The linked post shows how most non-tech people’s understanding of email is very very different from most of the people here.
I’m really disappointed with Lemmy’s idea of federation: all it is is a bunch of servers mirroring one another, but the user accounts are server-bound. No jumping instance and taking your identity seamlessly with you.
This isn’t really Lemmy’s idea of federation, it’s just ActivityPub, the underlying protocol. Having a mechanism for jumping servers is unfortunately quite complicated and it isn’t clear how it should be done or if it is even possible.
Lemmy does allow you to export and import your settings though, so you can kinda do it but you lose your history.
There once was a discussion going on to implement DIDs in ActivityPub.
Unfortunately you can’t just change the ID format as it would require a breaking change to the protocol.
pretty much. That’s why the discussion is still on draft.
AFAIK the Nostr protocsal sorta let’s you hop around, but it’s full to the brimwith cryptobros, and I’m still not sure how moderation works there.
Yea moderation becomes a big problem once you can’t actually block people. I don’t like that Nostr describes itself as censorship resistent or even censorship free, that’s not a good quality.
…
I’m not very familiar with Nostr, but knowing other distributed protocols, you can just hide messages from selected users in client.
censorship resistent or even censorship free, that’s not a good quality.
Also, wtf did I read?
Censorship-free implies that moderation is impossible. If you don’t have moderation, your social media will turn into a Nazi bar.
you can just hide messages from selected users in client
That’s not good enough. First of all, users don’t want to have to block people before having a good experience. Users don’t want to deal with moderation themselves, but they also don’t want mean people, harassment and nazis. It’s not easy to recruit moderators for online forums, not a lot of people want to deal with that stuff.
But secondly, client-level blocking is not effective. It does not stop those bad users from continuing their bad behavior. In the case of Lemmy, it also doesn’t stop their votes from still affecting your feed.
So yes, censorship-free platforms are not good because censorship-free means moderation-free, and users don’t want that.
I don’t think it matters. the specific ways in which email services work or are used are not what the analogy is supposed to explain.
it’s supposed to explain how two people who log in to different lemmy instances is different from logging into Facebook and MySpace, or Twitter and Threads.
"how does it work? aren’t they different sites?’
“you know how you can have a gmail and someone else can use an outlook email but you can still send emails to each other”
done. even 70 year olds would get it. problem solved. easy, approachable analogy.
In my experience, the majority of people doesn’t have the slightest clue how mail works. Somehow you type it in and provide it with an address into one of the three indistinguishable fields that are titled “To”, " CC", “BCC”. And by some black magic it either appears on the screen of the other person. Or it doesn’t. That’s about the amount of knowledge.
So comparing something to this is kind of meaningless.
Yup, and people younger than a certain age think email is as archaic as the pony express.
As a younger tech person, I definitely don’t get a lot about email. It’s old and weird and arcane and half it’s features that match newer services seem to be built on top of hacks that are enforced through convention alone that will break if I decide I like to format my titles a little differently. Third party clients work, but the main providers, Gmail outlook use some proprietary api to make sure their own works well while everyone else gets stuck with shitty imap. There’s endless little incompatibilities. It all just feels like delerict tower held together with miles of duct tape. Oh and I still haven’t found a good answer to why calendars are so tied up with email.
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I now after many years of living understand most people don’t care or even want to understand how anything works. It completely baffles me.
Everyone I know says I’m smart but nah, I was literally in special Ed classes in school. I’m proven slower than the rest, but I am just curious and want to understand how things work which no one else does. It blows my mind how uninterested people are in the things they use everyday
If you want to get non-techy users, then there is absolutely no need to even use the word fediverse or to try to explain what any of this means. If you want to help a friend get onboard, just send them a link to sign up on the same server that you use, or a nice general purpose server. That’s it. They sign up, they use it, and THEN they can start to learn about fediverse shit if they care to.
Yes. You can use it without understanding how it works behind the scenes. At some point, they’ll run into a situation where it is helpful to learn some part of how the fediverse works and then they can ask about it, generating more content and interaction along the way
"you know how you can’t talk to someone on Twitter.com from facebook.com? But you can email from your @gmail.com to someone with an @yahoo.com address?
That’s the difference, federated social media is like email in this way."
I’m mostly sure even my elderly parents understood it when I said it…
Me, explaining how Lemmy is similar to email…
They all complain about “Muh Open source UI bad” Ok then what is considered a good UI/UX according to you lot (Not you lot in particular I’m not trying to start any beef here)
& how does one decide that particular UI is User-Friendly ?
One button to expand pictures similar to RES would be a big improvement
Built-in keyword filters are another one
And of course, multi-communities
Don’t explain anything, there’s literally no point. Why are nerds so insistent that people understand technology?
Just tell people to make an account on any instance, whichever one you like best, and let them experience federation. Even if they never really understand what is happening they can still use the service. It’s not like any of them understand how email works, and yet they all use email. Understanding is worthless. Stop being nerds.
Why are nerds so insistent that people understand technology?
Because technology forms the basis of the online environments we inhabit, and gives us the tools to tell how, say, our data is stored and processed.
If you’re going to get in the water, it’s probably a good skill to be able to swim. If you’re going to drive a car and don’t have the faintest idea how the engine works, you’ll be at the mercy of manufacturers and mechanics.
The solution to your issue is not that everybody should conform to the lowest common denominator of technology literacy, but that the general internet user should get a fucking idea of the environment they navigate.
Stop being nerds
Never.
Nerds don’t just want to teach people to swim. They want to teach them about hydrogen bonds and the mineral contents of the water, the processes of water treatment, and the technical requirements for a functional pool.
Nerds don’t just want to teach people to drive. They want to teach them about the engine, the drive train, the underlying transportation infrastructure, and how to change their own oil and tires.
If you want people to swim or drive or use the fediverse you skip all that shit. Normal people do not care.
Stop being nerds.
Well, apparently you consider basic maintenance like changing tires superfluous to driving. Says all I need to know about your mindset on the other subjects.
Stop being
nerdshelplessly unskilledFTFY
The majority of people pay other people to do that stuff. Normal people don’t care about your nerd shit.
I change my oil, oil filter, tires, battery, wipers, all that shit. It doesn’t fucking matter though, it’s all superfluous.
Stop. Being. Nerds. Just let people be basic, stop insisting that they know everything before they’re allowed to drive.
Those other people are nerds too, now you’re gonna tell them to stop being nerds ? Why should incompetent people be rewarded ?
Rewarded?
This is about what is best for getting more people in into the fediverse. I’m telling people to stop being nerds and chasing normies away.
Nerds don’t just want to teach people to swim. They want to teach them about hydrogen bonds and the mineral contents of the water, the processes of water treatment, and the technical requirements for a functional pool.
And I think that’s beautiful. There is nothing like watching someone explain something they’re passionate about.
There’s something wrong with hurting other people’s ability to access the fediverse with insufferable nerd explanations that have nothing to do with posting.
“hurting”? someone yapping about the fediverse is a minor inconvenience at worst. A TON of people that are on Lemmy don’t know how it works, or even care about how it works, and that’s perfectly OK. Nothing wrong with going on [email protected] and upvoting the cute cat pictures.
People have been using email since they were five and all modern lives depend on it. If they don’t understand federation they will just be confused why they can’t see the content and leave. “I didn’t understand it and it didn’t work” is one of the more commons reasons I’ve seen on Reddit for failing lemmy
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Strong agree. Just tell people to go to feddit.org and call it a day
In general, wouldn’t one of the English speaking instances be a better choice?
Long story short, there is no ideal generalist instance. If you open the top 20 instances (https://fedidb.org/software/lemmy/)
- Lemmy.world is too big
- Lemm.ee is federated with hexbear and lemmygrad, something that is not very welcoming to new users (see this thread: https://sh.itjust.works/post/28798607/15305964 )
- sh.itjust.works names contains “shit”, which can deter users
- lemmy.ca is Canadian-centric
- feddit.org, as you mentioned, is German-centric, but technically English speaking too
- dbzer0 federated hexbear
- programming.dev is topic-centric (and has a database corruption for the last month https://programming.dev/post/20515601?scrollToComments=true)
- blahaj is queer-focused
- discuss.tchncs.de has a difficult name
- lemmy.sdf.org does not defederate anyone
- lemmy.zip is federated with hexbear and lemmygrad
- sopuli.xyz doesn’t have “lemmy” or “feddit” in its name
- beehaw is way outdated
- infosec.pub is topic-centric
- aussie.zone is country-centric
- midwest.social is region-centric
The next page has reddthat.com which is known to have federation issues with LW due to its location in Australia, and lemmy.today which does not defederate anyone
So Cars are designed & built by nerds, so are you gonna stop driving cars ? Imagine telling people that you shouldn’t bother trying to learn
I’m telling people that it’s okay to be a normie.
And it is.
Car nerds can be car nerds to support the normies who can only drive.
as soon as you say “make an account” their eyes will glaze over. if not, as soon as they hear “instance” their eyes glaze over. if not, as soon as they hear “whichever one you like best” their eyes will glaze over.
Sorry, you misread what I said 😅
You, the recommender, are the one picking the instance. Whichever one you like best! Don’t bother telling them anything about instances, that’s a waste of time. Just say “go to lemmy.world and post” and don’t bother explaining anything else.
LW pretty much made the Lemmyverse almost centralized, thanks to people like you.
And yet I’m the one on lemmy.ml and you’re the one on lemmy.world 🤔
no, I migrated away from LW a few months ago. I am currently on discuss.tchncs.de
I think you confused my current account with the inactive one on LW that I only use for moderating in asklemmy sometimes.
Oops, embarrassing. 😅
I have not been convinced lemmy.world being the largest instance is actually a bad thing. It’s bad for federation, I suppose, but they’re all Redditeurs and I appreciate having a containment zone for them.
I have not been convinced lemmy.world being the largest instance is actually a bad thing. It’s bad for federation, I suppose, but they’re all Redditeurs and I appreciate having a containment zone for them.
Most people here are from reddit or other centralized and enshittified platforms such as Twitter.
LW got recommended often and it created a snowballing effect, which is why it became the biggest lemmy instance. Unfortunately people keep doing it and LW admins refuse to close down their registrations temporarily to allow other instances to get some traffic as well. That’s why some people (like me) advise people (like you) to stop recommending LW over other instances.
And LW is not a “containment” zone for former redditors.
Don’t explain anything, there’s literally no point. Why are nerds so insistent that people understand technology?
All people understand Ohm’s law now. It took only 150 years of explaining.
I promise you that if you collect 10 random people and ask them what Ohms law is, at most you get 5 that knows it’s something about electricity. You are lucky if you have one that knows it.
It’s taught in every school… At least in Europe.
I can only speak for myself here but… A lot of things are taught in school. Most of them weren’t something that I use everyday and thus have forgotten about it (some more than others, of course).
Ohm’s Law would’ve been taught to me sometime during highschool (as the other commenter mentioned, I can tell you it relates to electricity but without looking it up I couldn’t tell you the actual principle behind it) - I graduated from highschool 10 years ago, and have not had a reason to “flex” that memory ever since then.
