Please don't link to Reddit. Let's not boost their traffic.
this post was submitted on 26 Jun 2023
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Yeah for sure. I went to the Join Lemmy website and was so confused about where I was supposed to create an account. Once I found lemm.ee and their intro to Lemmy article, it got way easier.
It was straight forward for me - I did some googling to understand the way that different servers shared data, picked what I thought was a popular platform (lemm.ee) and setup shop with my first community (being migrated from you know where).
Same exact experience for me. It hasn't been too difficult to pick up the Lemmy basics. I only ever lurked on Reddit and here on Lemmy I'm trying to be more of an active participant.
The Jerboa app not working due to the lemm.ee server not being upgraded to v18 was confusing at first - but then I found the conversations going on and I understand why we haven't upgraded yet. I'm patiently just using the lemm.ee website directly.
I only ever lurked on Reddit and here on Lemmy I'm trying to be more of an active participant.
Same here, and now I'm soo glad that I jumped that ~~shit~~ ship.
Somewhat yes, and still do. If I find a community I like the look of, there's often a non-functional login page where after entering my details (correctly!) there's just a spinner that spins forever without ever giving at least an error message, but if I prefer there are some !hier@oglyp.hics that look like an email address but aren't, that I can bung into some search page somewhere that doesn't always return anything but it might if I refresh it or it might not but if I keep trying then it might eventually but then it doesn't for days so I start fiddling around with some other stuff and find that it suddenly works, but that other browser tab that still has that interesting thread open won't register as subscribed no matter how much I refresh it even though the community works perfectly in the other tab, but then I can't find the message I want to engage with in the tab where it works.
I'm a coder so I'm used to being persistent and working around bugs and poor UX, but your bog standard pleb isn't going to be that patient with it - they just want to login, hit subscribe and it's done (although to be fair that's what I want too).
I'm sure there are good reasons for all this but when the Lemmy devs decide they have to prioritise a simple UX that Just Works no matter what context I think there's a good chance it'll be well placed to take over from previous chat communities. At least make that !random@ju.nk clickable taking me to a page that with just one click at most gets me logged in and linked; this copy and paste business where you can't double click it cos it's not a word and you can't triple click it cos then you get the whole paragraph is just dumb - OK, correction - hasn't been streamlined yet because nobody's realised how important this bit of a distributed system is yet.
Yes. I still don't quite understand how moderating works with federation (and critically, defederation). The advice of "Pick an instance that aligns with your values" is the most WTF advice I've ever seen when signing up for a site. Even worse is the conflicting advice that it didn't matter since they all talk to each other, then followed by a warning that you have to choose an instance that will talk to your communities.
As bad as it was, at least the advice of "Go to lemmy.ml and sign up" was simple and direct, and most people could follow that without getting overwhelmed or confused
Picking an instance that aligns with your values is fair enough -- except that if you're just joining for the first time then you probably have no idea what values each instance has; or even what kind of values you might be looking for; or how you might find out; or whether they are big or small; or reliable long-term instances or throw-away hobby projects.
... Like, most of what you need to know to make an informed choice only is revealed after you start using it - i.e. after you've already made the choice.
I've heard a suggestion of having a kind of 'newbie instance', where you just join by default to get a sense of what's going on; and then later choose an instance that suits you. That would make it easier to make an informed choice later; but also probably be even more confusing - since you'd still be thinking about instances and stuff, and also that you have to move sometime... it probably creates more problems than it solves.
The most confusing part was getting started, especially at the beginning when no one really was able to give good advice. Once I figured out where to start and how to pick an instance (literally randomly) I explored around. A few days later I ran across someone talking about kbin and how it may see more than some Lemmys, so I searched it out (had to really dig to find it) and ends up that's where I've "lived" since then. But I have my Lemmy account in case something goes wrong with kbin or Lemmy just ends up being a better application down the road. That's the biggest advantage I see, you can always go to a different place if the one you're at is a problem, the only think you lose is setting things up and maybe some connections you might make (although if account merging becomes a thing later on then it won't be an issue at all).
I did and still do. The concept at a high level makes sense, but the application leaves me with questions.
The most confusing thing is that there is no "Lemmy" site. Rather its a federation of independent sites sharing content and comments. This is probably good practice for the transition to web 3.0 stuff. (and its the first time that I've ever thought that Web3.0 was legit and not just a bunch of marketing bs).
Once you're on an instance, the rest SHOULD be transparent to the user.
But there are many technical hurdles (posts from unfederated instances missing, finding communities on another instance). There IS a learning curve where before there was almost none (just sign up at Reddit.com and start browsing).
To be fair, Lemmy is not mature, and the benefits of the fediverse are worth the learning curve. But that friction definitely could be reduced.
posts from unfederated instances missing
I don't think this is a technical hurdle as posts from unfederated instances shouldn't show up.
Lemmy was confusing at first, until I gave up and signed up somewhere. From then on the user experience was not flawless, but pretty solid. Default sorting for new accounts should probably be changed, but as soon as you discover "all" it's smooth sailing.
I've since moved to an account on another instance, now that I have a better idea of what I want and what the instances are like, but I only lost a few comments in that move.
The most difficult part is to choose a server/instance. It's like you want to install GNU/Linux, and you have hundreds of distributions to choose. But after you chose where you want to stay, it's easier.
Would be nice if account creation was a bit easier to be honest. Would be much easier if they allowed federated authentication with Google, Facebook or Microsoft. Just two clicks and you're in a new server. Instead of having to write passwords in a bunch of places, which is slow and insecure. That way exploring instances would be a lot faster and easier for newcomers.
Do you happen to know exactly how that all works and how it matters for individual users?
My understanding, and I might be wrong, is that it really doesn't matter which instance you join due to federation. I thought the only time it mattered was if one instance decided to cut federation with another, and even in that case it would just affect your ability to interact with the instance that was de-federated.
Kbin is so much clearer to me, personally.
Kbin was actually MORE confusing for me because of the whole 'magazines' thing.
A magazine is basically a subreddit, though. I didn't realise Lemmy called them something different until after hahah
No, but tbf I work in IT, more specifically currently in SAP Basis… so one could say I‘m good at not getting confused, by having a lot of practice with weird UI frustrations or barriers to do anything etc as that software is a bit complex.
Everything is confusing to begin with. I was born not even able to take a shit correctly but here I am controlling my bowels like a big boy (most days).
I tried Lemmy from a mobile phone and found it confusing at first. Kbin was much easier to use imho.
Did you try Jerboa? Because it has been one of the most unintuitive apps I've ever used. I'm sticking to desktop view until some other mobile apps are released.
Try Connect for Lemmy
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