this post was submitted on 10 Jun 2023
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Asklemmy

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Tips for a new user! (lemmy.fmhy.ml)
submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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Reddit refugee here - stumbled across Lemmy as it was mentioned in a comment on Artifact but intrigued by this format and communities!

Looking for tips as a brand new user to get the most out of it - any advice is welcome! I’m using Mlem which seems to be working pretty well so far.

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[–] [email protected] 30 points 1 year ago (1 children)

This is not complete by any means but this is what I did (recently):

  • Explore around: Currently there's an influx of new user and communities (subreddits) being created. Total users has doubled (give it take) in 10 days. Active monthly users has increased 6x in the same 10 days
  • Try to engage: For many (most?) of us this is a brand new place. Not so long ago it felt rather quiet (I remember taking a look a few months back and thinking "It's a cool idea but there's not enough content") As a forever lurker, this has been easier said than done. The vibe I get (YMMV) is from early Slashdot / Slashdot clones, only much more vibrant. I haven't seen something similar in a really long time
  • Missing content? Either you wait (keep exploring) or become proactive. Even if you intend to hand it over down the line, create/start building any community you are missing. For those that are joining after you, it's reassuring having a moment of "Hey, here there's also interest in $RANDOM_THING"
  • Be aware of size: Recently I was taking about this. Some "not so large subreddits " have 10x users subscribed as users in the whole "lemmyverse"? "lemmy ecosystem"? (I'm still not sure how it's named)
  • The system is quite new and has had a sudden explosion in popularity. Be prepared to see some rough edges here and there.

A couple of things that might be odd to get your head around:

  • Instances: Although you can think of instances as a "whole reddit" they all work together. Both of us are on different instances and I'm commenting on your post. I'm not even sure without scrolling on which server resides the post
  • Fediverse: The collaboration is not constrained to instances alone. I was engaging (from Lemmy) with a post originating on a different platform (kbin) and checking how it looks on a third platform (Mastodon). The analogy might be bad, but think of commenting from Reddit on a post originated on digg and checking how you see/comment on it from Twitter.

But the most important part, enjoy your time here

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

Great advice thanks! I’m a huge lurker on Reddit just due to the gargantuan size I feel like it’s almost just shouting into the void but looking to get more involved here!

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago

It is the users who provide value to these platforms. If you like it here, provide value and contribute! Posts, comments, create a hobby community that you want (that doesn’t exist here yet pls).

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

Some tips:

Also, some useful places to find new instances:

Finally, try not to lurk and have fun :) (edit: lemmy_support is better than lemmy for support)

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Awesome thanks for all the info :)

[–] ulu_mulu 2 points 1 year ago

Thanks for the links, very useful!

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

If you’re on your own instance it’ll be very quiet until you start adding sub-lemmys (lemmings?)

You need to paste the entire link into your instances search bar and subscribe from there. Otherwise you’re taken to the instance it’s hosted on and need to log in.

@Pliny

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Thanks! So I signed up to an instance and I can then filter by all and the option to ‘subscribe’ to lots of other sub-lemmys is available - still not really sure how it all works but definitely getting served a lot of activity!

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

If you know of a community and you can't find it in all, paste the whole URL in the search field ( https://lemmy.ml/c/linux ) and then you can subscribe.

This indicates your insurance there's someone interested in this community and it'll start getting future content

Only the first user would need to do this, for those after, the community will show when searching in all

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Is there a way to see all the communities from another instance?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

You can visit the actual instance, e.g. lemmy.world and then check out communities at the top. Not sure if there's a better way yet, someone let me know if so!

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

You know I've been recommending that link to everyone and had no idea you could actually use it to browse per-instance lol. Well done me 🤦‍♀️

Thanks for the heads up!

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Edit: I visited beehaw.org, which seems to be a relatively large fediverse site (I'm new, don't judge), and their communities tab lists communities they host locally and others they are federated with. You can subscribe to any one of them through kbin by pasting the full address of the community (which looks like communityname@hosturl, usually listed on the right hand side column in the community) into kbin's search bar.

Also the notifications for comment replies are turned off by default on kbin. Actually, all notifications seem to be off. It detracts from the new user experience as people don't realize their comments have been replied to. Turn on your notifications in your settings!

I'm wondering this too. And if there's a good way to see what instances there are in the first place.

I'm quite sure I understand how the overall "fediverse" system works on a technical level, and I think most people are quite capable of understanding the architecture of the system.

What people are confused about when they ask how this works (and are answered with useless email analogies and metaphors as to how the architecture is set up) is the user experience of finding curated content similar to a way they are used to getting on centralized systems.

I don't think most people are confused about what federation is or how the underlying protocol works, nor do they need the details unless they are interested in creating and hosting their own instances. What people are wondering is how they can recreate a reddit-like (or twitter like, in the case of mastodon) experience, while the decentralized nature of the system seemingly makes it impossible.

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

To some extent. I've come across a lot of new people who think having one account on the fediverse allows them to log into any other platform. "I wanted to check out Mastodon but when I tried to log in with my beehaw account it said I wasn't registered!"

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

I can see how that might result from the general style of the answers people are getting when they ask how to start using this system. Things like "it's like email" or "it doesn't matter which one you sign up on as every instance can see the other instances they are federated with" can very well lead to the impression that a single user account works on all instances sharing the protocol.

I still think the reason for this is people are actually asking about the user experience rather than the way the protocol works. When they are answered with the above, instead of "go to the largest instance you can sign up at and start asking questions" and "if you go to a small instance it'll be very quiet and you'll get the feeling that all of this is really hopeless".

First and foremost, and I know this freaks out the decentralization first users who value that above the lively environment, people should be directed to where everyone else is if we want any sort of widespread adoption. Even if people flock to one instance, the decentralized nature of the protocol will still act as a safeguard against monopolization because once people learn the ropes, it's trivial to migrate to another instance which doesn't have whatever that is you don't like about your first instance.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

lemmy.directory is attempting to show all communities from all instances (federate all instances? I'm not sure of the terms yet). they're doing a decent job so far I think

[–] sanguinepar 5 points 1 year ago

Hiya - I'm a fellow Reddfugee and I only joined yesterday, but I'm starting to get the hang of it I think. Happy to try and help with any questions, although I can't promise I'll know the answers!

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

How do I subscribe to a lemmy community from kbin? I've tried searching and waiting like on lemmy and it still doesn't show up.

Is there a certain format? I tried fill url, !community@instance, community@instance

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

@[email protected] that's a more common way across the fediverse and also how you follow people, including those on other platforms like Mastodon and Calckey, etc.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Thanks. Unfortunately it doesn't seem to work for me. Maybe it's something with the specific community I'm looking for?

I'm trying @canada

Edit: that is rendering strangly in my reply. The community is called canada and the instance is lemmy.ca

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Huh, that is strange. I wonder if that one isn't federating for some reason. I can find @[email protected] but @[email protected] turns up nothing. Neither does https://lemmy.ca/c/canada 🤔

Edit: I forgot there are issues with federation right now because of the cloudflare check. It should only be temporary. See Ernest's post

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Thanks, hopefully that's it. Kbin seems nicer than lemmy but I need some of the communities from lemmy! I was wondering if lemmy.ca was defederated from here or something but good to hear that isn't it.

I'll check back in a few days.

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