this post was submitted on 30 Jun 2023
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Lemmy

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Everything about Lemmy; bugs, gripes, praises, and advocacy.

For discussion about the lemmy.ml instance, go to !meta@lemmy.ml.

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Sad to see almost none of the devs, from
Apollor (ChristianSelig), RIF (u/talklittle), Infinity (u/Hostilenemy),
Boost (rmayayo), BaconReader, to Relay (u/DBrady), etc. are not considering Lemmy at all.

I know these were hobbies but by atleast developing it for some time just to make transition for your audience to Lemmy easier would have gone a long way!

@lemmy @LemmyDev Lemmy will remain a niche platform if not enough people switch to it

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[–] li10@feddit.uk 74 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I really don’t think they owe people a Lemmy App. Hell, this platform might even be dead in a couple of months.

Lots of people are making Lemmy apps, so there’s no real need for them to make one as well. The entire platform is a work in progress and there are a number of apps available, so just be patient and eventually they’ll be refined and ready.

[–] maard@lemmygrad.ml 21 points 1 year ago (2 children)

This platform might even be dead in a couple of months

It's been there for a couple of years, it'll be fine lol

[–] li10@feddit.uk 9 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I’m talking about amount of activity, it’s not exactly bustling right now so I imagine it was pretty damn quiet before the Reddit situation.

There’s no problem with that, but why would any of the Reddit app developers devote their time to Lemmy if it’s not going to catch on.

[–] RoundSparrow@lemmy.ml 5 points 1 year ago

I agree, there are communities here that had postings from 3 years ago as the most recent, topics like YouTube. The largest Lemmy database has only 1 million comments in total (Lemmy.ml) for all of history.

[–] maard@lemmygrad.ml 3 points 1 year ago

I agree, i don't think there's any point in having them make another client, the few that are already available are plenty good. More choice doesn't hurt but i won't be angry at them for not making a lemmy 3rd party app.

[–] HobbitFoot@thelemmy.club 7 points 1 year ago

Lemmy needs to do a lot to handle a fraction the traffic that Reddit does. The system worked because it wasn't being stressed by user demand.

[–] ddnomad@infosec.pub 13 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (4 children)

We are one centralised and pretty Reddit alternative away from people flocking to it.

As swanky as it sounds, I doubt fediverse with all its quirks, bugs, instability, confusion etc. will be able to sustain or even gain mass adoption.

I want this to be false, but we have Mastodon as an example and it ain’t getting the traction it needs to replace or even properly compete with Twitter. Especially not once BlueSky opens up, assuming it will happen.

[–] wernsting@lemm.ee 15 points 1 year ago (4 children)

What makes you say Mastodon isn’t getting any traction? To me https://mastodon-analytics.com tells a different story.

I agree a well thought out centralised Reddit alternative could swoop in, but I’m in no hurry to look at anything other than Fediverse alternatives. I see no compelling reason to.

The active user chart on that site shows a spike after Twitter was sold and then a 50% decline and a flat line after.

It's not bad, but doesn't seem to be growing.

[–] ddnomad@infosec.pub 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Judging by user count alone is deceiving, in my opinion. We need to look at how many “big Twitter personas / companies” are moving to Mastodon, because they are the ones generating content and increasing traction.

As it is right now, I only see some people creating Mastodon accounts and posting 1:1 with what they still post on Twitter. This is not enough.

But at the same time, all migrations take time and we will only be able to determine a “winner” after months if not years of this process taking place.

I’m crossing my fingers and hoping for the best still.

[–] Izzy@lemmy.world 8 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Big twitter personas and companies is the enshittification that is trying to be avoided. The less of that and the more of regular people the better.

Why exactly would anyone want companies to advertise to them? This seems like only a bad thing to me.

Quadrupling the daily active user to 1.1-1.2M is so far so good. I don't know how different your story is but that is barely 0.5% that of Twitter still.

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[–] TheRaven@lemmy.ca 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Mastodon requires the people I want to hear from to migrate. If Person X still uses Twitter, I have to use Twitter to hear from them.

Lemmy is different. All we need is enough active users to generate interesting content. We also don’t need it to gain mass adoption. We just need adoption large enough to create interesting content. That means we don’t need to grow 5000x to meet Reddit numbers. We just need to grow X to be great.

[–] OtakuAltair@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

Yup. This just needs needs enough people, doesn't matter much who, to post and repost interesting content like people do on Reddit. There's no fanbase or content creators here to worry about like on YouTube or Twitter

The ux is already about to be better than reddit in a few weeks (kinda already is with wefwef) too. More people will come as they realize it has the same content with better ux

[–] sam@lemmy.ca 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I think having 100M+ users as a goal is unsustainable and unrealistic. I'm quite happy with where we're at, and optimistic about where we're going. If growth in the fediverse continues, we'll be ok.

My feed on Mastodon already moves quicker than I could ever keep up with.

[–] ddnomad@infosec.pub 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I just hope we won’t end up having what used to be Reddit (or Twitter) fragmented across 10 different platforms. That would definitely suck :/

I still argue that the pre-reddit/digg days where different communities had there own forums and sites was healthier and more diverse.

Homogeneous != Better

The fediverse is a nice middle ground. You can still have diverse communities but, for the most part, interact with them through one pane of glass.

[–] can@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 year ago

With apps it's not too bad. Liftoff already makes it fairly seemless (not perfect, but it's still in early development)

[–] ImplyingImplications@lemmy.ca 4 points 1 year ago

I doubt fediverse with all its quirks, bugs, instability, confusion etc. will be able to sustain or even gain mass adoption.

I think the same. I was with the first wave that jumped over during the Reddit blackout earlier in June and questions like

"Which instance is the best one?"

"Why is there a /c/gaming on lemmy.world and a /c/gaming on lemmy.ml? Which is the best one? Shouldn't they be centralized?"

"How do I search every instance in existence? What do you mean some instances don't talk to other instances??"

I get the feeling most users want a centralized and highly managed stream of content and don't care for content on a network of small, individually managed, forums

[–] ictinus@lemmy.world 32 points 1 year ago
[–] animist@lemmy.one 13 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Unpopular opinion: I hope lemmy remains niche. Mainstream social media brings mainstream bullshit with it (trolls, nazis, low effort posters, bots, attempts at monetization leading to enshittification). People who are wanting a reddit clone, you're in luck, reddit still exists

[–] fuser@quex.cc 13 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

we aren't "competing". We aren't shilling for an IPO. We aren't trying to emulate commercial social media. We don't need 20% annual growth - or even significantly more users. We just need civil discussion forums without vitriol being deliberately injected to maximize ad impressions. We are not the product.

[–] abcxyz@mastodon.social 0 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

@animist Twitter is mainstream. Instagram is mainstream.

Reddit was nowhere as mainstream as you might think. Outside of US.

It had a nice balance between being niche but having enough content.

Atleast that's what I feel

[–] animist@lemmy.one 3 points 1 year ago

On the spectrum of niche to mainstream, reddit is a lot closer to Twitter than it is to Lemmy

[–] wernsting@lemm.ee 13 points 1 year ago (1 children)

How do you know they’re not considering it at all?

Reddit just pulled the rug out from under them, give them some time at least to come to terms with that and decide what’s best for them. They certainly weren’t hobbies, look at Christian’s (Apollo) posts on the debacle and you get a sense of the scale of what he built.

I’m hoping Christian makes a Lemmy compatible app (I’d subscribe in an instance like I have been for Apollo) like the developers of Tweetbot did for Mastodon but they have to do what is right for them in the first instance!

[–] zekiz@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago

Well Doctile Alligator is trying to implement a subscription model. Of cause you can also compile it yourself with your own API key since it keeps being Open Source

[–] JshKlsn@lemmy.ml 10 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Development is hard. I wouldn't be surprised if they are waiting to see if Lemmy sticks before spending time.

Also they need to make a living some how. I'm sure implementing ads into a Lemmy app right now wouldn't go over well.

It's better for them to dust their resume off, update it, and attempt to get a new job before dabbling into making a free app with no revenue streams.

[–] abcxyz@mastodon.social 1 points 1 year ago

@JshKlsn You are talking about a chicken and egg problem here.

When these devs with millions of users promote Lemmy, is when Lemmy will thrive bringing in even more incentive to build great apps for them

[–] abcxyz@mastodon.social 1 points 1 year ago

@JshKlsn most FOSS Reddit were side projects not intended to bring in money. Atleast those I was hoping would try to promote Lemmy.

RedReader and Sync are 2 clients who have said something positive about developing for Lemmy

[–] OtakuAltair@vlemmy.net 7 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Sync for Lemmy coming out in a few weeks is already huge imo.

It was my favourite reddit client; amazing to see it coming to Lemmy.

Also, wefwef.app is starting to feel alot like Apollo already.

[–] Tester@lemmy-test.223308.xyz 1 points 1 year ago

I just hope I find a way to be notified once it is released. I'm sure excited for it.

[–] NoTime@lemmy.one 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

There are some fantastic apps being made right now though. For android I am following development for:

Connect

Jerboa

Liftoff

Thunder

Connect is only on Google Play, but the bottom 3 I keep updated using the Obtainium app which grabs the releases from GitHub (gets updates faster then waiting for Google Play).

[–] can@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 year ago

Thank you for letting me know about obtanium.

[–] TwinTurbo@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

If you're on iOS, some great options are (in no particular order):

  • Memmy
  • Mlem
  • Liftoff
[–] grldaeg@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I would also add wefwef to the list. Don’t be put off by the name. To me it’s the most Apollo like.

[–] Toxinflora@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] grldaeg@lemmy.world 6 points 1 year ago

That is correct. But you can add it to your homescreen and then it behaves pretty much like a native app.

[–] AbidingOhmsLaw@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I would say give them a minute, month, year. They all just had a major ongoing project conclude in an unwanted way and they all deserve a break. Then in a few months or years maybe. Also, I don’t know the APIs for either platform but I would guess they are quite different so it might be starting over. As for Lemmy, I’m new to the platform but have been watching it for a while and reddit just gave me the nudge. Sure there will be a bunch of fair weather users that will go back to reddit once things die down, but they where not here before and Lemmy will be fine once they leave. Lemmy is such a breath of fresh air from the toxic nature of reddit and I just hope the Lemmy-for-a-day crowed can behave themselves for the period they are here.

[–] ophy@lemmy.nz 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Not to sound rude, but did you do any research before naming all of these? Boost developer is developing a Lemmy app, you can find it on the Play store already. Sync developer is also developing a Lemmy app.

[–] abcxyz@mastodon.social 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

@ophy thanks for not being rude about it.

I did mention Sync. Mastodon has word limits after all so couldnt fit all in 1 post. Here's my post right after this one- https://mastodon.social/@abcxyz/110632697269529190

As for Boost, that was announced a few days AFTER my post. Yes I didnt edit it because there was the word limit and I also like to believe my post played some part in making the devs consider ;)

There is a reason why I used the word "ALMOST". All my posts are heavily researched :D

[–] ophy@lemmy.nz 1 points 1 year ago

Ah, apologies! I'm still not yet in the habit of checking post dates on Lemmy! But wow, it feels like it's been more than 10 days since all that happened!

Of the ones that have been announced so far, which app in development are you most excited for?

[–] Wander@yiffit.net 3 points 1 year ago

Boost for lemmy was just announced.

[–] R1x38rexrper@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 year ago

Check out http://wefwef.app. It’s an excellent Apollo clone. We don’t need these devs. Others are stepping up.

[–] rjc@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

To not the most popular choices, Boost and Relay were tied for first place in my opinion. (And I tried nearly all the Android apps)

While their devs owe us nothing, I sure hope future lemmy apps can borrow some of their awesomeness.

[–] shorty@feddit.de 2 points 1 year ago
[–] R1x38rexrper@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Check out http://wefwef.app. It’s an excellent Apollo clone. We don’t need these devs. Others are stepping up.

[–] abcxyz@mastodon.social 1 points 1 year ago

@R1x38rexrper its not about lack of apps. Its about switching over their millions of audience to Lemmy.

Apollo and RIF especially had lot of loyal fans who would have tried out Lemmy if these apps served as a nice gateway to the Lemmy platform

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