We're continuing investigation to the performance issues, you can follow and react here: https://lemmy.world/c/friendicaworld

akkoma - Link to source

Hashtags do not replace groups.

No one moderates them. They’re easy to hijack and spam. And there’s simply no permanence to them.

Which is why, if you actually want to discuss something, it’s better to tag a group. For example, if you want to be part of an actual PC gaming community on the Fediverse, it’s better to tag @pcgaming@lemmy.ca than #pcgaming.

This needs to be common knowledge because people new to the Fediverse do not know about groups. Hell, I’d say people who have had Mastodon accounts for years still don’t know. And that’s a shame.

@fediverse

@Fediverse
in reply to Chris Trottier

mastodon - Link to source

CoolMcCool

TBH I think a lot of people (including me) have a very sketchy idea of how the different bits of the Fediverse link together... I'm still a bit vague about how my #Mastodon and #Pixelfed accounts could work better together.

There's a lot of *assumed knowledge* about the #Fediverse ... and people don't want to ask 'stupid' questions because they don't want to 'look stupid'. There needs to be easily accessible and explicit step by step instructions *to get people started*.

Where could I find a group about #ux or #humancentredesign for example? Or #photography ?

#mastodon #fediverse #photography #ux #pixelfed #humancentredesign
in reply to CoolMcCool

akkoma - Link to source

Chris Trottier

@Coolmccool The best way to explain #Pixelfed is that it’s an Instagram-like front-end for the Fediverse. But practically speaking, it’s Mastodon if pictures were a requirement on Mastodon. You interact with a Pixelfed account from Mastodon in much the same way you interact with another Mastodon account, or how you’re interacting with my Akkoma account right now. It really is just like email.

Regarding group topics, the best way to find them is to do a search on a place like lemmy.world or lemmy.ca. For example, uiux@programming.dev is one. And you can find the URL here:

programming.dev/c/uiux

#pixelfed @CoolMcCool

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in reply to Chris Trottier

mastodon - Link to source

JWcph, Radicalized By Decency

@Coolmccool I think you're missing the point - it's not "what is PF/Masto/whatever", it's "how do they relate to each other, exactly, in a way I can understand & benefit from?" I've been in fedi for a few years & have, in fact, been asking the stupid questions, but I still don't quite understand either...
@CoolMcCool

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akkoma - Link to source

Chris Trottier

@jwcph @Coolmccool The best way to understand the Fediverse is not as a collection of servers but instead as actors that implement activities.

You are an actor. A Lemmy community is an actor. A bot is an actor. An app is an actor.

All these things do certain activities. One activity is to like a post. Another activity is to repost.

And all these apps like Mastodon are just presenting these actors/activities in a certain format.

Hope that explains things.

@JWcph, Radicalized By Decency @CoolMcCool
This entry was edited (9 months ago)

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akkoma - Link to source

Chris Trottier

No, those concepts aren’t for everyday users. It’s for developers. For the same reason a homeowner doesn’t need to know the ins and out of architecture, an everyday user does not need to know about the architecture of the Fediverse.

Nevertheless, it’s how ActivityPub works—and I will go more in depth in a future thread for those who want to know.

This entry was edited (9 months ago)

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in reply to Chris Trottier

mastodon - Link to source

JWcph, Radicalized By Decency

@Coolmccool That's what I mean - I think you're missing the point. I don't think anyone is expecting every developer to also be able to explain the usefulness of the fediverse to casual users, but some of us do feel, I think, that there's a lack of fundamental recognition that developer explanations are beside the point as far as most regular people are concerned, which can cause the unwelcoming impression for non-devs that we hear people talk about fairly regularly.
@CoolMcCool

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akkoma - Link to source

Chris Trottier

@JWcph, Radicalized By Decency @CoolMcCool

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in reply to Chris Trottier

mastodon - Link to source

JWcph, Radicalized By Decency

@Coolmccool That's not what people are asking - they're asking "How does it work *for me*?".

"Like email or phones" again still only explains in the abstract, that you can connect with anyone in the same way as those things. It still doesn't explain how to use it or how it solves the things people would like to solve.

People are asking for a driver's license & you're telling them how a combustion engine turns gasoline into mechanical motion.

@CoolMcCool
in reply to Chris Trottier

mastodon - Link to source

JWcph, Radicalized By Decency

@Coolmccool Yes, I did - did you not read the rest of the thread? At no point did I say "explain it to me" & neither did Cool, your answer to whom I originally responded to - in fact, I said specifically that I don't expect you to explain it to laypeople if you're on the dev side. All I'm asking is for you - and just as importantly, other readers of this thread - to recognize the explanation gap, that we may become a welcoming place for everyone, not just developers.
@CoolMcCool

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wafrn - Link to source

Yohan Yukiya Sese Cuneta 사요한 🧇

@Chris Trottier @JWcph, Radicalized By Decency @Fediverse @CoolMcCool
in reply to Chris Trottier

mastodon - Link to source

nikkiana

I've mostly been on the Mastodon corner of the Fediverse, and I think you're right... this isn't wildly known and/or has been explained poorly.

I've had the sense there's more to groups on the Fediverse, but nobody's really mentioned where to find high quality active groups and how to interact with them outside of the ones on a.gup.pe.

in reply to Chris Trottier

mastodon - Link to source

⁂ Jnk ∞ 📎

@nikkiana I, for one, would definitely love that. Started reading this thread thinking I knew how the fedi worked and now I feel lost again. After using lemmy, pixelfed, and mastodon I assumed lemmy was just doing weird shit to be more like reddit, but groups are a thing? How are they different from a user or a hashtag? How are they created and moderared? If mentioning the group makes me publish there, how is is joined, following the "account"? So groups are like auto-boost bots?

Sorry if it's too many dumb questions, we definitely need better guides for this. Seems like a useful feature wasted

@nikkiana
in reply to Chris Trottier

lemmy - Link to source

ElectroVagrant

The tricky part is, the group-supporting fediverse software and the microblogging software need to improve how they interact for this to be as good as it could be.

Right now Mastodon barely supports group users/actors/accounts, however they're called, translating stuff from Lemmy's format in a rather clunky way. Meanwhile Lemmy also has to roughly translate Mastodon's format to its own, working pretty well all things considering, but leaving clear artifacts (subject line/first line repeating, community mention remaining shown, etc.).

in reply to atomicpoet

mastodon - Link to source

The Sleight Doctor 🃏

@atomicpoet @BenDoubleU I feel it's worth pointing out in this context that from the perspective of a Masto server, this thread features several accounts with no avi, bio, follows or followers. I assume they're the Lemmy accounts?

As a Twitter vet I've developed an aversion to engaging *at all* with newly-created accounts lacking properly fleshed-out profiles!

But it's still cool there's these options. Perhaps the integration will improve?

@BenDoubleU @atomicpoet
in reply to The Sleight Doctor 🃏

friendica (DFRN) - Link to source

Adam

@The Sleight Doctor 🃏 But you're not a Twitter user anymore, so maybe it's time to let that go. You're part of something much bigger than Twitter-style micro-blogging. Lemmy users will usually have profiles (bios) -- although not typically as extensive as Mastodon users -- but following users or being followed doesn't make any sense on Lemmy. The primary unit is the community (group) not the user.
@The Sleight Doctor 🃏
in reply to Adam

mastodon - Link to source

The Sleight Doctor 🃏

@breakfastmtn Thanks. So far I've tried Friendica, Misskey and Hubzilla, as well as three different Mastodon servers. So I do understand that Masto is not the whole fedi.

It's just that so far as I was concerned, "Lemmy" is a dead rock star who had a penchant for Nazi memorabilia.

I'd never heard of it as a fedi service until Chris' post, yesterday! 🤷‍♂️

@Adam
in reply to The Sleight Doctor 🃏

friendica (DFRN) - Link to source

Adam

@The Sleight Doctor 🃏 You should check it out. Lemmy's great! Interoperability is terrific but I think the way information and discussion are displayed in Lemmy* is superior for deeper dives and being "in" a discussion. Not at all a knock on Mastodon, which is perfect for what it is. They're just trying to be different things that have different strengths 😀

  • PieFed and mbin too, the other "threadiverse" projects
@The Sleight Doctor 🃏
Unknown parent

akkoma - Link to source

Chris Trottier

@nikkiana But this is why people have to be trained out of their mental models away from how social media is supposed to “work”.

I’m someone who writes long posts all the time. When I started, people complained. Now everyone who follows me expects to see long posts.

Basically, it should be assumed that a post that appears on Mastodon may not be from Mastodon. And Mastodon should make that assumption apparent.

@nikkiana
in reply to Chris Trottier

akkoma - Link to source

alster

Also it whould be neat to somehow see from the handle itself if it's a group or not. It's the case with the classic å.gup.pe, but I can't derive that from lemmy.ca without having to look it up.

I also find it father difficult to find groups, because the default ActivityPub-Search doesn't work that way and groups are just special users.
That's why I like a.gup.pe, it sounds a bit like Gruppe in german. Which doesn't help internationally, something like gro.up oder a subdomain including group whould be helpful and make the seqrch for groups easier, because then it's part of the name.

@fediverse

Guppe Groups

a.gup.pe
@Fediverse
This entry was edited (9 months ago)
in reply to Chris Trottier

mastodon - Link to source

Maruno Ulfdrengr

I had found this in the beginning, used it for a few days and unfollowed everything in frustration. At least in Mastodon it is way, way too spammy as you get every single reply. I don't really get why you would want this, hashtags make more sense for the microblogging idea to me and once I knew you could follow them instead things got a lot better for me here.
in reply to Chris Trottier

mastodon - Link to source

Alien_Sunset

@maruno Yeah, like i said you have to know the complete address. If you just search for, say, “knitting” you’ll get the hashtags and the guppie group, but no lemmy. is there even a lemmy knitting group? Either way it’s the same for a bunch of other topics too, unless you know the full address already you are unlikely to actually just find a lemmy group. And most people aren’t going to know that lemmy even exists, let alone that they need to search differently
@Maruno Ulfdrengr
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