The more people see the engagement, the more chance of them asking "what is that?" It won't be long until the apps are better, and links to articles could be less likely to get suppressed than migration memes....
Except communities on Discord aren't search-engine-facing, so they're a complete dead end. Nobody can discover useful information there unless they are already members of that particular community. It's the "walled garden" effect.
This morning when I opened Infinity to check Reddit, I saw the announcement above: they're going subscription-only. Ironically enough, I couldn't scroll down to see the rest of the message including prices, if there were any. I also couldn't see if there was a button to close the message or start a paid subscription. I couldn't proceed to Reddit at all. My only option was to close the app completely. So I uninstalled it.
That's it for me using Reddit on mobile! Can't say I'll miss it much. But I added a LOT of content to Reddit that way, so it's their loss. Fuck you, spez!
Here’s the article I’m pitching to the Atlantic about the #RedditMigration.
Title: "The Lemmy Stampede: A Grand Misstep for the Fediverse and a Siren Call for Journalists"
The Fediverse, that nascent realm of decentralized social networks, has been a tempting frontier for the tech-savvy and the web-woke. The lure of uncharted digital territory, uncorrupted by algorithms and corporate influence, has been irresistible for some. But recently, a million new faces, adopting a website called Lemmy, have stumbled into this Edenic expanse, and what was once a promising promise of digital democracy is swiftly deteriorating into a frothing Babel.
At first blush, Lemmy's explosive growth appears a testament to the Fediverse's potential. After all, surely the influx of such a vast user base indicates the technology's merit. But with a closer look, it is clear that this influx brings with it a disaster, both for the Fediverse and for the journalists who might have been tempted to investigate this new terrain.
What made the Fediverse attractive - its freedom from censorship, its decentralization, and its meritocratic conversation - has been diluted, if not entirely destroyed, by the Lemmy boom. As a million new voices ring out across the network, the Fediverse's original charm is being drowned in a cacophony of mindless noise and uninspired banter. To the erudite observer, the virtual tumbleweeds of substantive discourse are rolling across the Lemmy landscape.
The influx has also resulted in an environment filled predominantly with two types of newcomers: the technology-obsessed nerds who revel in the Fediverse's intricate complexities, and the rubes—late adopters blindly following the herd. This lack of diversity has turned what was once a rich, vibrant conversation into a monotone echo chamber, bereft of the balanced and nuanced discussions that are crucial for journalistic investigation.
Journalists, with their critical eyes and ears, ought to avoid the spectacle that is Lemmy. There is little to gain from attempting to navigate this latest addition to the Fediverse. Journalists need platforms where voices from all walks of life converge, where insightful discussions can be had, where the zeitgeist of the times can be accurately gauged. The starkly binary culture of Lemmy offers no such opportunities.
This is not to undermine the Fediverse's potential as a democratic digital space; it is merely to acknowledge the fallacy of the Lemmy surge. To view it as anything more than a transient tide of users, an unpredictable upshot in an otherwise promising technology, would be misguided.
It is time to recognize that the tried and true platforms - Twitter, Reddit, et al. - still hold the most value for journalists. Yes, they have their flaws. Their algorithms sometimes skew towards the sensational rather than the substantive. But they provide a pulse of public sentiment, a broad spectrum of voices, and a wealth of content that is essential for journalism.
Let the Lemmy rush be a cautionary tale, a lesson in unchecked expansion and an insight into how quickly a promising space can transform into a barren echo chamber. For now, journalists are better off keeping their focus on more established platforms, where meaningful conversation still thrives amidst the noise.
So, to all the wordsmiths out there, stay your curiosity. Let the Lemmy lemmings leap. There's nothing for us in the Fediverse's current state. Let's return to the familiar confines of Twitter and Reddit. After all, the bird still tweets, and the front page of the internet still turns.
Note: I’m not actually sending this article to The Atlantic, but if I did, they’d probably publish it.
Most people aren't even thinking of moving to reddit alternatives. Users have a lot of power in this situation. Just move your community to Lemmy or Kbin. It's not that hard.
That's probably a problem with the specific instance you were trying to sign up on, rather than on Lemmy as a whole. You might want to try picking a different instance.
God, I hope so. I don't see any way to stop the billionaires from killing off our species, at this point. But I want to at least see those psychotic monsters suffer before we all go!
This might sound childish, but there's an old EP of lullabies that my parents used to play and sing for me long ago. Decades later, I got a copy to play and sing for my own son.
It's called Golden Slumbers: Lullabies From Near and Far (1956). It's not available digitally and was never released on CD, so I ripped the EP and posted it to YouTube at the link above. It's really relaxing.
Reddit used to be a great platform to discuss some topic and get different points of few in a friendly but factual manner. However, slowly it seems like the platform has become a lot more like Facebook, where it's been invaded by toxic people that are constantly looking for opportunities to shit and hate on others....
Yeah, I'm another old school early adopter who was on the internet since the '80s. No way the enshittification and souring of Reddit was caused by boomers and Gen xers. Most of them wouldn't know how to get on, and those who would... Honestly, I'm the only boomer I know who is on there. Well, unless you go to some of the subreddits that are specifically for people over 50. And those people are incredibly nice! One of the few things I will really miss about Reddit.
I downloaded these every week from The Onion long ago. They've been unavailable online for many years; even the Internet Archive was missing a lot of them. Which is a pity, because they're incredibly funny. Recently I assembled them into a single collection, filling in some of the gaps with supplements from the IA, and posted the whole collection. There are 40 files. As far as I know, this is the most complete archive available anywhere.
I downloaded these every week from The Onion long ago. They've been unavailable online for many years; even the Internet Archive was missing a lot of them. Which is a pity, because they're incredibly funny. Recently I assembled them into a single collection, filling in some of the gaps with supplements from the IA, and posted the whole collection. There are 40 files. As far as I know, this is the most complete archive available anywhere.
I downloaded these every week from The Onion long ago. They've been unavailable online for many years; even the Internet Archive was missing a lot of them. Which is a pity, because they're incredibly funny. Recently I assembled them into a single collection, filling in some of the gaps with supplements from the IA, and posted the whole collection. There are 40 files. As far as I know, this is the most complete archive available anywhere.
I have a bunch of very rare comedy MP3s that I collected long ago from the web. They're not available online now, for the most part. They're REALLY funny, and I'd like to make them available on Lemmy. Any idea how I could post them? I have 40 files.
Do you know there's a #fediverse alternative to Amazon-owned #Goodreads? #BookWyrm is a social network for tracking your reading, writing reviews, and discovering what to read next. You can follow and interact with users on different #BookWyrm instances and on #Mastodon. You can import from a Goodreads CSV export. You can create...
I'm on StoryGraph too (and BookWyrm), but I've been burned WAY too often by profiteers. GoodReads in particular is seared into my memory; their owners lied to users to get tens of thousands of free hours of labor out of us (to "save GoodReads from Amazon"), all while they were negotiating to sell out to Amazon! And then Amazon immediately started censoring and shadowbanning reviews to suit their corporate bottom line.
I've seen far too many great digital communities destroyed by greedy vulture capitalists. I'm done. If a service has a single owner - plutocrat or corporation - it automatically goes to the bottom of the list. I'll stick with BookWyrm, thanks! It may be a little light on features so far, but I'd rather put my work in there and wait for improvements.
As title. Even better if whatever you use also helps with recommendations! I’ve been mostly using Goodreads, but Bookwyrm looks like a neat decentralized alternative. Does anyone have any experience with it?
I don't really track my reading. Maybe I should have, but I never really saw the point. Besides, most of my reading predates the web. I've been reading since 1966. That said, I did a TON of book recommendations on Reddit at r/booksuggestions and r/SuggestMeABook. I ended up creating a Google doc to store the recommendations I wrote for re-use. That turned out to be a good idea; I separated the recs into genres, and polished them as I noticed mistakes or areas for improvement.
Eventually someone asked me to make that Google doc public, so I did.
Meanwhile I'm on BookWyrm. I was part of a group that left GoodReads when Amazon took over; we set up a community on Google Plus (RIP) to search for alternatives to GoodReads and Amazon (see what I mean about greedy corporations destroying one community after another?). We set up a research project to find and test replacement services. If BookWyrm had existed back then, it would have been far and away the best choice. It needs more development, but I'm willing to wait for that to happen. Meanwhile I'm having fun with it.
One thing for sure: I will NEVER trust a service owned by a plutocrat or corporation ever again.
Imagine Lemmy becoming so popular it drives Reddit to support ActivityPub or go extinct
Reddit would become compatible with Lemmy essentially making it it's own "instance", and suddenly 3rd party apps work with Reddit again....
Rather than telling Reddit users to migrate, share links to Fediverse posts to drive them here
The more people see the engagement, the more chance of them asking "what is that?" It won't be long until the apps are better, and links to articles could be less likely to get suppressed than migration memes....
The Four Best Reddit Alternatives (lifehacker.com)
As Reddit melts down, users are fleeing to lemmy, kbin, tildes and more.
I don't understand why people still want to use reddit instead of moving to Lemmy or Kbin
Most people aren't even thinking of moving to reddit alternatives. Users have a lot of power in this situation. Just move your community to Lemmy or Kbin. It's not that hard.
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Is this the beginning of the next tech bubble bursting?
Original take found on another forum....
Why is Lemmy called Lemmy?
Reddit is called as such because “I read it on Reddit”
What song do you listen to when you are upset and want to calm down?
In my case I always like listening to "A whiter shade of pale", it always works.
Why are conversations on Reddit often so hostile and toxic now days?
Reddit used to be a great platform to discuss some topic and get different points of few in a friendly but factual manner. However, slowly it seems like the platform has become a lot more like Facebook, where it's been invaded by toxic people that are constantly looking for opportunities to shit and hate on others....
Reddit refugees assemble!!!
Nothing important here. I just want to see how many people are moving away from Reddit.
Rambling Readers (@ramblingreaders@toot.community) (toot.community)
Do you know there's a #fediverse alternative to Amazon-owned #Goodreads? #BookWyrm is a social network for tracking your reading, writing reviews, and discovering what to read next. You can follow and interact with users on different #BookWyrm instances and on #Mastodon. You can import from a Goodreads CSV export. You can create...
What do people use to track their reading?
As title. Even better if whatever you use also helps with recommendations! I’ve been mostly using Goodreads, but Bookwyrm looks like a neat decentralized alternative. Does anyone have any experience with it?