Does the Fediverse give you hope?
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Commenting on a message board is a lot more normal now than it used to be. Facebook, Reddit as well as comment sections on YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, etc. are fairly mainstream things by now, I would consider all of these forms of message boards.
And isn’t it our job to normalize Lemmy as much as Reddit has been normalized? Though I guess that depends on your goals for Lemmy. I would like to see it overtake Reddit. Whether that’s an unrealistic goal or not, I say we aim for the stars and see how far we go.
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It could grow into something that could be used to organize locally! But for now, I think the goal should be information and comments shared on our terms, not on big social media’s terms.
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I get what you’re saying, but that train of thought isn’t very productive IMO. First, I agree with you on BlueSky, and I even tell that to all my friends switching to BlueSky, but I also believe it’s better than Twitter.
I think we should stop and ask ourselves why people are choosing BlueSky over Mastodon. How do we learn lessons from this switch to BlueSky and use what we learn to draw more people into the Fediverse?
I know I’m probably being idealistic, but I also think being pessimistic won’t increase our chances of winning in the end.
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I don't live in that country, but while I like Lemmy, no, I don't have hope any more. I've not had that for a long time now.
It's interesting though, to see the US slowly turn into our enemy, and to consider that Germany will be one of our strongest democratic, antifascist allies against the new axis of evil when the time comes.
Thankfully I'm too old to be forced to fight in the next war against fascism, but I suppose poverty and climate change might kill me before then anyway. There truly is no hope left for me.
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I agree! Another small step - though I do enjoy the like-minded crowd - would be to get some different perspectives here. Even if I don’t necessarily agree with all those ideas, I don’t think it’s healthy for my own ideas to be trapped in an echo chamber.
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In general yes, but I would prefer if it had a wider variety of viewpoints on societal issues. I don't even always disagree with the prevailing circlejerk here on everything, but I would occasionally like to read counterarguments to it too.
I agree. I like the crowd here, but I also worry I won’t be able to argue my ideas if I never leave the echo chamber.
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We don't have control of our world, we never did. Just distance yourself from the madness and embrace the good in the world. Focus on those things and it becomes your reality.
Why can’t I do a bit of both? Maybe start by voting with my money by supporting less unethical businesses.
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Mark Zuckerburg was up there at the inauguration because he is one of the richest men alive, and he became so mostly because of the platforms he owns.
By using the Fediverse and not his platforms, I'm denying him revenue from ads and data, even if its an infinitely small amount.
Use open platforms, give your money to ethical businesses and keep it from these assholes. Money isn't the only way for someone to have power, but there's no denying that the net worth on that inauguration stage was the most concentrated anywhere on earth. Don't give them a cent more.
Vote with your dollar! You can also vote by donating to projects you believe in!
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Finally some god damn recognition
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Oh, no. Not at all. All hope is lost, this is just a comfortable place to die.
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Let's not argue semantics and argue realistic uses of moderation.
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I made a post about a blender project I am working on from my Mastodon and tagged the Lemmy community. This project is pretty dear to my heart, and I wanted it to be seen by many people, so I made the same post on Reddit.
I got 35 stars on Mastodon + 80 upvotes on Lemmy + many cool comments.
I got literally no upvotes on Reddit. maybe skill issue on my side but the Fediverse is, in my general experience, so much better when it comes to engagement.
It's cause no one on Reddit goes past r/hot on their sorts. If it isn't found by people in New and given an initial boost, it dies there. Plenty of stuff has died with 3 up votes while a repost that has a bot farm behind it hits r/all every other week. Reddit now is a feed people scroll with no interaction; bots with an agenda and a select few users interact with stuff.
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Not all moderation = censorship
You play by the rules or you face the consequences. Nowhere on the planet are the consequence-free zones - at least not forever.If you really want fediverse instance where absolutely everything is permitted, make it. I bet you after the first CP post you'll rethink your stand on "all moderation = censorship".
That's quite the number of assumptions you made there
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It gives me hope. We have an opportunity to level the playing field. So much hope that I'm actually starting a show to try to help folks get to know people behind the Fediverse! I truly believe in it and hope we can claw back the internet from the tech giants.
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I mean it's really depressing even being in Europe honestly but at the same time it's a huge opportunity. It's time to take it
Let's show them how decentralization AND open source can be a new standard! I'm seeing the same trend in Linux too and this is so important as well.Also a lot of new projects to help decentralization are emerging, check https://spritely.institute/ which there's Christine Lemmer-Webber a co-author of the ActivityPub protocol
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Do paste the definitions and sources here.
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Having been around since the early days of identica/statusnet: no, not really.
It's always been small and a generally nice set of communities but it won't reach a large enough audience to matter. US (and to some degree) global politics are such a clusterfuck that it'll take more than some little servers with people discussing open source software and art or whatever to create substantial change.
that's not to say it's pointless. it's nice to have these little groups to focus on. it doesn't give me any hope but it does regulalry lift my spirits.
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Yeah but there are a few notorious large instances that censor things that aren’t stated in their rules at all.
Like criticising china or russia will get you banned from the ML instances but their rules don’t mention that.
Oh yeah, for sure(I blocked the lemmy.ml and lemmygrad instance). But there is a difference between censorship and moderation.
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the Fediverse really seems like it could be our response to these fuckers controlling the narrative on social media. It could be more than just an interesting decentralized social media platform. I really think this could be a key step in reclaiming our democracy.
Agreed, and I would add that finding ways to get nonprofit news organizations (e.g. ProPublica) and public media (e.g. NPR, PBS, etc.) to host and administer their own instances and to start directing their readers/listeners to those services would be a great way to advance this goal
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I don't think the fediverse as it currently exists will draw a significant amount of people away from it, but who knows? My partner isn't particularly tech-savvy and she was on Mastodon without me ever having mentioned it to her. She was also the first person between us to use PixelFed.
I feel like the fediverse in its current incarnation is much like the early internet. It has a lot of promise, but most people on it are those who are enthusiasts and/or idealists. If the fediverse becomes easier to engage with over time, I can see it growing in appeal. If the fediverse equivalent of a killer app or high-profile voice gets established, we could see some huge growth.
I think that one of the hurdles it will face is that hosting these instances isn't free. With the centralized apps, they have VC funding they can burn through while they try to figure out how to monetize their service and to build it to be robust enough to be stable while handling growth.
What happens when a large instance has to pull the plug due to lack of funding, or they fail because they get hacked and/or don't have working backups, or the person/people who run it turn out to have an agenda? How things move on from those disruptions will be very telling for the future of the fediverse. They're all things that could happen, and I'm sure at least one of them will happen at some point.
