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Are we using Lemmy correctly? (self.asklemmy)

submitted 2 years ago by _finger_ to c/[email protected]

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What I think could make Lemmy superior to Reddit is the ability to create themed-instances that are all linked together which feels like the entire point. I've noticed that a lot of instances are trying to be a catch-all Reddit replacement by imitating specific subs which is understandable given the circumstances but seems like it's not taking advantage of the full power that Lemmy could have.

Imagine for a moment that instances were more focus-based. Instead of having communities that are all mostly unrelated we had entire instances that are focused on one specific area of expertise or interest. Imagine a LOTR instance that had many sub-communities (in this case "communities" would be the wrong way to look at it, it would be more like categories) that dealt with different subjects in the LOTR universe: books, movies, lore, gaming, art, etc all in the same instance.

Imagine the types of instances that could be created with more granular categories within to better guide conversations: Baseball, Cars, Comics, Movies, Tech etc.

A tech instance could have dedicated communities for news, programming, dev, IT, Microsoft, Apple, iOS, linux. Or you could make it even more granular by having a dedicated instance for each of those because there's so many categories that could be applied to each.

What are your thoughts?

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[–] _finger_ 7 points 2 years ago (2 children)

This was the case with Reddit as well, there were a lot of competing subs created due to shitty mods and rules so I don't think it'd be much different in this case

[–] FermatsLastAccount 5 points 2 years ago (1 children)

There was a r/Yankees subreddit that had awful mods, so some people created r/Nyyankees and basically everyone moved there.

[–] ChemicalRascal 1 points 2 years ago

Presumably we'll see that happen here as well, just potentially at a higher level, with instances rather than just communities.

I recently had to migrate my Mastodon account (home.social shut down, for... frankly frustrating reasons, but whatever). It was a pretty painful process, and none of my old toots exist as a result.

Hopefully we can figure this out with Lemmy, and in doing so, make migration painless enough that it can even be a common occurrence without a loss of data and content. Let's not forget that one of the great things about Reddit is (was, I guess) that old threads still contain relevant information from passionate enthusiasts.

[–] slapmefive 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)

The real issue with instances shutting down is losing access to a user account. Correct me if I'm wrong, but there would be no way to login/recover an account from an offline instance.

[–] _finger_ 4 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Im honestly not entirely sure but that seems to be the case. Everyone is worried about mod power and decentralization but what about the power of instance owners over your own account? If I take the time to link a bunch of external communities to one instance, what happens if the instance goes down? All that work is gone

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

This is a good point and makes me wonder: is there any interest in running a personal instance that has no communities, just for the sake of being in control of your own identity? Would that even be an appropriate thing to do? And if so, how would you convince instances to federate with you if you have no content?

[–] mxh 1 points 2 years ago

I think (I heard) federating is opt-out, so unless instances specifically block you, you should be able to subscribe to anything anywhere. I will probably host my own instance if this is the case!

[–] B4tid0 1 points 2 years ago

I think there are users self hosting for the purpose of control over their accounts and future features like bots.

[–] Ataraxia 1 points 2 years ago

That's why I made an account in every instance I was interested in. I don't cqre about my post history and what not and if i want to keep important info I'll just save the page to my phone.