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Why can't magazines/communities aggregate content from other instances? (kbin.social)
submitted 3 years ago* (last edited 3 years ago) by to c/fediverse@kbin.social
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When I look at https://lemmy.ml/c/startrek vs https://kbin.social/m/startrek I see two entirely different lists of posts. Why? It's the same topic, just on different instances. How can we have communities about topics without having them siloed into their own instance-based communities? Is this just related to that 0.18 issue with Lemmy/kbin not talking nicely, or is this how the Fediverse is?

Is it (at least theoretically) possible for me to post an article on https://kbin.social/m/startrek and have it automatically show up on https://lemmy.ml/c/startrek, or are they always going to be two separate communities?

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[–] 1 point 3 years ago* (2 children)

Look at Reddit: it's gone bad, and yet millions still use the site.

Because they are trapped there. A user account on Reddit remains on Reddit, it can't access communities outside of Reddit.

If Reddit were magically part of the Fediverse then I, FaceDeer@kbin.social, could have been posting on startrek@reddit.com. Then when Reddit goes bad and startrek@reddit.com starts sucking, I can just start posting on startrek@startrek.website instead. No need to create a new account or "migrate" anywhere. The friction is minimal.

Since Reddit is not part of the Fediverse, then the only way I could be posting to startrek@reddit.com would be if I was using the account FaceDeer@reddit.com and if Reddit goes bad then FaceDeer@reddit.com cannot interact with startrek@startrek.website. FaceDeer@reddit.com is "trapped" there, and I would have to create a whole new account to get off it (as I did).

so if a community becomes "bad" enough to make me move to a different instance

You don't need to move to a different instance. I'm not sure where this miscommunication is coming from. You can continue using timbervale@kbin.social if startrek@startrek.website "goes bad" and instead go hang out on some other startrek community without having to create a new account.

Do I have to put up with a bad site as long as everyone else puts up with it, too? Or do I have to move to a smaller community on a different instance just so I don't have to deal with the problems of the original instance?

Move to the smaller instance. Everyone else can move too. It's just as easy for them as for you. Then it becomes the bigger instance.

If it's "bad enough" for you to move but not for them to move, perhaps you're being more sensitive to the badness than everyone else is. Maybe it's not so bad. If it is that bad, then why aren't they moving?

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  • [–] [S] 1 point 3 years ago (1 child)

    Because they are trapped there. A user account on Reddit remains on Reddit, it can't access communities outside of Reddit.

    Creating a new account on kbin here was not exactly hard. Is your argument that millions of people still use Reddit because they can't type in a couple of data fields?

    Then when Reddit goes bad and startrek@reddit.com starts sucking, I can just start posting on startrek@startrek.website instead. No need to create a new account or "migrate" anywhere. The friction is minimal.

    Right, but then all of the other users that post interesting content that you went to startrek@reddit.com for are still on startrek@reddit.com, not on your new instance. Now, your new instance gets zero posts because it's new, but the old instance still has millions of people posting to it every second of every day. Yeah, you have a new place to post to, but all of the content that you went to startrek@reddit.com for in the first place is still over there. Federation did nothing to help that problem.

    You don't need to move to a different instance. I'm not sure where this miscommunication is coming from. You can continue using timbervale@kbin.social if startrek@startrek.website "goes bad" and instead go hang out on some other startrek community without having to create a new account.

    It's not miscommunication, it's just that I'm removing the option of changing to a different community/magazine on the same instance. If I can no longer stand being part of !startrek@startrek.website, I'm not going to start posting to !startrek2@startrek.website, I'm going to the next largest community, which is, at this time, usually on a different instance all together, like !startrek@lemmy.world. I'm not talking about my user account, I'm talking about the community/magazine itself. If a mod on !startrek@startrek.website goes crazy and starts banning people for talking about Star Trek: Discovery, I'm not going to want to be there, even if my account hasn't been banned, yet. As a result, I would need to find a new Star Trek community to post in, which is what I mean when I say I'd have to move to a different instance (because why would I switch to a different community/magazine on the same instance? And, also, there are a million scenarios where switching to a different community/magazine on the same instance would be a bad idea/impossible). Note that when I say community, I mean the equivalent of kbin's magazine, as Lemmy calls it a community.

    Move to the smaller instance. Everyone else can move too. It's just as easy for them as for you. Then it becomes the bigger instance.

    The entire reason I would subscribe to a community/magazine is because I enjoy interacting with the community there, and seeing/interacting with the content they post. If I switch to a smaller community/magazine, that content becomes exceedingly rare, and the number of people I can converse with drops dramatically. There are 315 subscribers to !electricvehicles@kbin.social, but 241,000 subscribers to https://reddit.com/r/electricvehicles. Clearly, the experience of posting to one vs. the other is drastically different, wouldn't you say? Why would I go to a place where I have just a few people to talk with, when I could stay on the old site that has thousands upon thousands of people? The same applies to if it were 5 years from now and !electricvehicles@kbin.social has 241,000 users but !electricvehicles@lemmy.world has 315: no one will want to switch if the mods of the larger community/magazine turn into assholes.

    If it's "bad enough" for you to move but not for them to move, perhaps you're being more sensitive to the badness than everyone else is. Maybe it's not so bad. If it is that bad, then why aren't they moving?

    So now it's, "if most people don't move, it's not really that bad, or it's your fault for thinking it's bad"?

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  • [–] 1 point 3 years ago

    Creating a new account on kbin here was not exactly hard. Is your argument that millions of people still use Reddit because they can't type in a couple of data fields?

    Creating the account is not the only burden in this process, it's a whole other website you need to go to. All those objections you've been raising about "migrating content" and "migrating users" and whatnot that don't actually apply between federated instances do apply between the Fediverse and Reddit.

    Now, your new instance gets zero posts because it's new, but the old instance still has millions of people posting to it every second of every day. Yeah, you have a new place to post to, but all of the content that you went to startrek@reddit.com for in the first place is still over there.

    The scenario you originally proposed is that the current "main" community has gone bad in some way.

    Has it, or has it not, "gone bad"? If it has then people will want to leave it to go someplace that hasn't "gone bad." The Fediverse makes that easy. Reddit makes that hard.

    It's not miscommunication, it's just that I'm removing the option of changing to a different community/magazine on the same instance.

    You're not talking about federated instances, then. I'm talking about the Fediverse, and you seemed to claim to be talking about the Fediverse, but it really seems like you're not. I assumed that this was because you were failing to understand something that we were telling you, but at this point I'm really not sure any more. You appear to have some imagined version of the Fediverse that you're discussing that doesn't correspond to reality and you're refusing all correction that you're getting to this.

    Look, if you really want to stick with whatever is the biggest community regardless of how "bad" the admins have become, then just stay on Reddit. You don't need to come here. Stay on Reddit, endure whatever the admins decide to do with the site, because it's the biggest and that's all that matters to you. That's fine, everyone has different priorities.

    The reason people are migrating to the Fediverse is because it frees them from Reddit's admins, and will prevent future admin abuse by making it easy to interact with any instance from any other instance. Nobody's trapped on just one instance here, meaning nobody is stuck with dealing with just one set of admins.

    So now it's, "if most people don't move, it's not really that bad, or it's your fault for thinking it's bad"?

    Pretty much. What's wrong with that statement? Different people have different values and priorities and will consider different things to be "bad." There are people who use Reddit's official app and like it just fine. There are people who don't mind if their favourite subreddits are overrun with trolls or are lacking the best content because the good mods have all been driven away. That's fine, they can stay with Reddit if they want. Reddit doesn't have to die for the Fediverse to live.

    Do you want to come here? I've explained how it works. If you don't like how it works, don't come here. It's really quite simple.

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