I read an old thread documenting the opinions of Lemmy maintainers an the .ml instance. The issue of funding a project with people openly expressing opinions many find distasteful and it being the biggest reddit alternative on the fediverse came up, so here’s a topic to discuss it.
What should we do? What are the options?
Answer: No fork necessary, there are Piefed and Mbin.
We already have Piefed and Mbin.
OK, thanks. I guess I’ll be migrating to those and setting up a donation - if they don’t use Github sponsors.
Both main devs of Mbin support at least Librepay.
Me being reminded I have my mbin account abandoned: 👀
The Lemmy platform is just a tool to manage and delivery content. And I think it’s important to differentiate the software from those who manages the software. I can see there’s is a tacit connection and influence there. But unless they start baking inherently bias features into the software and skewing it, I don’t think it’s a big problem.
Also, because it’s an inherently federated platform, if people don’t like the opinions of those who run a specific instance, they can (with the inclination and determination) spin up their own instance and manage that the way they see fit. And that has happened quite a few times over the last couple of years.
So no, I don’t think it requires a fork really. Not unless the people managing the main branch lose interest and the software starts to wither on the vine, or they start corrupting it somehow. But that’s just my opinion.
Reactionary forks don’t have a great record of success (or even getting off the ground).
Piefed already exists (although I contest the use of “reactionary” here)
PieFed is not even a fork, btw, it’s a completely different software
Yes I know, but I was just speaking generally.
There is Piefed, it’s compatible with Lemmy instances and has a whole load of useful feature for both users and moderators.
Much quicker and responsive development (I’ve been able to get two small feature/improvement requests implemented within weeks of my initial issue post).
One of the Lemmy developers is also an admin on the notorious Lemmygrad instance.
Looks like I’ll be checking that out.
It’s great, a lot better than Lemmy.
The main weakness IMO is that Voyager doesn’t support most of the cool features of Piefed (core interaction works great though). I have yet to try Interstellar. The mobile WebUI is pretty good, albeit in need of some polish and optimisations.
Maybe join piefed and if you want block ml.
Is the code good? Are you prepared to make any potential fork viable and useful in ways that Lemmy isn’t so people have a tangible, non-ideological reason to choose your software over Lemmy? Do you have a long term goal for funding and maintaining a fork?
That said, Piefed is already a thing, and it federates with Lemmy. It’s where I’m commenting from right now. It has a better on boarding process and does a better job surfacing things I care about.
I write opensource software, I donate to opensource, I use opensource. I however can’t do everything. That is why the question is “we” not “hey @gerowen@piefed.social why don’t you make a fork, you lazy bastard”. Code is not the only way to contribute to a project and I’m willing to donate to lemmy alternatives while it is still possible for me.
Piefed might be where I start donating. Gotta check it out first.
I don’t see a “we” in this, follow the free software way: Don’t like it? Fork it yourself or don’t use it.
It will become a problem for us if lemmy isn’t funded, won’t it?
Only if Lemmy was the only Reddit alternative. As so many people are saying though, it’s not.
e.g. PieFed not only exists but it has surpassed Lemmy in most ways in terms of feature development. And it continues to add new features at an astonishing pace.
There is no hope for “Lemmy” reaching the mainstream in my mind, but with PieFed leading the way, and Mbin also exists (that sounds mean so I’ll clarify: it has <1k users worldwide iirc), and yes a fork of Lemmy could be created if necessary, there is hope for the Threadiverse (federated threaded-based conversational platforms) overall.
Try out PieFed, even just the sign up wizard will leave you amazed. Donate to both its development and the operation costs of the instance that you choose (PieFed.social, PieFed.zip, several others to choose from).
No. If the project is interesting enough for people spending their time developing and using it there will always be running Lemmy instances. The need for funding over the amount people are willing to dedicate to a hobby project is the death of a project like this.
You can use mbin if you want out of the Lemmy codebase, it’s a separate codebase that does the same thing.
Not only the same thing, some features are even better compared to Lemmy.
Usually it is as this point things turn to shit in opensource/community/fediverse/cooperative. The devs are not the product.
Who will go in holidays with 100% of the team for every product one use ?
Usually it is as this point things turn to shit in opensource/community/fediverse/cooperative. The devs are not the product.
What does this even mean? Who creates something doesn’t matter at all? If that’s the case, then using Microshaft products doesn’t matter, does it? They can provide the infra and software for bombing Gaza but who cares right? They make software that is worth using so we should keep giving them money. No problem.
Please re again my previous message. I didn’t mention any single thing of your list.
Sorry if this has been triggering for you, have a nice Christmas.
What should we do?
There is no “we” and you can start a fork/rewrite if you want to, good luck!
I don’t see the point in boycotting something that’s free and doesn’t make money off of selling my data. I suppose you aren’t obligated to donate to it, but that was already true.
I suppose OTOH, I’m not pro-tankie, but I at least prefer tankies to the fascists and authoritarian capitalists (or whatever you want to call them) that run mainstream media. Harm reduction is the name of the game IMO, not finding a platform with a perfect set of political values aligning with yours (at least for me, I haven’t run into many leftists who are also committed to nonviolence due to pragmatic reasons). The russia/ukraine stuff in that thread you link does look nasty, on the other other hand
This has been rethreaded so many times I feel like it deserves an entry in knowyourmeme. Opinions are like asses, everyone has one, everyone things someone else’s stink, in the end, what matters is you can support Lemmy without actually supporting the developers (eg.: support your local instance).
Just don’t give money to the instance they own that is pro russian occupation and pro china human right abuses
No, I think they’re doing a great job.
Lemmy works over ActivityPub, which is the thing that provides the federation, and what people has been accostumed to call Lemmy as a whole. But there is more software that works with AP. No need to create a copy, other software can do similar things (for example: mbin, piefed, mastodon, etc).
