5300 5y ago
      Im saying that the current state of our (US) moderate left is effectively most other places moderate right. Our far left is most other places moderate left. Do you not see this to be true? Our far right is just full blown fascist/Christofacist now. We have $10,000 bounties on the heads of those assisting in seeking medical care in one of our largest states now.
- swiley 5y ago
  So does Reddit heh.
- ggm 5y ago
  Society as a whole, consistently tends to be more left wing than people appreciate. If you survey people in private, they show both selfish and collectivist opinions. In public, in some economies, declaring the collectivist view is harder. Collectivism, is essentially "left wing". It's the sense there is some basic equity out there, nobody "deserves" more (or less) than the individual. (obviously this is modulated by reality, economic and political) I like to believe 'we' are in a real majority. The point is the same, even if this isn't true: It's not some mythic 50/50 world, and there is no phantom "equity" out there which is a "balance" between libertarian-right, centerist and left views. Apes, penguins, take your pick. Collectivism is out there. Its a basic model. I'd call it "herd mentality" but that tends to have negative connotations. Sure, there are apex elements in collectivism. It doesn't undermine the main thesis: There is more collectivism, essential left-wing thinking, than a lot of people credit. In the US, because of individualism, this is often ignored. The belief "most" people in the US simply want to a) be left alone to b) sink or swim on their own and c) pay less taxes is a bit distorted. Really? They just want c).
  - zepto 5y ago
    The fact that humans are social is not relevant to whether a leftist political ideology should impose its preferred social structures by force. Capitalism allows people to organize collectively too. Proponents would claim that it enables more freedom to do so than ‘leftism’.
- kieselguhr_kid 5y ago
  I mean, there is a large (by Lemmy standards) Leninist server, which is indeed pretty left. But the idea that Leninism is widely embraced by the contemporary American left is a bit hysterical.
  - zepto 5y ago
    Leninism may not be by but Maoism was explicitly adopted by parts of the radical left in the 70s, many of whom are still influential for the current generation.
- unbad505 5y ago
  FWIF lemmy.ml isn't meant to be the default, but it is still run by the devs.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
radicalriddler 5y ago
I would define myself as pretty progressive, but Reddit's been absolutely dog** due to all the anti-capitalist, populist rhetoric. Every post seems to be filled with comments these days of "eat the rich". Like, you'll have a gif of a dude petting a dog, and then in the comments, they'll be like, "Bro, you're financially oppressing this dog and that's why it's forced to be pet by you" (Hyperbole, but I've seen some crazy stuff). I just wish, we could have a platform that was; not necessarily politically neutral, but where it didn't consume so much of the site. Unfortunately when I visit Lemmy, I'm fronted with a lemmygrad.ml, and a "leftist" privacy focused one, which seem to be the only populated instances at the moment. So it doesn't inspire much hope.
- Saptarishi 5y ago
  I pin the blame on too many users joining due to the mass popularisation of Reddit by YouTubers. At one point, almost every "popular" YouTuber seemed to have these "subReddit review" videos going on, which inevitably created a large boom in Reddits user base (it grew exponentially in the last 2-3 years). Suddenly Reddit went from being focused on fun/discussion/discovery/curiosity to mass populism and extreme echo-chamberism . The curious folks who originally were the soul of reddit were lost in the noise of "common" people barging in.
- Apocalypsenear 5y ago
  Which is why Lemmy needs more users to promote diversity and mainstream usage. Right now its filled with leftists mostly because they get banned from sites like reddit. The thing I enjoy about Lemmy is that you can join an instance and if you don't agree with the policies and the people there you can join a different instance.
  - account42 5y ago
    https://github.com/innereq/lenny#the-lemmy-problem https://github.com/innereq/lenny#the-lemmy-problem Having more users isn't going to help if the core developers are anti-diversity.
    - 5y ago
riffic 5y ago
Lemmy implements the ActivityPub protocol, a W3C recommendation.
- rapnie 5y ago
  Here is some more documentation on that. It is a bit outdated, and the latest release of Lemmy brought a lot of extensions and improvements to the federation code. https://join-lemmy.org/docs/en/federation/overview.html https://join-lemmy.org/docs/en/federation/overview.html
nicbou 5y ago
My options are "Run a server" and "Join a server" This is not an alternative to reddit, where you would see a front page with content on it.
- detaro 5y ago
  And if someone posted a link to a page about the reddit software (which isn't open-source anymore, but was for a long time), you'd also say "this isn't reddit", because the descriptive page doesn't show a front page, but you need to actually go to somewhere the software is installed to see it? That's two clicks!
  - HexbearShill 5y ago
    Way two many clicks
- rektide 5y ago
  you're right: it's better.
- skohan 5y ago
  I agree, for something like this to take off, you need someone to invest heavily up front in creating a user experience which is worth using - which means content. The tech is the easy part, you need to have a place that is worth going before the tech will be utilized.
- rapnie 5y ago
  Run a server / join a server is just your first setup step. After that you join Communities and while these can exist on any other server that yours is federating with (Lemmy has an allowlist for this), you interact with them from your own account on your own chosen server. The federation stuff is now mostly hidden to you, and the default filtered timeline shows stuff from you subscribed communities.
- kixiQu 5y ago
  Right, that's https://lemmy.ml https://lemmy.ml
peakaboo 5y ago
People who don't see why platforms like these are critically important has never had an opinion that isn't allowed on the major tech platforms.
- enumjorge 5y ago
  By and large what “isn’t allowed” on major tech platforms is racist, xenophobic, and homophobic content. You can still find a lot of non-PC, fringe content on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and Reddit. I get that censorship in major tech platforms is problematic, but the sense of martyrdom in comments like yours feels a little overwrought.
  - guerrilla 5y ago
    Nope. https://crimethinc.com/2020/08/19/on-facebook-banning-pages-that-support-crimethinccom-and-the-digital-censorship-to-come https://crimethinc.com/2020/08/19/on-facebook-banning-pages-... And now we've moved on to "misinformation" which has no real definition other than being mitigated by so-called fact checkers who mostly work for American for-profit newspapers.
    - reginold 5y ago
      First slow, then all of a sudden. Seems like the move to decentralized platforms may come quickly. I wonder what the precipitating event will be. Any speculation?
  - reginold 5y ago
    What would you say if you were truly anonymous?
    - Barrin92 5y ago
      nothing I wouldn't say when I'm not. Are you under the impression everyone is secretly homophobic or throws the n-word around when nobody can see them? If I'd be too ashamed to say something if my name is attached to it I wouldn't say it when it isn't. you need to be far gone to manage to get yourself kicked off Facebook.
pvg 5y ago
Previously: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28453165 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28453165 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23664067 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23664067 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19686972 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19686972
commoner 5y ago
FediTips, a Mastodon account, recently shared some concerns about the Uyghur-related content in the largest Lemmy instance, which is run by Lemmy's developers: https://mstdn.social/@feditips/106835057054633379 https://mstdn.social/@feditips/106835057054633379 This created a firestorm on Lemmy, on which it was noted that Lemmy removes conservative and libertarian communities with the reason "No conservative communities": > Removed Community conservatives reason: No conservative communities > Removed Community Libertarian, in the pursuit of a free society reason: No conservative communities allowed https://lemmy.ml/post/78808 https://lemmy.ml/post/78808 https://lemmy.ml/modlog https://lemmy.ml/modlog Perhaps the underlying software is fine, but the largest Lemmy instance is not exactly the friendliest to anyone who wants to express themselves more freely than they are allowed to on mainstream social networks.
- Krasnol 5y ago
  But you can even host your own instance with all the "conservative" communities you want. Why not do that? I mean, you must be aware by now that those "conservatives" did ruin a couple of actually good communities in the last years (especially in the reddit clone scene) and some people just don't want to deal with those people at all. And they shouldn't have to.
  - dfdub10 5y ago
    Why is it that people keep saying ignorant racist trash and then cry about cancel culture and how it’s all the media’s fault. The fact you think people along you out for being disrespectful is everyone but your own fault. And quit blaming the media, if they are such a problem stop watching. Or continue to spend your days watching the elitist con men on your favorite channel and praise an opinion host like a god. You’ve likely broken every law from your magic book and still think your better than every person that can think for themselves instead of being sheep following their masters every word.
    - Saptarishi 5y ago
      The problem arises when people dont actually say "ignorant racist trash" but have a genuine point of discussion(albeit controversial), but are painted with the same brush as real racists and bigots. Resorting to subversive vulgarity is not a good idea.
prashantsengar 5y ago
I have to say that it does seem to be pretty good unlike many other federated alternatives to poplar social media platforms. Pretty good means switching to it will not be too tough for Reddit users since most of the users (anecdata) preferred the older UI to which it is very similar and is easier to use on mobile.
unraveller 5y ago
The front-end is still buggy and needs a designer's touch. And the real-time aspects wear thin at scale with all the notifications in a mismatch of languages showing up in the main feed. Lemmy is practically unusable without a personal feed filter, it seems that of the new reddit alternatives only retalk_[1] want to get this right. If you do decide to run an instance of lemmy be sure to nuke the absurd word filter - the code is designed to make it as difficult as possible to change out. Thankfully some nice souls [2] are maintaining that anti-feature removal. [1] https://retalk.com https://retalk.com [2] https://github.com/innereq/lenny https://github.com/innereq/lenny
- reginold 5y ago
  How strange they would include word filters that are hard to edit. Seems counter to their whole mission...what? Edit: actually it would make sense if word filters themselves were hard to add. But having their own filter and making that hard to edit is bonkers.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - bbarnett 5y ago
    Reading the whole bug, it's literally a political stance with no teeth or real purpose. It's bizarrely all for show, serves no real purpose, is functionally deficient, and the DEVs know this. Further, a 10 line script could easily patch each new version, replacing the hardcoded code with a loadable text file. Done. Updates would take zero time to deploy. It's all about taking a position. Taking a position is fine. But, imagine a self driving car which wouldn't let you drive home to Cuntsington, MA (an example)? The DEVs think this logic is fine? Strange people.
    - reginold 5y ago
      Super strange. One of those artifacts that makes you question the whole project. One of the powers of diving in super deep is you can start to notice internal consistency or dissonance quicker. With this as an example.
xhrpost 5y ago
At quick glance the communities look very sperate. In my ideal federated dream, most servers would subscribe to most other servers and thus you could see your posts on several of them. Is that the intention here?
potamic 5y ago
Could someone ELI5 how the federation model works in practice? From the understanding, there is one entity that owns the core technology but the operators of the servers are distributed and independent. How do they typically manage things like scale, data growth, security, monetisation etc.? Is the experience likely to vary a bit across the operators? And how do users trust which operators then want to join?
- CaptArmchair 5y ago
  > one entity that owns the core technology Correct. Ownership is governed through intellectual property laws, the type of license used, agreements and so on. Lemmy's code is released under a GNU Affero license, and so ownership and usage are governed under this license. Large open source projects tend to set up legal entities (foundations, non-profits) which manage their brand, trademark, intellectual property rights and so on. > but the operators of the servers are distributed and independent. In the era of classic web forums, you would download a copy of vbulletion, phpbb,... operators would download a copy of the software and set up their own intance(s) on their own server(s). The federated model operates the same way. The distinction, though, is that all these instances are interconnected. They can communicate with each other. In the federated model, you have an account on server A, but you can use that account to subscribe and see content of and participate on server B. > How do they typically manage things like scale, data growth, security, monetisation etc.? Each to their own. Operators work independently. The operator of instance A is entire responsible for their own setup regardless of what happens at instance B. Operators get to set the rules on their own instance as to moderation, monetization, topics, community growth, etc. etc. Since servers are interconnected, each instance can use an allowlist to determine which other instances, and their users, are allowed to connect and participate. As an operator, you get to decide that users of B can connect with your server, but users of C aren't allowed. > Is the experience likely to vary a bit across the operators? Communities are groups of people. Just like in real life, a community establishes its own culture, its own identity, its own way of communicating. So, yes, the experience can vary across the board depending on who's active on your instance. Functionally speaking, all Lemmy instances operate the same way. You have communities, comment threads, voting, posting, etc. Barring configuration differences, as a user, the experience is quite similar across servers. > And how do users trust which operators then want to join? The same way you'd trust your ISP, your bank, the garage that services your car, etc. You read reviews, you try to gauge sentiment, number of users, etc. etc. Mastodon - a Twitter clone - uses the exact same federation protocols as Lemmy. Mastodon has an order of magnitude more users across its instances. A big feature in Mastodon is the ability to just move your account from one instance to another instance. A thing Lemmy doesn't seem to have at the moment: https://lemmy.eus/post/8181/comment/31995 https://lemmy.eus/post/8181/comment/31995 https://docs.joinmastodon.org/user/moving/ https://docs.joinmastodon.org/user/moving/
spoonjim 5y ago
What are examples of things designed in the last 20 years that are federated and usable?
- unicornporn 5y ago
  Matrix, Mastodon and PeerTube.
  - spoonjim 5y ago
    Is Mastodon federated in practice? I’m a member of several but they are all independent.
    - tadzik_ 5y ago
      Independent as in: closed off? Servers that don't federate are extremely rare ime, except for the likes of Gab that most people just choose not to federate with.
      - numpad0 5y ago
        Remote follow don’t work as good as hardcore users would like it to. Federation mechanisms would have to have kilo- to mega-posts/second bandwidth but not happening. Also that federation choice being in hand of instance owners makes an account on each instances a must. You are going to have a person or two that your instance owners don’t like, or instance or two that don’t like yours.
        tadzik_ 5y ago
        Curious – I run my own pleroma instance for myself on a tiny VPS and I'm seeing no problems at all, with remote follows or any other interactions.
    - unbad505 5y ago
      I follow many people from different instances all on one account
twelvechairs 5y ago
What happens with moderation of unethical subs? The docs say "each instance has a set of administrator Users, who have the power to do site-wide removals and bans." So does that mean someone can start an instance for (as examples) covid deniers or white supremacists and reject any request to ban them? Or is there broader community input? What happens if I run an instance and these subs become popular - am I going to be liable legally for their use or will a broader community be able to input into their moderation?
- fractalf 5y ago
  Think of these federated instances as a good 'ol forum. Same rules applies
- null0pointer 5y ago
  My understanding of how federated social networks work is that a server operator can firstly moderate the content on their own server as they see fit, and secondly blacklist other servers from syncing data with their own if they don’t approve of the content it hosts.
asymptosis 5y ago
I'm intrigued by this. However -- and this is probably a cultural thing with me being an old-timey unix guy who likes to build things from scratch -- I have a point of confusion. If you choose Run A Server, it suggests two main options: Ansible or Docker. It specifically warns against "from scratch". When I'm developing software, I want people to be building it from scratch. If someone likes something I made enough that they want to take it and build a docker or ansible thing out of it ... okay, that's flattering, albeit a little confusing, and it's not my default. And I probably wouldn't agree to support those third-party ansible/docker things which someone else felt the need to create. What happened to rolling a versioned tarball that you can chuck in opt or wherever and point nginx at it? Eg, if I knew I could pull in versions of lemmy server through my package manager, I'd be totally trying it out as my side-project this weekend.
- codetrotter 5y ago
  From a cursory look running the backend is close to as simple as installing libpq and then cargo build --release and then creating the PostgreSQL user and database, and editing a config file then running the lemmy binary. I don’t see a problem. Serving the frontend cannot be a challenge either I imagine but I didn’t bother looking at the frontend.
  - asymptosis 5y ago
    Thanks for the pointer. I guess I was more thinking about the culture involved in explicitly denouncing a from-source build. Sorry if that wasn't clear.
    - tasuki 5y ago
      I suppose the Ansible and Docker versions are both built from the source, in a reproducible manner. What would you gain by going through the build steps manually by yourself? From my point of view, having to build things is a hassle: one needs the dependencies, it will work differently on different OSes/distros, the maintainer needs to keep the build instructions up-to-date and verify manually that they won't break (for all OSes/distros). Ansible or Docker just gives you a reproducible thing, easier to verify in one step whether the build instructions in it still work.
echelon 5y ago
Federated Reddit and federated toots and all that shit are just too obtuse and like the old regime. It's too hard to set up and run your own node, and joining an existing one is just like joining Reddit or Facebook. The optimal way to distribute social news: bittorrent-style P2P swarms. People copy and paste news articles with photos (maybe this is piracy?) and share them as files with known hashes. The swarm pulls down all the articles for you to read locally without ads or scripts. No HTML and script garbage. Beautiful plaintext with minimal markdown-style markup. A core group of 5 or so people alone can probably scrape what's valuable of the old web on a daily basis, rendering the need for the web moot. The web is going away anyway with the social media giants. We should just own the method of distribution instead of having it locked away in Medium and AMP. User identities in the system are PGP signed, but can be effectively anonymous. You follow people that you upvote frequently, and articles they upvote are given higher priority in your feed. You share your voting with others to create rich filters. If the system detects noise, you know where in the graph it comes from and can nuke it. It'll take time to build a reputation, so people won't risk it. You can layer comments on top and distribute them the same way. Content is ephemeral as you want and decays naturally if nobody keeps or seeds it. Some archive team might want to keep stuff, but nobody else has to go to the trouble of maintaining infrastructure to do so. No spam. No ads. No VC-funded growth engines that require your phone or a mobile app. Just a solid protocol and beautiful reading and authoring client. The protocol should include a plaintext legal preamble / poison pill that prevents companies from ever trying to coopt it: BEGIN. BY EMITTING THIS PROTOCOL, WE OFFER SHARES EQUIVALENT OF 1% OF OUR COMPANY ON A DAILY BASIS TO ANYONE WHO CONNECTS TO THIS CLIENT. Or something to make "embrace and extend" impossible by forcing companies into an impossible legal contract.
- numpad0 5y ago
  Did you seriously just reinvent Winny there!?
debdut 5y ago
I liked it but then I went to the Server's page and saw it's filled with Communist symbols, got terrified and closed it :(
- spzb 5y ago
  And then this comment got posted on the Lemmy site and the circle was completed https://lemmygrad.ml/post/33925 https://lemmygrad.ml/post/33925
- carbolymer 5y ago
  yeah, you should go with lenny then: https://github.com/innereq/lenny https://github.com/innereq/lenny
deleted 5y ago
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betwixthewires 5y ago
Lemmy development is coming along great, but there are some things I think don't make a lot of sense on a federated network. 1) at the very least there should be an option to run it as a single community, not multiple communities. Federation means you can have multiple communities, each on their own server, the whole user created multi community paradigm makes sense on centralized services like reddit. Added bonus, you remove site administration and have only moderation, removing bureaucratic layers is good. 2) subscriptions on federated services should ideally be handled client side. If I want to subscribe to a community feed, needing to log in doesn't make sense when a community I follow might not be on my home server. I should only need authentication to interact.

Lemmy's default instance leans heavily to the contemporary american idea of leftism. This doesn't affect the actual software in any way, only that community is a bit disturbing.

rektide 5y ago
not disturbing. good.
- rektide 5y ago
  i genuinely think this sort of good, do for ourselves, improve the world attempt- software as public good- is something that the left has a far far stronger bead on. the right, for all their history of rugged individualism, doesn't have a participatory background, doesn't have techno-inclusivity & open cyber-frontiers in their value-system. it's unastounding to me in the extreme that the right has very little presence on most of the fediverse.
LeoPanthera 5y ago
You're being rapidly downvoted but to play devil's advocate I wonder if you could explain why you think "American leftism" is "disturbing".
- iszomer 5y ago
  For me, it wasn't a place to satisfy my intellectual curiosity.
  - s5300 5y ago
    American rightism essentially leans towards Christian theocracy. Does that lend itself more to your intellectual curiosity? There are obviously other political spectrums, but those are all extremely insignificant minorities. Surely you don't only find satiation to your curiosities in said extreme minorities, that seems rather unfulfilling as any meaningful advancement in them is highly statistically unlikely in you or your direct childrens lifetimes.
- alex_munroe 5y ago
  For the same reason all the orthodox authoritarian ideologies are disturbing. Why would I want to join an online discussion forum where free thought isn't welcome? Having "leftist" in the description makes people (at least myself) automatically jump to the conclusion that one can get cancelled/banned/deplatformed for posting any thought or argument that disagrees with the mainstream. I'm not a conservative or anti-vaxxer or anything like that, but this culture really creeps me out. Also in the About page the author of the software says things like: > [Reddit's] libertarian founders have allowed some of the most racist and sexist online communities to fester on reddit for years (Implying that this community wouldn't permit certain types of discussion, defined by very broad and ambiguous terms that were weaponized such that they can be used against anyone who disagrees with the leftist ideology in any way). And criticizes reddit for being: > liberal, and pro-US, not left (leftism referring to the broad category of anti-capitalism) I wouldn't be comfortable with participating in a discussion moderated by a person who says things like that. Also, as a person who grew up in a country ruined by "anti-capitalism", I find that trend in American culture extremely disturbing. Can you think of any anti-capitalist country (now, or at any point in history) that you'd like to live in? Luckily this is a free software and anyone is free to run their own instance. Politics aside - I wonder if it would be possible to create an instance focused on free speech, without automatically attracting all the worst people?
  - smt88 5y ago
    You seem to place authoritarianism and capitalism on opposite ends of some spectrum, but they're unrelated. Russia, for example, is both authoritarian and capitalist. Capitalism != individual freedom != democracy. Those are all separate axes. > Having "leftist" in the description makes people (at least myself) automatically jump to the conclusion that one can get cancelled/banned/deplatformed for posting any thought or argument that disagrees with the mainstream. I'm not a conservative or anti-vaxxer or anything like that, but this culture really creeps me out. Outside of maybe 8chan, what is a community that won't ban you for saying something they find harmful? Left/right/liberal/conservative communities all have this. It's totally fine if a self-described left-leaning community is not for you, but there's nothing weird or creepy about it.
- JohnHaugeland 5y ago
  if he uses the word "leftism" he can't say anything coherent about politics
  - jayd16 5y ago
    Tbf, the sub-lemmy(?) seems to describe itself as leftist.
  - darthrupert 5y ago
    What would you call it?
    - JohnHaugeland 5y ago
      I don't reduce myself to cliches, so, I wouldn't "call it" anything
      - zepto 5y ago
        That doesn’t seem coherent.
        JohnHaugeland 5y ago
        That's cute. I haven't said anything meaningful about politics. What I said, perhaps a bit too abruptly to be well understood, was "the use of a non-meaningful piece of slang that is almost entirely held by a specific group of poorly informed folks is a red flag that any attempt to discuss politics will end in a likely mix of muh jerbs and dumbocrats." The phrase "leftist" properly applies to a group of people who essentially haven't existed in the United States in around 80 years. It would be like if someone went to a baseball stadium and started calling people soccer hooligans. That is not a person from whom to learn sports. Thanks for the attempt at a table turn. You've been a delight
        zepto 5y ago
        > The phrase "leftist" properly applies to a group of people who essentially haven't existed in the United States. There are large numbers of people who describe themselves today as leftists, and there have been for the past 80 years. People across the political spectrum, academics, and the news media use the term in relation to contemporary politics. If you are using a definition that stopped being relevant 80 years ago, it will be hard for you to have a coherent discussion with people today.
- fcklckdwns 5y ago
  The "American leftism" that promotes universal healthcare and reining in Wall Street is shared by a large chunk of the population of Western nations. The "American leftism" that promotes changing the genitals of 3-year-old children is completely alien to 99.99% of human experience throughout time and space. Hope that clarifies it.
  - jayd16 5y ago
    Er, hmm, circumcision is very common. Maybe you mean something else?
    - onlyrealcuzzo 5y ago
      My understanding is that the far left is anti-circumcision.
      - zapzupnz 5y ago
        More to do with anti-unnecessary-medical-procedures-with-no-benefit-yet-lifelong-consequences-performed-on-infants-without-consent. It’s a question of body autonomy rather than circumcision as a practice unto itself; obviously, it’s medically necessary for many people later in life. My understanding is circumcision is just seen as the ‘done thing’ in the US whereas it’s not as common elsewhere. Certainly not as common in New Zealand.
  - smt88 5y ago
    > The "American leftism" that promotes changing the genitals of 3-year-old children is completely alien to 99.99% of human experience throughout time and space. This is utter nonsense and fear-mongering. There is no organized movement promoting changing genitals of 3-year-olds.
    - zepto 5y ago
      Not 3 year olds perhaps, but there is definitely an organized movement to promote early gender affirmation surgery.
- deleted 5y ago
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- jim-jim-jim 5y ago
  Somebody can correct me if my timeline is off, but I think Lemmy was largely embraced by exiled Chapos, much like Voat became a Groyper den. I don't think it's even worth considering such a community left-wing. They're more like an anime poisoned grooming circle that embraced red aesthetics for shock value. However pathetic that sounds though, I'm the bigger loser for even being familiar with this nonsense.
  - sudosysgen 5y ago
    No, you're thinking of Hexbear. Chapos didn't go to Lemmygrad.
  - SerLava 5y ago
    Sure I'll bite, none of what you said is true, in either timing or circumstances. -They didn't go to Lemmygrad -No definition of leftism would exclude the very leftist people who went over to Hexbear, the Lemmy instance for exiled r/Chapotraphouse posters -they don't seem to be particularly into anime -they are very into left politics, socialism, trade unionism, anti-imperialism, and so on. So like they are left-wing
- lmm 5y ago
  I'm not the person you replied to, but today's American leftism practically mandates a belief in blank-slatism on race, gender, and IQ, to an extent that’s inimical to sincere science in those areas. And that ends up having a wide impact on science generally and policy generally.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - iszomer 5y ago
    "I don't want to be a product of my environment, I want the environment to be a product of me." ^So that's where this quote came from, TIL.. https://quillette.com/2017/01/12/the-blank-slateism-of-the-right/ https://quillette.com/2017/01/12/the-blank-slateism-of-the-r...
  - SerLava 5y ago
    Oh they don't like it when you repeatedly point out your favorite very sincere scientific facts collected by sincere scientists with the best calipers?
- pugets 5y ago
  Modern American leftism, at least on social media, is really weird. You have a lot of these so-called leftists rebelling against the philosophies of Marx and other communist philosophers on very fundamental issues (e.g. gun ownership for the proletariat, or the freedom of speech) all because of the current political climate in America. At the same time, these people will support and protect Big Tech and other capitalist interests when it is politically convenient to do so. I've heard American leftism once jokingly called Socialism with Silicon Valley Characteristics. Ask any one of these new-age leftists what they think of Alex Jones' YouTube channel being banned, and they will hit you with a response that would disturb any of the Gen X leftists who grew up in an era where Communist was a dirty word and the protection of free speech was a top-most necessity. New-age leftists have grown up in the left-sympathetic social media era and cannot conceptualize the pendulum ever swinging the opposite direction.
  - jim-jim-jim 5y ago
    In practice I think mainstream liberals are the gleefully censorious ones, not leftists. In a sibling comment I called these guys losers, but you can't argue that they're not walking the walk by setting up their own platforms. The people in these alt communities have been kicked off Reddit for rightfully pointing out how astroturfed it is by advertisers, police, and military agencies, so I'm not sure if you'd find much love for big tech among their ranks. Setting up your own community with specific standards is totally fine imo.
    - Saptarishi 5y ago
      >Setting up your community with specific standards is totally fine imo In some sense I agree, but what happens when these communities begin to overflow with people, and chaos increases? It leads to opinion suppression( no I'm not talking about extreme opinions on any side of the political spectrum , I'm talking about opinions which differ from the status quo ), echo-chamber creation, and worst of all, unnecessary aggressive behaviour and mud slinging.
      - uabstraction 5y ago
- the_third_wave 5y ago
  The American left manages to combine the worst of the traditional far left - authoritarianism, enforced collectivism, a total lack of ideological flexibility combined with an as total lack of historical insight - with a willingness, nay eagerness to use non-state commercial actors to enforce their doctrine. It is as if they read Ayn Rand and decided that she got everything backwards so they made their own philosophy of Subjectivism, with a sprinkling of critical theory and a dash of Maoism.
- deleted 5y ago
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ddingus 5y ago
So join them. I do not mean ideologically. Just in conversation. More of us learning to talk with one another better is a really good thing. The American idea of leftism varies widely, and on all axis too. A similar thing can be found in the right. Both have populist factions that have a lot in common. Many identify as indie too. They lack a solid party home. Both have moderate and conservative factions too. Authoritarianism is also on the rise generally. All of this can be disturbing. I find the economic policy that way right now myself. Labor seems to be organizing though. Others see that as disturbing! What I know, having had a ton of conversations in various venues around the nation is the body politic is far more complex. Everyone is listening to some loud or compelling voices and not talking with one another near enough to garner a better sense of where people are at and how policy might make a whole lot better sense. It does not have to be disturbing. Shouldn't in my view.
- LAC-Tech 5y ago
  > I do not mean ideologically. Just in conversation. More of us learning to talk with one another better is a really good thing. The vast majority of people do not want to have that conversation (hence the flagged post of the grandparent).
  - ddingus 5y ago
    Why? I find the answer in most cases is worries over personal judgement. More of us quit doing that and more people will have that conversation. I usually lead with, "ignore the talking heads on TV." Worked wonders for me. I enjoy politics and culture again as do others I talk to. The other basic worry is inability to manage a conversation coupled with the idea of ideology being the means to better ends rather than the reasoning tool it really is. A person who maintains one ideology, sans a working understanding of others, will feel threatened when its merit is challenged. Fact is we have many solutions to the problems we face with no requirement they all conform to a single ideological frame.
- unraveller 5y ago
  The creators say they don't want people not of their ilk joining so this idea that open debate is welcome is disingenuous. They don't allow anyone to federate with the main instance either if they don't also toe the political line.
dflock 5y ago
So? Early reddit was also quite left-ish.
- onionisafruit 5y ago
  Early reddit seemed more libertarian to me. They couldn’t get enough of Ron Paul. I’m not a libertarian, but I kind of miss those days on reddit.
guerrilla 5y ago
You mean lemmy.ml? All I see is a bunch of science, privacy and climate stuff right now.
- fulafel 5y ago
  Sounds like themes counter to the american right.
s5300 5y ago
Hmm... disturbing? The United States leftism leans heavily to the contemporary idea of all other developed western nations rightism... so are we to be seen as a bit disturbing by the rest of our nation peers? (hint, they mostly seem to :D )
- darthrupert 5y ago
  I'm an european center/leftist and I have no idea what you're talking about.
  - s5300 5y ago
    Im saying that the current state of our (US) moderate left is effectively most other places moderate right. Our far left is most other places moderate left. Do you not see this to be true? Our far right is just full blown fascist/Christofacist now. We have $10,000 bounties on the heads of those assisting in seeking medical care in one of our largest states now.
swiley 5y ago
So does Reddit heh.
ggm 5y ago
Society as a whole, consistently tends to be more left wing than people appreciate. If you survey people in private, they show both selfish and collectivist opinions. In public, in some economies, declaring the collectivist view is harder. Collectivism, is essentially "left wing". It's the sense there is some basic equity out there, nobody "deserves" more (or less) than the individual. (obviously this is modulated by reality, economic and political) I like to believe 'we' are in a real majority. The point is the same, even if this isn't true: It's not some mythic 50/50 world, and there is no phantom "equity" out there which is a "balance" between libertarian-right, centerist and left views. Apes, penguins, take your pick. Collectivism is out there. Its a basic model. I'd call it "herd mentality" but that tends to have negative connotations. Sure, there are apex elements in collectivism. It doesn't undermine the main thesis: There is more collectivism, essential left-wing thinking, than a lot of people credit. In the US, because of individualism, this is often ignored. The belief "most" people in the US simply want to a) be left alone to b) sink or swim on their own and c) pay less taxes is a bit distorted. Really? They just want c).
- zepto 5y ago
  The fact that humans are social is not relevant to whether a leftist political ideology should impose its preferred social structures by force. Capitalism allows people to organize collectively too. Proponents would claim that it enables more freedom to do so than ‘leftism’.
kieselguhr_kid 5y ago
I mean, there is a large (by Lemmy standards) Leninist server, which is indeed pretty left. But the idea that Leninism is widely embraced by the contemporary American left is a bit hysterical.
- zepto 5y ago
  Leninism may not be by but Maoism was explicitly adopted by parts of the radical left in the 70s, many of whom are still influential for the current generation.
unbad505 5y ago
FWIF lemmy.ml isn't meant to be the default, but it is still run by the devs.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

radicalriddler 5y ago

I would define myself as pretty progressive, but Reddit's been absolutely dog** due to all the anti-capitalist, populist rhetoric. Every post seems to be filled with comments these days of "eat the rich". Like, you'll have a gif of a dude petting a dog, and then in the comments, they'll be like, "Bro, you're financially oppressing this dog and that's why it's forced to be pet by you" (Hyperbole, but I've seen some crazy stuff). I just wish, we could have a platform that was; not necessarily politically neutral, but where it didn't consume so much of the site. Unfortunately when I visit Lemmy, I'm fronted with a lemmygrad.ml, and a "leftist" privacy focused one, which seem to be the only populated instances at the moment. So it doesn't inspire much hope.

Saptarishi 5y ago
I pin the blame on too many users joining due to the mass popularisation of Reddit by YouTubers. At one point, almost every "popular" YouTuber seemed to have these "subReddit review" videos going on, which inevitably created a large boom in Reddits user base (it grew exponentially in the last 2-3 years). Suddenly Reddit went from being focused on fun/discussion/discovery/curiosity to mass populism and extreme echo-chamberism . The curious folks who originally were the soul of reddit were lost in the noise of "common" people barging in.
Apocalypsenear 5y ago
Which is why Lemmy needs more users to promote diversity and mainstream usage. Right now its filled with leftists mostly because they get banned from sites like reddit. The thing I enjoy about Lemmy is that you can join an instance and if you don't agree with the policies and the people there you can join a different instance.
- account42 5y ago
  https://github.com/innereq/lenny#the-lemmy-problem https://github.com/innereq/lenny#the-lemmy-problem Having more users isn't going to help if the core developers are anti-diversity.
  - 5y ago

riffic 5y ago

Lemmy implements the ActivityPub protocol, a W3C recommendation.

rapnie 5y ago
Here is some more documentation on that. It is a bit outdated, and the latest release of Lemmy brought a lot of extensions and improvements to the federation code. https://join-lemmy.org/docs/en/federation/overview.html https://join-lemmy.org/docs/en/federation/overview.html

nicbou 5y ago

My options are "Run a server" and "Join a server" This is not an alternative to reddit, where you would see a front page with content on it.

detaro 5y ago
And if someone posted a link to a page about the reddit software (which isn't open-source anymore, but was for a long time), you'd also say "this isn't reddit", because the descriptive page doesn't show a front page, but you need to actually go to somewhere the software is installed to see it? That's two clicks!
- HexbearShill 5y ago
  Way two many clicks
rektide 5y ago
you're right: it's better.
skohan 5y ago
I agree, for something like this to take off, you need someone to invest heavily up front in creating a user experience which is worth using - which means content. The tech is the easy part, you need to have a place that is worth going before the tech will be utilized.
rapnie 5y ago
Run a server / join a server is just your first setup step. After that you join Communities and while these can exist on any other server that yours is federating with (Lemmy has an allowlist for this), you interact with them from your own account on your own chosen server. The federation stuff is now mostly hidden to you, and the default filtered timeline shows stuff from you subscribed communities.
kixiQu 5y ago
Right, that's https://lemmy.ml https://lemmy.ml

peakaboo 5y ago

People who don't see why platforms like these are critically important has never had an opinion that isn't allowed on the major tech platforms.

enumjorge 5y ago
By and large what “isn’t allowed” on major tech platforms is racist, xenophobic, and homophobic content. You can still find a lot of non-PC, fringe content on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and Reddit. I get that censorship in major tech platforms is problematic, but the sense of martyrdom in comments like yours feels a little overwrought.
- guerrilla 5y ago
  Nope. https://crimethinc.com/2020/08/19/on-facebook-banning-pages-that-support-crimethinccom-and-the-digital-censorship-to-come https://crimethinc.com/2020/08/19/on-facebook-banning-pages-... And now we've moved on to "misinformation" which has no real definition other than being mitigated by so-called fact checkers who mostly work for American for-profit newspapers.
  - reginold 5y ago
    First slow, then all of a sudden. Seems like the move to decentralized platforms may come quickly. I wonder what the precipitating event will be. Any speculation?
- reginold 5y ago
  What would you say if you were truly anonymous?
  - Barrin92 5y ago
    nothing I wouldn't say when I'm not. Are you under the impression everyone is secretly homophobic or throws the n-word around when nobody can see them? If I'd be too ashamed to say something if my name is attached to it I wouldn't say it when it isn't. you need to be far gone to manage to get yourself kicked off Facebook.

pvg 5y ago

Previously: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28453165 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28453165 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23664067 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23664067 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19686972 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19686972

commoner 5y ago

FediTips, a Mastodon account, recently shared some concerns about the Uyghur-related content in the largest Lemmy instance, which is run by Lemmy's developers: https://mstdn.social/@feditips/106835057054633379 https://mstdn.social/@feditips/106835057054633379 This created a firestorm on Lemmy, on which it was noted that Lemmy removes conservative and libertarian communities with the reason "No conservative communities": > Removed Community conservatives reason: No conservative communities > Removed Community Libertarian, in the pursuit of a free society reason: No conservative communities allowed https://lemmy.ml/post/78808 https://lemmy.ml/post/78808 https://lemmy.ml/modlog https://lemmy.ml/modlog Perhaps the underlying software is fine, but the largest Lemmy instance is not exactly the friendliest to anyone who wants to express themselves more freely than they are allowed to on mainstream social networks.

Krasnol 5y ago
But you can even host your own instance with all the "conservative" communities you want. Why not do that? I mean, you must be aware by now that those "conservatives" did ruin a couple of actually good communities in the last years (especially in the reddit clone scene) and some people just don't want to deal with those people at all. And they shouldn't have to.
- dfdub10 5y ago
  Why is it that people keep saying ignorant racist trash and then cry about cancel culture and how it’s all the media’s fault. The fact you think people along you out for being disrespectful is everyone but your own fault. And quit blaming the media, if they are such a problem stop watching. Or continue to spend your days watching the elitist con men on your favorite channel and praise an opinion host like a god. You’ve likely broken every law from your magic book and still think your better than every person that can think for themselves instead of being sheep following their masters every word.
  - Saptarishi 5y ago
    The problem arises when people dont actually say "ignorant racist trash" but have a genuine point of discussion(albeit controversial), but are painted with the same brush as real racists and bigots. Resorting to subversive vulgarity is not a good idea.

prashantsengar 5y ago

I have to say that it does seem to be pretty good unlike many other federated alternatives to poplar social media platforms. Pretty good means switching to it will not be too tough for Reddit users since most of the users (anecdata) preferred the older UI to which it is very similar and is easier to use on mobile.

unraveller 5y ago

The front-end is still buggy and needs a designer's touch. And the real-time aspects wear thin at scale with all the notifications in a mismatch of languages showing up in the main feed. Lemmy is practically unusable without a personal feed filter, it seems that of the new reddit alternatives only retalk_[1] want to get this right. If you do decide to run an instance of lemmy be sure to nuke the absurd word filter - the code is designed to make it as difficult as possible to change out. Thankfully some nice souls [2] are maintaining that anti-feature removal. [1] https://retalk.com https://retalk.com [2] https://github.com/innereq/lenny https://github.com/innereq/lenny

reginold 5y ago
How strange they would include word filters that are hard to edit. Seems counter to their whole mission...what? Edit: actually it would make sense if word filters themselves were hard to add. But having their own filter and making that hard to edit is bonkers.
- deleted 5y ago
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- bbarnett 5y ago
  Reading the whole bug, it's literally a political stance with no teeth or real purpose. It's bizarrely all for show, serves no real purpose, is functionally deficient, and the DEVs know this. Further, a 10 line script could easily patch each new version, replacing the hardcoded code with a loadable text file. Done. Updates would take zero time to deploy. It's all about taking a position. Taking a position is fine. But, imagine a self driving car which wouldn't let you drive home to Cuntsington, MA (an example)? The DEVs think this logic is fine? Strange people.
  - reginold 5y ago
    Super strange. One of those artifacts that makes you question the whole project. One of the powers of diving in super deep is you can start to notice internal consistency or dissonance quicker. With this as an example.

xhrpost 5y ago

At quick glance the communities look very sperate. In my ideal federated dream, most servers would subscribe to most other servers and thus you could see your posts on several of them. Is that the intention here?

potamic 5y ago

Could someone ELI5 how the federation model works in practice? From the understanding, there is one entity that owns the core technology but the operators of the servers are distributed and independent. How do they typically manage things like scale, data growth, security, monetisation etc.? Is the experience likely to vary a bit across the operators? And how do users trust which operators then want to join?

CaptArmchair 5y ago
> one entity that owns the core technology Correct. Ownership is governed through intellectual property laws, the type of license used, agreements and so on. Lemmy's code is released under a GNU Affero license, and so ownership and usage are governed under this license. Large open source projects tend to set up legal entities (foundations, non-profits) which manage their brand, trademark, intellectual property rights and so on. > but the operators of the servers are distributed and independent. In the era of classic web forums, you would download a copy of vbulletion, phpbb,... operators would download a copy of the software and set up their own intance(s) on their own server(s). The federated model operates the same way. The distinction, though, is that all these instances are interconnected. They can communicate with each other. In the federated model, you have an account on server A, but you can use that account to subscribe and see content of and participate on server B. > How do they typically manage things like scale, data growth, security, monetisation etc.? Each to their own. Operators work independently. The operator of instance A is entire responsible for their own setup regardless of what happens at instance B. Operators get to set the rules on their own instance as to moderation, monetization, topics, community growth, etc. etc. Since servers are interconnected, each instance can use an allowlist to determine which other instances, and their users, are allowed to connect and participate. As an operator, you get to decide that users of B can connect with your server, but users of C aren't allowed. > Is the experience likely to vary a bit across the operators? Communities are groups of people. Just like in real life, a community establishes its own culture, its own identity, its own way of communicating. So, yes, the experience can vary across the board depending on who's active on your instance. Functionally speaking, all Lemmy instances operate the same way. You have communities, comment threads, voting, posting, etc. Barring configuration differences, as a user, the experience is quite similar across servers. > And how do users trust which operators then want to join? The same way you'd trust your ISP, your bank, the garage that services your car, etc. You read reviews, you try to gauge sentiment, number of users, etc. etc. Mastodon - a Twitter clone - uses the exact same federation protocols as Lemmy. Mastodon has an order of magnitude more users across its instances. A big feature in Mastodon is the ability to just move your account from one instance to another instance. A thing Lemmy doesn't seem to have at the moment: https://lemmy.eus/post/8181/comment/31995 https://lemmy.eus/post/8181/comment/31995 https://docs.joinmastodon.org/user/moving/ https://docs.joinmastodon.org/user/moving/

spoonjim 5y ago

What are examples of things designed in the last 20 years that are federated and usable?

unicornporn 5y ago
Matrix, Mastodon and PeerTube.
- spoonjim 5y ago
  Is Mastodon federated in practice? I’m a member of several but they are all independent.
  - tadzik_ 5y ago
    Independent as in: closed off? Servers that don't federate are extremely rare ime, except for the likes of Gab that most people just choose not to federate with.
    - numpad0 5y ago
      Remote follow don’t work as good as hardcore users would like it to. Federation mechanisms would have to have kilo- to mega-posts/second bandwidth but not happening. Also that federation choice being in hand of instance owners makes an account on each instances a must. You are going to have a person or two that your instance owners don’t like, or instance or two that don’t like yours.
      - tadzik_ 5y ago
        Curious – I run my own pleroma instance for myself on a tiny VPS and I'm seeing no problems at all, with remote follows or any other interactions.
  - unbad505 5y ago
    I follow many people from different instances all on one account

twelvechairs 5y ago

What happens with moderation of unethical subs? The docs say "each instance has a set of administrator Users, who have the power to do site-wide removals and bans." So does that mean someone can start an instance for (as examples) covid deniers or white supremacists and reject any request to ban them? Or is there broader community input? What happens if I run an instance and these subs become popular - am I going to be liable legally for their use or will a broader community be able to input into their moderation?

fractalf 5y ago
Think of these federated instances as a good 'ol forum. Same rules applies
null0pointer 5y ago
My understanding of how federated social networks work is that a server operator can firstly moderate the content on their own server as they see fit, and secondly blacklist other servers from syncing data with their own if they don’t approve of the content it hosts.

asymptosis 5y ago

I'm intrigued by this. However -- and this is probably a cultural thing with me being an old-timey unix guy who likes to build things from scratch -- I have a point of confusion. If you choose Run A Server, it suggests two main options: Ansible or Docker. It specifically warns against "from scratch". When I'm developing software, I want people to be building it from scratch. If someone likes something I made enough that they want to take it and build a docker or ansible thing out of it ... okay, that's flattering, albeit a little confusing, and it's not my default. And I probably wouldn't agree to support those third-party ansible/docker things which someone else felt the need to create. What happened to rolling a versioned tarball that you can chuck in opt or wherever and point nginx at it? Eg, if I knew I could pull in versions of lemmy server through my package manager, I'd be totally trying it out as my side-project this weekend.

codetrotter 5y ago
From a cursory look running the backend is close to as simple as installing libpq and then cargo build --release and then creating the PostgreSQL user and database, and editing a config file then running the lemmy binary. I don’t see a problem. Serving the frontend cannot be a challenge either I imagine but I didn’t bother looking at the frontend.
- asymptosis 5y ago
  Thanks for the pointer. I guess I was more thinking about the culture involved in explicitly denouncing a from-source build. Sorry if that wasn't clear.
  - tasuki 5y ago
    I suppose the Ansible and Docker versions are both built from the source, in a reproducible manner. What would you gain by going through the build steps manually by yourself? From my point of view, having to build things is a hassle: one needs the dependencies, it will work differently on different OSes/distros, the maintainer needs to keep the build instructions up-to-date and verify manually that they won't break (for all OSes/distros). Ansible or Docker just gives you a reproducible thing, easier to verify in one step whether the build instructions in it still work.

echelon 5y ago

Federated Reddit and federated toots and all that shit are just too obtuse and like the old regime. It's too hard to set up and run your own node, and joining an existing one is just like joining Reddit or Facebook. The optimal way to distribute social news: bittorrent-style P2P swarms. People copy and paste news articles with photos (maybe this is piracy?) and share them as files with known hashes. The swarm pulls down all the articles for you to read locally without ads or scripts. No HTML and script garbage. Beautiful plaintext with minimal markdown-style markup. A core group of 5 or so people alone can probably scrape what's valuable of the old web on a daily basis, rendering the need for the web moot. The web is going away anyway with the social media giants. We should just own the method of distribution instead of having it locked away in Medium and AMP. User identities in the system are PGP signed, but can be effectively anonymous. You follow people that you upvote frequently, and articles they upvote are given higher priority in your feed. You share your voting with others to create rich filters. If the system detects noise, you know where in the graph it comes from and can nuke it. It'll take time to build a reputation, so people won't risk it. You can layer comments on top and distribute them the same way. Content is ephemeral as you want and decays naturally if nobody keeps or seeds it. Some archive team might want to keep stuff, but nobody else has to go to the trouble of maintaining infrastructure to do so. No spam. No ads. No VC-funded growth engines that require your phone or a mobile app. Just a solid protocol and beautiful reading and authoring client. The protocol should include a plaintext legal preamble / poison pill that prevents companies from ever trying to coopt it: BEGIN. BY EMITTING THIS PROTOCOL, WE OFFER SHARES EQUIVALENT OF 1% OF OUR COMPANY ON A DAILY BASIS TO ANYONE WHO CONNECTS TO THIS CLIENT. Or something to make "embrace and extend" impossible by forcing companies into an impossible legal contract.

numpad0 5y ago
Did you seriously just reinvent Winny there!?

debdut 5y ago

I liked it but then I went to the Server's page and saw it's filled with Communist symbols, got terrified and closed it :(

spzb 5y ago
And then this comment got posted on the Lemmy site and the circle was completed https://lemmygrad.ml/post/33925 https://lemmygrad.ml/post/33925
carbolymer 5y ago
yeah, you should go with lenny then: https://github.com/innereq/lenny https://github.com/innereq/lenny

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

betwixthewires 5y ago

Lemmy development is coming along great, but there are some things I think don't make a lot of sense on a federated network. 1) at the very least there should be an option to run it as a single community, not multiple communities. Federation means you can have multiple communities, each on their own server, the whole user created multi community paradigm makes sense on centralized services like reddit. Added bonus, you remove site administration and have only moderation, removing bureaucratic layers is good. 2) subscriptions on federated services should ideally be handled client side. If I want to subscribe to a community feed, needing to log in doesn't make sense when a community I follow might not be on my home server. I should only need authentication to interact.