Asklemmy

• I have to scroll all the way down to comment
• I can't collapse comments
• I need an app :/

It's growing on me.

Overall it's going well, and experience from both browser and Jerboa is great, especially considering the lack of maturity and large influx. It's been amazing to see how quickly communities have shown up. A couple of weeks ago when I first heard about Lemmy and plans for Reddit subs going dark, I looked at Lemmy and walked away with a meh because of lack of content, and what was here was not my thing. However, throughout the day today I watched the number of communities grow like crazy, with new topical communities popping up every time I checked.

I do think lack of a centralized /c/ namespace makes things confusing for a lot of people, and will result in a lot of topical duplication between servers - even with federated access and searching. I get why lack of a centralized namespace is also a design feature, but it comes at a price, in my opinion, and it'll be interesting to see how it works itself out over time. Just an observation/opinion on my part.

Still a bit early to call it, but it's looking good!

It has a ton of potential. I really hope it takes off because even if it doesn't replace Reddit immediately it's good to have another place to communicate with others. I have a tech background so it was fairly easy to figure out. I think once folks get used to it that it will be no more difficult than other social media sites. Mobile users will probably have the hardest time adapting but who knows.

Once I added a few different instances it became much better! Content will come. But the best users from Reddit will migrate along with us!

I definitely do agree with the old school vibes, I wasn't really born in that era of the internet, but it really is giving me those vibes.

Overall though, I'm finding it pretty intuitive. Certainly better than other social medias. I've tried tumblr and Twitter, just can't get the hang of them yknow?

I definitely prefer reddits app ui though. But I might just be so used to it anything else just feels weird.

not great. reaching my feed or finding communities requires multiple clicks, like why is the local community selection the default in the community tab, it's just stupid. collapsing comments requires more mouse movement and clicking in a different location every comment because of name length, very dumb. communities are too small and not reliable news aggregators yet, not sure why we couldnt just have subreddits move their culture over and agree of a server, or at least set up bots with RSS feeds from news sites or popular stuff in the mean time. lacks customizability for visuals and usage in general. i'd like to have it autocollapse or autohide posts i've already seen, but now i just see the same threads from 2 days ago. user and community pictures in every post on my frontpage are visually noisy. and more and more issues. the devs definitely need help with creating a reasonable browing experience.

It seems that there's some missing middle-management link conversion that someone needs to release.

If someone makes a post saying (and I'm making up links here, don't click them) - there's a new reddit-equivalent community at https://lemmy.world/c/whatever come join! ....that's only telling us half the story.

So newbies click this link and oh they have to create a lemmy.world account? What about if they already created a lemmy.one account? Do they need multiple accounts? We know they don't, but they don't know that yet.

Even experienced users can't make use of that link at all, and this is the crux of the issue. Every link given out has to be some sort of !whatever@your.instance variant. And you have to manually search for that or manually enter it. It's 2023 and this renders your hyperlink unclickable and that much trickier to use.

On mobile I assume it's even harder, or even mobile-to-desktop or desktop-to-mobile.

There needs to be a one-click way to subscribe to communities using the instance you're logged into without all the back and forth.

here's a cohertly sound Answer.

1. What happens to the communities/comments/accounts if a Lemmy instance goes down? Do they just disappear?
   When a specific Lemmy instance goes down, local users won't access their accounts, communities, or comments until it's restored. The data seems to "disappear" but it's not lost if the instance comes back online. Content copies exist in other federated instances but the original data is tied to the creating instance. BTW, you can backup your toots, comments and anything else on your account on your current instance and start again

2. Can people on other instances use your username? Could others tell which is which in comments/posts?
   Yes, usernames are instance-specific, so the same username can be used across different instances. However, usernames include the instance, making identification clear. For instance, 'username@instance1' and 'username@instance2' indicate different users.

3. How can people afford to host an instance? Aren't there costs to hosting a server?
   Indeed, hosting an instance involves costs for server, bandwidth, and potentially maintenance. Individuals hosting instances usually cover these costs themselves or use donations or sponsorships.

4. Is there anything stopping corporate interests from hosting a Lemmy? I fear that these corporate instances will be the only ones that can handle large traffic and we're just back to Reddit.
   Theoretically, a corporation can host a Lemmy instance. But federated platforms like Lemmy ensure that no single instance controls the entire network. Even with a popular corporate instance, users can choose other instances or create their own, allowing diverse moderation policies and community norms.

5. Can an instance go from fully federated to partially without telling its users? How would they know?
   An instance changing its federation policy can impact the available content and the reach of users' posts. Although there's no built-in notification system for such changes, a responsible administrator should inform the community, potentially using the instance rules listed in the sidebar or other official communication channels. Users may notice a change if they stop seeing content from certain instances, or if their posts aren't visible on instances they used to federate with. Such a shift in federation policy could also alter the dynamics of moderation and community interaction on the instance. you can see what instances is blocked on /instances. and /modlog shows all moderations.

I miss more intuitive comment collapsing, I used it a lot to skip conversations faster than scrolling through them.

The whole federation thing is not intuitive for new folks. Although watching the lemmy.ml bubble is pretty funny.

I'm interested in reading more about Lenny's privacy and internal workings, ~~but this information is pretty hard to find.~~

Docs for anyone interested

I'm concerned about a reliable deletion mechanism Lemmy doesn't care about your privacy

Reddit thread of the same story

I'm also concerned by some posts which I hope are not true:

Lemmy's creator banned from r/socialism for posting neo nazi literature

Liking it a bunch! Chief complaint is how sometimes posting is instantaneous and sometimes it's a 45 second lag. Same with subscribing to communities. Seems to be the various *.ml communities.

Former Reddit user here. It's a bit confusing but I'm holding up. I'm glad I found Kbin as it seems pretty user friendly compared to the various Lemmy instances. I'm excited for the future of both networks, and look forward to getting my head around it all a little better.