this post was submitted on 26 Jun 2023
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Fediverse

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A community dedicated to fediverse news and discussion.

Fediverse is a portmanteau of "federation" and "universe".

Getting started on Fediverse;

founded 5 years ago
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Can we all stop the in-fighting for a minute and realise how awesome the platform we are on is?

We are forming communities on the realized image of the internet that we were told we would have back in the 80s and 90s.

You can make your own home on the web and have your own niche community, not owned by any corporation, while still being connected to the wider internet.

This feels like something out of a sci-fi movie.

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[–] [email protected] 76 points 2 years ago (6 children)
[–] [email protected] 44 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

I'm guessing they were referring to the defederation issues that came up.

[–] crazyminner 9 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Yeah mostly this. Also there seems to be some friction between the old guard and the Fledditors.

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[–] [email protected] 21 points 2 years ago

No you shut up!

[–] [email protected] 16 points 2 years ago

There isn't any, some people like to create drama where none exists

[–] [email protected] 16 points 2 years ago

I’m wondering the same

[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

🥊

You taking to me? Or chewing a brick???

'Coz you gonna lose your teeth eitherway.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 years ago

(ง'̀-'́)ง

[–] [email protected] 44 points 2 years ago (8 children)

That's why I like this place. Feels very old school somehow. And it's an actual protocol, like back before everything was the same handful of companies running everything with their own BS software.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 2 years ago

It really does feel a lot like the old forums are back, but now they can talk to each other. This should have happened a decade ago!

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 years ago (1 children)

To me it feels pretty much like reddit so far. Maybe I've just gotten very good at ignoring reddit's corporate bullshit though.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 years ago

At least every third post isn’t a flagrant ad poorly hidden as “this cool thing I discovered, you might find it cool too!”

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 years ago (1 children)

kinda reminds me of the old internet when no one knew wtf was going on and everyone was just doing weird shit for fun

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[–] [email protected] 38 points 2 years ago (3 children)

Not sure where you’re hanging out that you’re seeing infighting.

Also, I’ve been living in the Internet you describe since 1990. All it takes is intentionally saying no to the corporate offerings; there have been self-hosted and crowd-hosted communities the entire time.

Every once in a while I miss Fidonet though.

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[–] [email protected] 38 points 2 years ago (6 children)

This place is fantastic. I'm still working on convincing my husband that it's going to take the place of Reddit but I'll wear him down. He thinks because a lot of the posts only have a few comments and 20 or so up votes, it's not a valid community. I think it's just getting started and it's exciting to be here early.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 2 years ago (3 children)

I'm really enjoying the relative lack of content and what feels like an absence of astroturfing or bot content and votes. Way less dillholes and the interactions I see are generally meaningful and kind. I'm slowly building my subscription list of communities and can check in on top posts for the day in the morning and evening. I really felt a compulsion to read most of the posts for the day on my few favorite subreddits (mostly picture based so lots of cool shit to look at and get inspired by). I have those communities set up in an RSS feed for when I'm looking to scroll through stuff.

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I remember Reddit days when 5k upvotes was off the charts.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 years ago

Any community is a valid community, if there's 20 upvotes that's still 20 people who saw, enjoyed, and gave it some time, and that matters on the modern internet where there's a bit more gatekeeping than usual!

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[–] Gentoo1337 29 points 2 years ago (2 children)

In-fighting? What did i miss? lmao

[–] [email protected] 19 points 2 years ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

let's commit war crimes

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 years ago (1 children)

The Meta bullshit. I get it, Meta bad mmkay, but it's been on my front page every time I've come here for the past few days. We really can stop now...

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 years ago

Easy enough to just drop a down vote on the discussion, right?

[–] [email protected] 27 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

It's nice isn't it? I feel like it will evolve quickly.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 years ago

I’m all in for this ride! 🙌

[–] [email protected] 25 points 2 years ago

The software is a little clunky but this is everything I dreamed of when I got half way through making a peer-to-peer reddit clone in 2015 and gave up lol

[–] [email protected] 22 points 2 years ago (3 children)

Feels almost like going back in time, to the earlier days of the net. IRC, XMPP, Usenet… all distributed.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 years ago

Usenet is distributed. If you don’t mirror bins it’s not impossible to run your own “federated” server.

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[–] [email protected] 21 points 2 years ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (4 children)

We are forming communities on the realized image of the internet that we were told we would have back in the 80s and 90s.

Exactly! Back in the 80s, tech enthusiasts would run their own dial-up message boards in their homes. The Fediverse is like that, but with all the benefits of modern technology. Anyone can run their own instance if they have a decent internet connection (usually fiber). But it is more than just message boards: they can run Lemmy, Mastodon, Wordpress, and even things like Tor and NextCloud, and instantly contribute their computing resources to the larger Fediverse community.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 years ago (1 children)

@Ramin_HAL9001 @crazyminner
To add to that, it became dirt cheap to get hosting. Like under a pack of cigarettes per month cheap.
Did a little analysis over on my blog going over the shoestring methods for those interested: https://blog.lionscade.de/show/7

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[–] [email protected] 20 points 2 years ago (1 children)

The fact that everything is just "working" feels great!

Apps like Jerboa have made it so seemless to transition from deaddit.

Looking forward to the upcoming features that make the communities easier to join for the layperson.

Cheers!

[–] [email protected] 17 points 2 years ago

I'm honestly really impressed by the fact that it is just working.

In les than a month Lemmy saw an exponential growth and from my point of view it was always very smooth. It was a bit slow from time to time but knowing that all of that is just running on a bunch of servers puts together by few passionate relying on donations or just their personal resources.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

Methinks you have been so busy trying to fight that you didn't realise that nobody else is fighting.

However, there's a slight issue with 'still being connected to the wider internet' as I don't see results for Lemmy content appearing in my searches the way Reddit content comes up.

So it feels rather like a sci-fi movie when you've had too many mushrooms - kind of bright, but a bit confused...

However, it does help focus that idea that - if we are going to have interesting discussions and create information which is archived - it shouldn't be inside Reddit, and it should be accessible by search.

So Lemmy is half way there...

[–] [email protected] 17 points 2 years ago (3 children)

The search engines are increasingly becoming enshitified anyway. I no longer think being found on Google is going to be the hallmark of success long term it was purported to be. We need a new search paradigm. And I don't just mean reinventing search engines. I mean new ways of organizing content and answering search queries. Or better funding models for indexed search.

[–] pancakes 10 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I think you could really plot the decline in usability of Google search over the last 10 years. SEO and algorithms have really ruined the user experience.

[–] Angry_Maple 10 points 2 years ago (2 children)

You know what? I agree. Even over the last few months, I've seen it in action.

Before the blackout stuff began, I used to have to manually include the word "reddit" for reddit to even show up for most of my queries. Now, I can barely google anything without reddit showing up right near the top of the results.

Shenanigans, I tell ya.

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I think we need decentralized search, or rather federated search if possible. Something akin to Lemmy and kbin for search. I'm not sure what the implementation would look like, but it needs to happen I think.

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

No wait! I've just moved in! I missed all the fight!

I mean... can't you just do a little??? 🥺

[–] [email protected] 13 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Just wait a few days till some people overreact to something and call for defederating an entire instance due to it

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[–] pattmayne 13 points 2 years ago (3 children)

I agree.

BUT some degree of infighting means we're alive and engaged with the platform. I think it's healthy infighting.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 years ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Exactly. No human community exists without infighting. Infighting is not a good thing, but it is a good sign -- a sign of growth.

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 years ago

It's only infighting because we're all members of a living community. Other wise it's just fighting

[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 years ago

It has been quite emotional to see this community grow! I was a lurker here when Lemmy only had hundreds of users and to see such a vibrant and diverse set of instances form has been wonderful! I hope to see this platform returning some of the nostalgia from the Golden Age of the Internet. An internet for fun!

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I keep telling my wife how awesome the Fediverse is. She doesn't share the same sentiment I do, but she also doesn't care about Reddit. I'll win her over one day.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 years ago

Great change is coming enjoy these early amazing days!

[–] loaf 7 points 2 years ago

I definitely prefer it here over Reddit. It feels more free here.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 years ago

Fediverse is old-school internet! With some twists of course, but having new school social media in a decentralized way is great. The good & bad thing is there's a higher filter for getting on, so people here are nerdy and techy, but most 'normals' might not take the time.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 years ago

Them sounds like fighting words! Put up your jibblies!

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