Mastodon and Lemmy both use the same underlying protocol, but are fundamentally different types of content with different paradigms for interacting with it.
There are folks working on combining the two into an app or platform - Kbin is one - but mashing the content together is going to give the garbage UX you describe.
Kbin is a Lemmy clone that has a mastodon client built in. It uses slightly different terminology (e.g. magazines instead of communities) but is otherwise functionally the same.
So I’ve since gathered that this isn’t true. As I understand, and I could be wrong, Kbin doesn’t provide a feed of the people you follow in the same way mastodon etc do. Instead the microblog view is a view of the comments in all the magazines without being organised under posts. It’s like the “comments” view we have here on lemmy but threaded (I asked if we could have the same here: lemmy.ml/post/1932250).
Instead the microblog view is a view of the comments in all the magazines without being organised under posts.
No, that's absolutely not the case. From the microblog feed, I'm able to find my own posts from Calckey and PixelFed (e.g. https://kbin.social/u/@[email protected]), neither of which have touched or in any way interacted with n a kbin magazine.
You can follow users on kbin, but AFAICT you don't have home or local timelines, only federated/global. Instead, these stream of posts that are not addressed to a Group actor can be mined for hashtags by magazines, and those posts with matching tags get shown in a magazine's Microblog tab. Any posts that are untagged, or which cannot be assigned to at least one magazine, get dumped into m/random's Microblog feed.
Threads are specifically addressed the Group Actors. Comments belong to whatever they replied to. Microblog posts neither address a Group Actor nor are in reply to a thread or thread comment, and so are fundamentally detached from the core threadiverse ecosystem.
And yea, I was aware of the m/random feed and it being basically a global feed. I obviously wasn’t clear on what exactly goes in there.
But, as someone who doesn’t find the global/federated feed useful/interesting (and from polls I’ve seen, this is the same for most people), I don’t think the microblog view would hold any value for me or most people for that matter.
It kinda does. But the problem is the microblogs people post to the groups on kbin drown it out.
I followed elonjet on my instance. If I click on the main kbin page then microblog (NOT from a group, since it will filter only microblogs to the group) and scroll I will find the elonjet updates along with all the other stuff people probably mistakenly posted by clicking + and then add post instead of add thread (probably because reddit called them posts).
So it does work correctly. If you filter out all the microblogs that were probably posted by mistake.
Oh and you can get directly to only the specific content by clicking your name in top right, profile, followed and choosing the followed user. You'll see all their posts there.
As mentioned by @Kichae above, the microblog section, while it will contain posts by people you follow, seems to essentially be a global or federated feed of everything that goes through the instance … so it’s not just the microblogs posted to groups drowning things out then … ?
How would you filter out all of the microblogs posted by mistake? If the microblog section is like a global feed, how could you filter out everything but those you follow?
I don’t want to be too critical of kbin here, especially as it’s young platform with a bright future, but it shouldn’t be too hard to explain how to get a feed of the people you follow … right? Unless it’s just not possible? In which case, people should really stop saying that kbin is lemmy + mastodon. From the perspective of writing posts to both platforms, it seems to fit the bill nicely, especially with the nice hashtag->magazine feature. But for reading a feed, it appears to not have the mastodon side covered at all.
Is this on the roadmap (I would guess so)?
IMO, there is a tad too much “hype” or “overselling” happening on the fediverse. Excitement is good, obviously. But I’ve seen a bit too much factually incorrect statements about what is possible with a specific platform, which, IMO, only do harm by either leading someone to disappointment or feeling like a platform is too hard to use because they can’t work out how to do something that isn’t actually possible. I certainly felt that way about kbin and getting a feed of those I follow and dismissed it as having a bad UI, now I realise that I was under a false impression.
You could make a report here suggesting an enhancement.
But what comes into the feed is anything posted on kbin as a microblog (potentially by mistake) or, from mastadon where they tagged a community subscribed to.
It isn't normal threads to groups that end up there.
Just looking at the current feed on my instance (you can see yourself, you don't need to login https://kbin.life/microblog) the first item is from a mastadon user that tagged the [email protected] group. Hence why it shows up there since the instance takes content from there.
The next 2 items are clearly people on kbin.social that mistakenly (well maybe deliberately, but I suspect not) create a post, not a thread in the [email protected] group.
You can tell which is which, the mastadon users are deliberately using hashtags and tagging groups with @. The others are making a very reddit style post that is turning up in the wrong place because they chose post, not thread.
But I think it'd be a nice option to just show followed people and not groups. Maybe a three way toggle. People, Groups, All.
Thanks! It’s an interesting point you make about the user mistakes. Names are annoyingly important huh!
I’m on kbin.social, and the microblog page there just now seems to show posts from mastodon accounts that aren’t using hashtags or tagging a community: kbin.social/microblog
OK then I can see what's happening and there needs to be filtering added (and not just by magazine as it allows now).
I think it's putting into random microblog posts by anyone that any user followed. In fact, you can confirm it easily by scrolling down on my one while not logged in. I mentioned I only followed elonjet. And sure enough there's some posts by elonjet a bit further down, but otherwise it's just mastadon users tagging groups or kbin users making a mistake.
Simply merging the two feeds doesn’t make sense. But there are, I’d say, more than one level of integration, all of which are useful.
Single app that allows you to sign in to both platforms with two accounts. Both platforms are presented in separate views, but you only have one app that also manages all of the peripheral preferences like theme, notifications etc.
Single app that partially fuses the two platforms without simply providing two completely different views.
EG … all feeds of communities/magazines can be listed under “groups”, all users under “people”, and all notifications from both platforms (including “DMs”) under one list/feed
Some special aggregation service that you only need to create one account for but that provides you access to multiple platforms with proxy accounts. IF such a thing were to exist, there’d probably a whole range of possible hacks .
Worked at walmart many, many years ago on a cash register. One day, someone was out, so I got moved to the floor to make the shelves look pretty. It involved putting stuff like this where it belongs, and it was, by far, the best day I had working at walmart. I’ve never understood the complaints from employees who have to do this.
I have high hopes for Lemmy, but I don’t think that having a lot of users is going to be a super positive thing in the long term. It’d be great if it could feel like younger Reddit for longer than younger Reddit did, you know? Stay at least a little under the radar.
I think because of federation, even if lemmy blows up, smaller instances and communities will be able to exist still. Over on Mastodon, the big instances have grown up quite a bit, but there is also many thriving smaller communities that either aren’t federated with the big instances, or federated very selectively to curate the community they want.
Somewhat but reddit drew a lot of people in with celebrities. The people attracted to celebrities and image heavy content will be more drawn to Threads instead of Lemmy. At least imho
Reddit was and is impossibly easy to use. You visit the site and start scrolling. If and when you decide you want to participate you create and account and start doing so.
The barrier to entry on Lemmy is much higher. This will keep out many of the types of low effort users that would eventually turn this into reddit.
Maybe someday the fediverse will be as obvious to everyone as any other part of the internet but it’s definitely not right now and it will be awhile before it is.
It definitely took me a bit to wrap my head around the fediverse, but the presence of a “main” site (in this case, Lemmy.world, or in Mastodon’s Mastodon.social) has made it pretty easy for me. I hate that crypto nerds took “web3.0” because I think, in most ways, the true inter-operability of social networks is the next “web2.0”-tier step that the internet can take.
I honestly hope lemmy will not die. It will have to become simpler though. For many people, it will be simply way too complicated to wrap their head around the fact of many instances and most of them will worry about not being able to interact with people from other instances.
Also, the main lemmy web app is not necessarily good and alternatives such as wefwef are far easier to use.
We just need to be better about simplifying the explanation. Don’t tell people “it’s a federated website using an activitypub backend to communicate like mastodon, but only links to federated lemmys not including mastodon instances…” Tell them “it’s a fourm that shares posts and comments with other fourms that agree to work together”. If they want more detail they can easily find it themselves.
I feel like the explanation using email as an example works pretty well. Most people understand how different emails from different providers can communicate, but their account is hosted on one platform.
Even better is to talk about phone carriers, because people seem to know those better than emails these days. “Just because your phone is using Carrier A doesn’t mean you can’t call your friends on Carriers B and C”
Federation is the invisible glue that makes it all work… I have my own server but i can talk to you on lemmy.world without having to think about it or do anything special. Most people joining in the future won’t need to care federation even exists, just like they don’t care SMTP exists.
That said I suspect there will be a few mega servers anyway… just like gmail… people seem to like being where everyone else is.
I had a similar thing happen with my keys not too long ago. They had fallen from a cabinet and managed to get stuck halfway down a radiator besides it. Spend a boat load of effort cutting off the lock off my bike…
In looking for a replacement for Reddit, I came across this. I’m hopefully optimistic. The last straw for me in a long list of issues that I have with Reddit came yesterday. Lemmy has a long way to go, but I’m moving away from Reddit and will become active here.
Perma banned from r/Libertarian and a 3 day site suspension for saying “The cop would have had to shoot me too after that. Gun or no gun, I would have beat him within an inch of his life until I succumb to my wounds. My dogs are part of my family.” In response to a posted video of an Ohio LEO shooting and killing a Golden Retriever in front of her owner, while smiling and wagging its tail. Absolutely horrific watch.
ETA: I still can’t get the images from this video out of my head. If you love animals, do not watch it, it will only anger you and upset you for days. I meant what I said and to be banned by a Libertarian sub for saying it was a kick in the balls.
“I dunno this seems pretty intense for – wait, protecting your family? Your pets?! They did what to that dog?! Nevermind then, this isn’t intense enough.”
My mental processing of your comment as I read more and more
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