this post was submitted on 13 Jun 2023
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Technology
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I've checked both Reddit and Lemmy since I created my Lemmy account yesterday. Reddit has lost a number of subreddits I used to read and the feed seems decidedly less interesting overall. Although the equivalents to all the subreddits I used don't necessarily exist here, there is some good information here (particularly IT-related) and I think the overall feel of the community here is better - people seem (so far at least) largely pretty reasonable and there aren't the armies of contrarians or downvoters just wanting to spread their anger at the world to everyone else. So, overall, win some, lose some, and if I end up just here instead of Reddit, I think any losses there will be offset by gains here. Which if you think about it makes Lemmy look pretty good, given that it is (a) relatively new; (b) volunteer-run and funded; (c) much, much smaller than Reddit.
People say Lemmy is too complicated for most people, well that’s probably a good thing as it naturally filters out the people who only want to incite anger for upvotes. There’s no love on Reddits main subreddits anymore
Also it’s not that hard to understand anyway.
In terms of complexity, becoming conversant enough in how Lemmy works to do basic things feels on par with IRC. The expectations about how easy it is to hop on a service and start using it have shifted significantly because of the centralization of the past couple of decades, but the evidence available from comparing the tone of Reddit to here suggests the speed bump is helpful.
I disagree, it's easy to say that a barrier to entry is good because it keeps out trolls and those that just want to insight hate, but really those people will find a way when anything gets popular enough to bother with. Meanwhile, that same barrier prevents a lot of underserved people joining in and they're left to deal with the same toxic people we're trying to avoid ourselves.
The centralised services didn't succeed because they were centralised, they succeeded because they lowered the barrier to entry drastically. It's a lot easier to do that when you're centralised, but that's something we'll have to overcome if we want this community and others like it to succeed. Otherwise we'll just slowly die inside our own echo chamber.
Agree and disagree ... when we say "people shouldn't have to learn anything to use a technology," that shifts any focus on better education to dumber services.
I think it's not necessarily just dumber or more impatient people who can be soft-locked out by this, though. People who are too short on time to put a lot into hobbies (e.g. single mom working two jobs, and others with very busy irl lives) or learning a new unfamiliar system may also be left out, or older people with a anxieties or self-defeating beliefs about their ability to learn. And remembering here also that we are used to learning new internet systems, but that's a skill in itself even though it feels easy to us.
Leaving people on platforms that have ad-drive, hate-elevating algorithms also has consequences for all of us when it comes to politics and conspiracy spread.
Technology is a tool, and the tool should be as intuitive to a human newly encountering it as possivle, imo. If people make the same mistakes or have the same confusion with something again and again, it means the system is badly designed for humans, not that the humans are dumb.
I don't get where all this talk of the Fediverse being daunting to learn comes from. I thought it would be like setting DIP switches on a dot matrix printer...but I selected my usual username, provided email for backup, short summary of why I'm here - bam! Connecting to the rest of the Verse, how it's all interconnected, well, that's a titch more involved - but to me it's just registering again at lemmy or kbin, and I can link things up when I have the time.
The analogy of continents/states/counties/towns sums it up well. There was a really good post at reddit summarizing things.
You're right Lemmy is going to take a bit to get used to, but the kicker for me (and maybe a lot of people) is going to be at the end of the month when the 3rd party apps shut down. I'm either going to have to get used to something new either way, whether it be Lemmy or the official Reddit app and my understanding is that the official app is littered with ads and promotions that no one cares about so I probably won't even bother.
Yeah. I'm not willing to use the official Reddit app. I tried for a day, and it was terrible. Using Lemmy with Jerboa feels natural, because the interface is very similar to the app I used for Reddit - Boost. There are communities I will miss, but it's nice to actually see the fediverse start to grow, and participate in it. It's hard to change from being a lurker to actually commenting, but the community feels more tight-knit.
They're going to start adding ads targeted to comments and posts by keywords used in those comments/posts, too. Which obviously sounds horrendous.
I’m old and easily bamboozled by all this newfangled tech, and at first the whole fediverse thing was overwhelming. But eventually I realized it was not too different than an MMO’s multiple servers, and the idea of cross-realm and connected realms, and it functions not that much differently than a network mesh. You have multiple stand-alone nodes that are capable of cross-communications, so participate in a shared experience, and if one of the nodes goes down, the network will work around it.
It’s really not complicated once you give yourself time to think. And as long as the interface allows for the aggregation of random tidbits of data as we were accustomed to with Reddit, how the technology feeds that is not something the average user needs to worry about.
The only real difference between Reddit and Lemmy is that there is a bit more “hard wiring” that needs to be done by the user in order to set up a custom feed on Lemmy, but other than that, the user experience isn’t dreadfully different once the dust settles.
I appreciate talking to people from all walks, though. If a community wants to filter people it should be explicit and on purpose.
@CanadaPlus @Senseibu well I'm reading this on mastodon, so that's pretty wild.
In general, it's probably going to be difficult for a community to filter people out
And I can see this back on Lemmy. Fascinating!
I'm pretty sure you could still be banned from Technology@beehaw.org. I wonder how that would show up back on Mastodon?
I'm really hoping that lemmy can see a larger uptick in engagement. I know I should be the change I want to see in the world. However the thing I miss the most is pointless arguments in the comments section. :D
No you don't.
That's not an argument. An argument is a connected series of statements intended to establish a proposition.
No it's not.
Yes it is.
Sorry, is this the five minute course or the full half-hour?
An argument is a connected series of statements intended to establish a proposition.
No it isn't!
An argument is where I convince you that I'm right and you're 100% wrong by Logic^tm.
It's like going back to an abusive relationship....🤣...ahhhh feels like home
Well I think it's stupid and pointless that you miss pointless arguments. Are we doing it right?
Ohh for sure!
What you just want substance in your life? No debates over if Captain Picard could kick Luke Skywalkers ass? Everyone knows it's Picard all the way. :D
To me Reddit was always the comments and less about the news story. The pulse of what was happening in your country, or town, or hobby, etc. I'm sure that will happen here on Lemmy too in time.
Did you just say Pickard can kick Skywalkers ass? Luke is a jedi. And a trained knight who has fought many battles.
Pickard is a desk jockey who sits in a fancy chair. It's not even close.
Sure, the enterprise can best the falcon, but in a 1v1, there is zero chance of Pickard taking out Luke
I think you're underestimating Picard. Like, not only was the man a wild punk in his youth before Starfleet straightened him out, but it's shown throughout the series that he's more than capable of bluffing opponents with access to things like literal time travel.
If nothing else, if he fights Luke, he's not going to fight on Luke's terms if he can help it.
Bluffing isn't going to stop a lightsabre through the face.
In all honesty, I'm probably over estimating Pickard. Luke can force choke him from across the room while Pickard is doing his fancy speech
But wouldn't they both win as neither would want to even fight the other so there wouldn't be a battle to begin with?
You mean the same Luke Skywalker who threw his lightsaber away while confronting the most powerful men in the galaxy on board their planet-killing superweapon? And also tried to talk down the ruthless crime lord who had both his sister and her boyfriend as hostages? :P
There's no need to get into a fight when you can call for a site to site transport an intransigent Jedi into a hard vacuum.
"Mr. Worf, please facilitate Mr. Skywalker coming to a more complete understanding as to the relativity of his position by transporting his lower spine two feet to the left."
We haven't established the parameters of this fight well. If outside/friend help is not allowed, Skywalker wins. If outside help is allowed: Picard wins
Also it is canon now that jedi can survive a hard vacuum for a moment at least, per Leia in The Last Jedi (iirc). But Picard is definitely smarter so he'd find a way I think. Probably.
Hard vacuum is survivable for a short amount of time, but The Force won't really help Luke if he's half a light minute away from the closest breathable atmosphere.
You're right. We need a federated WhoWouldWin.
What IT related communities have you found? Keeping up with tech news was one of my primary reasons for keeping in Reddit. I’ve found a few things here, but not a ton. I’ll gladly take any suggestions