Something to help people lead to the Fediverse

[snoringearthworm@sh.itjust.works]

Users are trapped by the network effect and a desire for ease of use over anything else.

The corporate alternatives will always be an easier sell.

Twitter > Bluesky
Instagram > Upscrolled
TikTok > RedNote
Reddit > no corporate alternative
YouTube > no corporate alternative
Discord > no corporate alternative

To get the average user, you don't just have to convince them to leave Twitter, you have to convince them to leave corporate social media and all of their friends that still use it.

You have to convince them to accept additional inconvenience and complexity (@usernames and @instancenames?) in exchange for no direct, tangible benefit. (We know it's worth it, but the average user doesn't know and doesn't care.)

The people who could handle that are already here. Adoption going forward will be (at best) a slow trickle until we reach some level of critical mass.

::: spoiler Why people don't leave Reddit
Reddit has the advantage of years of community-built knowledge, and it's a "one-stop shop". Looking for the gaming community? Go to reddit, type in gaming, it'll be in the top 3, if not the top 10.

Go to the threadiverse, and you have to run the gauntlet of servers (what's an instance?), deferated instances (why can't I see XYZ?), and 20 communities with similar names (which gaming community is the "real" one?). The switching cost is too high for most as long as Reddit still exists.
:::

::: spoiler Why people don't leave Discord
Discord is easy to set up, and they're digging their claws into game dev by making it easy to monetize communities (enshittification, here we come!).

Revolt Stoat isn't federated, so each server is segregated from the others. As they grow, users will centralize for the sake of convenience. My bet is they either sell out or remain a niche alternative.

Element is (still) too complicated and unreliable. Audio sharing is inconsistent (no audio streaming on desktop screenshare, mics won't work, etc). Video calls aren't fully implemented.
:::

::: spoiler Why people won't leave YouTube
No one can match YouTube's sheer scale. They have billions of videos and billions of users. Their monetization system means that creators are incentivized to create quality content for the platform.

By contrast, PeerTube's best content is often mirrors or backups of content from other platforms. PeerTube is a great backup, but without monetization to incentivize creators, it's not a real alternative.

[thekaul@lemmy.dbzer0.com]

It kind of looks like Stoat is just an Open Source Discord clone? While the idea is great, it looks like all their servers are hosted by them (correct me if I'm wrong). Was really hoping for some kind of self hosted Discord where all the data is stored locally. I use Mumble currently, which is great for voice chat, but there are simply not enough features.

Edit: Actually I found the github page and it seems like there is a way to deploy this locally. Disregard

[tuuktuuk@piefed.europe.pub]

Basically the context is this: !meanwhileongrad@sh.itjust.works

[nutomic@lemmy.ml]

Thank you

[tuuktuuk@piefed.europe.pub]

I would recommend exporting your settings just in case. I was using an instance that kind of vanished for a week and then returned, but with my user account completely gone

It's nice that you can just import your settings from a file on your own hard drive and continue from basically where you left.

[tuuktuuk@anarchist.nexus]

You know that piefed.world exists? Its admins are the same people that are also admins of your current home instance, lemmy.world.

[nocturne@slrpnk.net]

I lost my piefed.ee account too. I have my subscriptions backed up manually, but it would probably be a good idea to export, then save it in Bitwarden.

[jubilantjaguar@lemmy.world]

20 communities with similar names (which gaming community is the “real” one?)

On this one, I agree with them. Network effects do not go well with splittism. And yet it's hardly surprising we're here given the ills of contemporary society: narcissism, snowflakery, identitarianism, intolerance for contradiction. For every subject there must be ten separate communities (AKA echo chambers, bubbles) so that nobody has to see anything that they might disagree with.

I'm caricaturing, of course. But this issue is real. Given the political orientation here, it probably affects the fediverse more than corporate social media. And whatever the wrongs and rights of the subject, it is not helping the cause of attracting newcomers.

[rumba@lemmy.zip]

80% the people on TT, YT and IG are there to follow content creators that are only on those platforms to make money.

Until creators can easily make money on Fediverse platforms, they'll always play second fiddle to closed platforms that market and share profits, no matter how crappy the returns are.

[deus@lemmy.world]

In the same vein there's also Mbin, which people seem to have forgotten about for some reason, and Sublinks, which was still under development the last time I checked.

[sam@break3.social]

@rumba This is where we need to showcase things like Patreon and other ways of people making money from people who truly enjoy there work, pay people not corporations.

[agent_karyo@piefed.world]

Bold words coming from a supporter of russian genocidal imperialism!

And please don't play dumb! We both know the overwhelming majority of tankies only speak English and at absolute best may have visited Europe for a week 20 years ago (let alone Cuba or China).

[sam@break3.social]

One of the reasons will simply be because the Fediverse doesn't really have a marketing budget or an easy way to get into it, We are decentralized by design but we need a way to explain that as well as tell people about why they should be using this instead of another cash grab centralized app.

[rumba@lemmy.zip]

now go convince all those creators making a living that have both youtube and patreon money coming in to post on a free only alternative and just go to patreon income.

[kolanaki@pawb.social]

This. There are alternative video hosting platforms; none of them are really alternatives to YouTube itself until the content creators also move.

[sam@break3.social]

I know it's not as simple as that, but creators are annoyed of these platforms, mirroring your content on the Fediverse is easy through PeerTube and having 'uncensored' or less restricted videos be uploaded onto PeerTube can help.

[kolanaki@pawb.social]

Honestly, the fact they complain about the platforms all the time while doing nothing to leave those platforms what-so-ever just feels like another manipulation tactic like clickbait titles and thumbnails.

[sam@break3.social]

As someone who creates stuff myself, I know how it is, It's hard to move away from the platforms when there's so many more people that see's your content on them.

I wish I could get half the people that get to see my content on PeerTube but sadly as of the moment it's not the case.

[kolanaki@pawb.social]

Small creators, sure. The huge ones with millions of subscribers, tho? If they left, their audience would follow them.

[auster@thebrainbin.org]

If that's trashing, most debates I've seen would be bloodbaths. e.e"

Irony aside, if someone is politely criticized, what seems to be what the OP did, and the receiver sees it as a problem, the receiver shouldn't be a public figure.