we need more users
-
I've been one of the people saying "we don't need more users. we need quality over quantity" and i was wrong.
the way it's going, lemmy needs active users who post content sothat the network stays relevant. networks like the fediverse benefit from network effects and that means that if we have more users, that improves the value and quality of the fediverse overall.
So please, everyone, when you can, make advertisement for the fediverse in your personal area. Go talk to friends, make attractive stickers and put them everywhere, stuff like that. We would all benefit from it.
edit: source for the graph
When this post is two days old and still on the very top of my feed you know that it's either a ghost town or the sorting algo doesn't work.
-
When this post is two days old and still on the very top of my feed you know that it's either a ghost town or the sorting algo doesn't work.
It can be both.
-
Either we will have a huge spike in activity soon or Lemmy will become a ghostland. It is no wonder that we have low activity here with those numbers of users. But, on the other hand, Reddit has too much users + bots which leads to information overflow. Thus, Lemmy would be nice if it had only a few several hundred thousands of users.
I don't quite get it:
Lemmy has started in 2019 with 0 users and 0 instances. In 2023 there were still less than 100 instances... now the platform has oviously jumped to a few thousand instances and about 100 k users. To me this is the opposite of a ghostland.
If we consider that bigTech will mostly screw over their customers bowing to Trump I don't really get all the negativity around here.I've joined two days ago and you know what? I'm actually willing to contribute by posting instead of lurking at reddit because if I create content it's not for somme multi million dollar corp to fill their pockets with revenue but for this community to thrive...
I my eyes this isn't the right time for doomerism... on the contrary.
-
Admin work is insane. Since every instance holds a full, independent copy and doesn’t only cache, they are legally responsible for the content and have to moderate it. So if someone posts e.g. illegal pornography on one instance and it’s federated to another instance, the admin of the second instance needs to delete it or face legal consequences. That means, instead of the mods or admins of the original community/instance being solely responsible for keeping their stuff clean, everyone is responsible for everything and the same work needs to be done hundreds of times, once per instance.
Eh, if the original instance removes the CSAM - the ban and removal federates out to everywhere else, so this isn't always true.
As for the scaling of Lemmy - absolutely, but it'll never get to Reddit sized levels. Down the line, the answer here would be for the federative structure to change so that an instance only hosts its own local content, and doesn't need duplicate content viewed from external instances.
This horrible scalability means that right now instances are getting close to their limits (see e.g. lemm.ee closing down exactly due to these reasons).
That's not why lemm.ee closed down. It wasn't financial.
Eh, if the original instance removes the CSAM - the ban and removal federates out to everywhere else, so this isn’t always true.
But if it doesn't, then other instances removing the content on their side doesn't federate. So you can either trust every instance that you federate with with your legal security, or you will have to moderate everything yourself as well, just in case someone missed something.
Down the line, the answer here would be for the federative structure to change so that an instance only hosts its own local content, and doesn’t need duplicate content viewed from external instances.
This would be extremely important, but I don't know if such a low level conceptual change can still be performed with a reasonable amount of work. Remember, for such a change you need to get every instance on board. That would be difficult now, and only more difficult later.
Tbh, it would have been much smarter if the setup would be basically a bunch of independent phpBB-like boards with federated single-sign-on and an app that transparently connects you to whatever instance hosts the content you are looking at.
That’s not why lemm.ee closed down. It wasn’t financial.
No, it was specifically because of the moderation issue: https://lemmy.ca/post/45390962
-
Most of the major instances do federate with each other though. The only notable difference in terms of content you'll get is if you like hexbear/lemmygrad currently.
Yes. And its been detrimental to the growth of the fediverse.
-
I don't mind other opinions. I don't mind different points of view. I don't mind culture and mentality differences. I'm Ukrainian living in America so the views I have, while leaning heavily left, differ to the point of leftists vehemently opposing even the slightest push back to some policies or views.
For this reason I never delete my comments and never block anyone. I need to see more. I need to see the different people and cultures. Otherwise we set up a community like parts of Seattle (where I live) that is in this political bubble that get shocked when anyone has views that differ. It creates this perspective that these other people don't exist and that the world was stolen from them. And the reason they can't comprehend other views is because they're involved in communities where these views get erased.
Yeah, this is generally my philosophy. I have exactly 1 user blocked, as well as a pure bot community or two.
But the problem for me is magnitude. With its sheer number of upvotes, /c/politics is blotting out my sun, reducing diversity; it does no good leaving it in my feed.
-
I don't quite get it:
Lemmy has started in 2019 with 0 users and 0 instances. In 2023 there were still less than 100 instances... now the platform has oviously jumped to a few thousand instances and about 100 k users. To me this is the opposite of a ghostland.
If we consider that bigTech will mostly screw over their customers bowing to Trump I don't really get all the negativity around here.I've joined two days ago and you know what? I'm actually willing to contribute by posting instead of lurking at reddit because if I create content it's not for somme multi million dollar corp to fill their pockets with revenue but for this community to thrive...
I my eyes this isn't the right time for doomerism... on the contrary.
I agree with you. I just say the possibilities based on statistics. I also like Lemmy more than Reddit. The only issue is that there are missing some specialized comunities like the one about Pyrotechnics(the only one existing on Lemmy is on the dead instance, thus having no activity), for example.
-
I don't know if you've convinced me to stay or go, but you've certainly convinced me of either or.
Wasn't trying to convince anyone of anything. Just offering a reality check.
Lemmy vs Reddit is like this meme where the one side says "I hate you" and the other side says "Who are you?" (or was it "I don't even think of you", can't remember).
Lemmy is cool. It being small has benefits and I like the political direction here much more than on Reddit. I like that most people I interact with on Lemmy genuinely are humans. On Reddit, that's much more difficult to be certain of.
But Lemmy is not Reddit, it's not a Reddit alternative, it's not even a Reddit competitor. It's a nice little niche forum, a little anti-capitalist experiment, that kinda copied the UI and UX of old Reddit. That's totally fine and it's got it's value. Otherwise I wouldn't have >3000 comments on this platform.
But it's a factor of 100 000x off of being on the radar of Spez and his crew.
-
Hexbear is super trans inclusive (50ish% of users are trans per the last survey) and bans transphobia instantly, you may fit right in
Hexbear is tankie space
-
I see, wasn't aware of that. Thanks!
Yeah, i unfortunately don't agree with the tankie censorship of people who disapprove of dictatorships.
Cowbee you especially are a gross person when it comes to licking authoritarian boot.
-
This and just so much negativity. I'm not saying the posts are wrong, but I often leave this site feeling worse than when I got on. It has the shortest daily app timer on my phone. Not good for engagement or growth
I have kind of the opposite experience. When I go on reddit, I feel depressed and angry, when I go on Lemmy I laugh and learn stuff. Probably the communities I subscribe to though. I get political and regional news from Reddit (and don't have an actual reddit account anymore). I get funny science and Star Trek memes from Lemmy and cyber security and tech news.
-
I don't know the motives of others, but I've been spending increasingly less time on the internet and more time listening to podcasts & reading.
Lemmy attracts only certain types of people who like reading articles and replying long paragraphs arguing with each other or small details. In a time when literacy is falling, means there's
only a smaller and smaller pie left. Maybe we need a book club or pen pal system or a noobie hub to make it a friendlier environment. There's a cloud of hostility in the air friends, don't let it take you. Ape strong together.And the obvious new use case of a centralized space to coordinate regime change has some daunting externalities that preclude it.
-
This. It was never about not having gatekeepers, it was always about being the gatekeeper instead.
The gatekeepers of these spaces are not meaningfully different from reddit.
-
Yeah, i unfortunately don't agree with the tankie censorship of people who disapprove of dictatorships.
Cowbee you especially are a gross person when it comes to licking authoritarian boot.
I'm not Cowbee, I just appreciate Cowbee, as my username says. Cowbee is the opposite of supporting dictatorships, he's a socialist supporting the struggle against western imperialism.
-
Hexbear is tankie space
Yes, that's why it's inclusive of trans and bans transphobia, that's a good thing! An internet space without overt Zionism, transphobia... It feels great
-
Yes. And its been detrimental to the growth of the fediverse.
Wait, I'm lost. You're saying that most of the fediverse federating with each other has been detrimental?
-
As much I love the idea of Lemmy, I've noticed myself I was drawn back to Reddit. Why? Because it has a larger community, of course, but (and please don't shoot me for this), Reddit's algo and rewards. Yes, the achievements gallery is stupid, but it works.
The folks building Lemmy investigating how to increase engagement, this is one factor.
Niche active communities for sure.
I am also banned from reddit and can't contribute. You'd imagine that would pull me more towards lemmy, but just getting the novelty of so many new posts makes it enticing even if I am not interacting.
Instagram and tiktok benefit less from its algo imo than they do from its numerous creators. The novelty drives people. It's complicated I am sure but actively this is what I think about when I reach for these platforms.
I definitely think the trick is having innumerable amount of content.
-
Eh, if the original instance removes the CSAM - the ban and removal federates out to everywhere else, so this isn’t always true.
But if it doesn't, then other instances removing the content on their side doesn't federate. So you can either trust every instance that you federate with with your legal security, or you will have to moderate everything yourself as well, just in case someone missed something.
Down the line, the answer here would be for the federative structure to change so that an instance only hosts its own local content, and doesn’t need duplicate content viewed from external instances.
This would be extremely important, but I don't know if such a low level conceptual change can still be performed with a reasonable amount of work. Remember, for such a change you need to get every instance on board. That would be difficult now, and only more difficult later.
Tbh, it would have been much smarter if the setup would be basically a bunch of independent phpBB-like boards with federated single-sign-on and an app that transparently connects you to whatever instance hosts the content you are looking at.
That’s not why lemm.ee closed down. It wasn’t financial.
No, it was specifically because of the moderation issue: https://lemmy.ca/post/45390962
But if it doesn’t, then other instances removing the content on their side doesn’t federate. So you can either trust every instance that you federate with with your legal security, or you will have to moderate everything yourself as well, just in case someone missed something.
Sure, you're right there - but an instance that kept having problems with removing CSAM would find itself defederated.
This would be extremely important, but I don’t know if such a low level conceptual change can still be performed with a reasonable amount of work. Remember, for such a change you need to get every instance on board. That would be difficult now, and only more difficult later.
Well it would be built in from Lemmy or Piefed. The devs would have to spearhead it. But were the load ever to get to that point, I suspect that would be the obvious move.
No, it was specifically because of the moderation issue: https://lemmy.ca/post/45390962
Yes, so not financial. You seemed to be implying it was financial.
-
Growth for growth sake is one of the most toxic concepts in modern society.
Hey Bro i think you forgot to wear this
-
Your argument is disingenuous. You appeal to "math", btw without demonstrating any proof of that math, but then you also used words like "destructive" and "crippled", which are not mathematical in the slightest! Your argument devolves into just-trust-me-bro and i-am-very-smart. Surely you have some crypto that you would like to sell me as well?
Yes defederation makes a network less fully connected, but I suggest you reexamine the principles of the federated model, which does not require a fully connected network to begin with, and in fact one of its chief strengths lies in how it can handle such disconnection points. The only way it "cripples" anything is when an edgelord teenager no longer has a captive audience "forced" to receive their spew - yes, their feewings do get hurt, but the rest of the network gets stronger for having cut them out. Like a cancer that must be sacrificed for the health of the rest of the body to live.
CONSENT MUST MATTER, or we have no freedoms at all. They have the right to speak, and I demand the right to not have to listen to it, if I do not want to.
The fact that their admins are operating in bad faith and cannot control the toxicity of their members is not my own fault, but my response is under my own control. Even, as we literally see happening, if that means leaving the Threadiverse entirely.
Also, don't miss the point where the Lemmy devs have left no other option besides full defederation, if you truly do not want to receive messages from people on that instance. In theory this could have been a different conversation if the "instance blocking" actually functioned as advertised, but instead it allows users from those instances to read, vote on, and reply to your content, and send you DMs, which even trigger notifications, the same as any unblocked user. That is no kind of "blocking" at all, so alrighty then, full defederation is the only option provided by the developers that will achieve the desired effect. (But this argument only affects the practicality of whatever solution is deployed, while I still think that consent should matter hence defederation should be allowed even on purely theoretical grounds. An instance admin should not be "forced" to receive messages that they do not want - CSAM being an absolutely perfect example of that.)
You are railing about moral issues I don't even disagree with. But there are basic, physical properties that networks have, that are scale dependent. There is no moralizing around that issue. And de-federation can and does occur all the time, its basically the norm between the major instances. And that has fundamentally crippled the growth of the fediverse (at least the lemmy side).
Just because I'm not bothering putting effort into responding to a slathering wall of text like you've composed, does nothing to change the fact that social networks, and actually, all large networked systems from the internet to a fungal colony, all base their survival in scale. I've done the work and shared it with those I've deemed worthy, here, regarding the network analyses I've built to run on the fediverse. Here's a hint: you aren't one of those.
Without scale, networked systems collapse. Without scale, complexity can't emerge.
A big part of this is architectural and we had that discussion years ago here. There are design constraints built into the original envisioning of lemmy that pretty much force these limitations. The biggest issue being that each lemmy instance is built to effectively be an "entire clone" of a reddit like system. The second is activity pub related, in that users can not "migrate" their accounts or community's to new instance, neither can we fork, clone, or merge a community.
The result is that we end up with duplicated communities, balkanized content, and an overall reduction in activity, which further suppress growth. There is no disagreement that the de-federation issue contributed directly to Lemmy's decline. We were all here for it.
![Cowbee [he/they]](https://lemmy.ml/pictrs/image/c18ce632-5fb5-4888-8226-3dc55a07acc4.jpeg "Cowbee [he/they]"){kind=avatar}
