I have a draft designed for all types of fediverse software, but i narrowed it down to just threadiverse stuff
This is a guide meant to be linked for beginners, to explain the fediverse in as short time as possible.
Concepts
What’s “federation”?
In easy terms; it’s a concept where instances seamlessly integrate with each other. Users can talk to each other and participate in their communities. For example, my account is on lemm.ee and the community i am posting to is on slrpnk.net, yet i feel no friction.
What’s an instance?
An instance is a server running software, with users, and communities, etc. (Each of these is like a mini-reddit/twitter/etc!) The software part is important, since instances can either be forums, microblogs, video-sharing sites, etc etc. And they can all interact with each other!
What’s the “fediverse”?
The fediverse (federation + universe) is a coalition of federated instances running all types of different software, so a user from a forum instance (lemmy) can interact with a user from a microblog instance (mastodon)
Another example is bluesky, but that uses a different protocol, and is much less effective than ActivityPub.
Why should i use the fediverse over normal social media?
Many reasons. A few:
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it can never truly die - People can always create software and run instances, and if one goes down, the others will still be up.
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No one person controls the fediverse. We are all on equal grounds.
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Unlike corporations who back social media platforms, fedi is 100% ran by normal people. You can talk to developers, instance hosters, the mods, all as normal people, and they (unless you use their server) have no control over you.
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There is no need to appeal to advertisers
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Freedom of choice. Disagree with an instance’s values, or a developer’s? Easy, defederate or just don’t use their software. You will still have the fediverse as a whole accessible to you, without the parts you do not like.
I’m convinced! How do i begin?
Excellent!
First you must choose what software you want your instance of choosing to run:
- Lemmy if you care about apps
- Piefed if you care about features/fast development, or a lightweight instance
- Mbin if you want both your blog and forum account in the same place
Instances
Lemmy
- lemm.ee, discuss.online, sopuli.xyz for general instances
- jlai.lu for french
- feddit.cl for chile
- lemmy.ca for canada
- feddit.org for german speakers
- slrpnk.net/lemmy.dbzer0.com for leftist/anarchist instances
Piefed
- piefed.social for the flagship instance
- feddit.online for an NA instance
Mbin
- kbin.earth, fedia.io, kbin.melroy.org, thebrainbin.org, moist.catsweat.com for general instances
- rimworld.gallery for rimworld content
- cesto.garden for a leftist [italian] instance
- m.a9press.com for a korean instance
Apps/clients [everything after this point is optional]
some people may not like the default frontends or want to access their instance through mobile, here is a curated list:
Lemmy
- Photon [PC]
- Alexandrite [PC]
- Tesseract [PC]
- Voyager [MOBILE]
- Mlem [IOS]
- Arctic [IOS]
- Raccoon [ANDROID]
- Jerboa [ANDROID]
- Connect [ANDROID, NOT FOSS]
- Thunder [MOBILE]
- Interstellar [ANDROID]
Mbin
- Interstellar [ANDROID]
Communities
Here are some good community recommendations, based on topics:
Memes
- !funny@sh.itjust.works
- !programmer_humor@programming.dev
- !onehundredninetysix@lemmy.blahaj.zone
- !historymemes@lemmy.world
- !youcantparktheremate@feddit.uk
Software
- !open_source@programming.dev
- !privacy@lemmy.dbzer0.com
- !piracy@lemmy.dbzer0.com
- !selfhosted@lemmy.world / !selfhosting@slrpnk.net
Politics
- !anarchism@lemmy.dbzer0.com / !anarchism@slrpnk.net
- !world@lemmy.world / !world@quokk.au / !globalnews@lemmy.zip
Casual
- !actual_discussion@lemmy.ca
- !asklemmy@lemmy.world
- !casualconversation@lemm.ee
- !casualuk@feddit.uk
- !dull_mens_club@lemmy.world
Knowledge
- !dataisbeautiful@lemmy.ml
- !documentaries@lemmy.cafe
- !math@lemmy.world
- !til@lemmy.world
- !vexillology@lemmy.world
- !wikipedia@lemmy.world
History
- !ancientcoins@lemmy.world
- !ancienthistory@slrpnk.net
- !askhistorians@lemmy.world
- !historyartifacts@lemmy.world
- !historicalpropaganda@lemmy.blahaj.zone
- !history@lemmy.world
- !historyporn@lemmy.world
- !historyruins@lemmy.world
- !historyillustrations@lemmy.world
Animals
- !superbowl@lemmy.world
- !bats@lemmy.world
- !catposting@lemmy.blahaj.zone
- !cat@lemmy.world -
- !catsstandingup@lemmy.world
- !opossums@lemmy.world
- !scrungycats@lemmy.world
Art
- !artporn@lemm.ee
- !astrophotography@lemmy.world
- !desire_paths@sh.itjust.works
- !fakehistoryporn@lemmy.world
- !imadethis@lemm.ee
- !inhabitedbeauty@lemmy.world
- !nocontextpics@lemmy.world
- !gameart@sopuli.xyz
- !wallpapers@lemmy.ca
Postface
That’s about all there’s left for you; have fun!
Finally… im done writing this…
I’m new here (the fediverse in general), this is exactly the type of thing I want to see. Everything seems much better here, but its harder to navigate (as in to find stuff appealing to you.) I will be looking through some of this stuff.
I’m trying to set it up so that I don’t create too many different accounts and stuff. Is there a good reason to go make an account on a piefed instance as well as Lemmy? Because it looks like Lemmy and Piefed instances can be federated with each other.
Welcome, Beastimus! :)
One really handy site that makes it much easier to find communities that interest you is lemmyverse.net, which allows you to search across every single lemmy instance, regardless of if someone on your instance has subscribed to one of those communities yet (which is how they become visible in your local instance search, as that initiates the federation).
There’s also browser addons that make it easier to bring up a different instance from your home instance, like Instance Assistant.
Glad to have you here with us!
Thank you so much. This helps a lot.
(Ive changed mains inbetween this posts creation but I am the same author)
Piefed and lemmy instances can 100% federate with each other, no problem. If you don’t mind that piefed has no apps or clients (yet) I 100% recommend it. Otherwise use Lemmy. PS, YSK that a lot of this community has moved to !fedibridge@lemmy.dbzer0.com
If you would like to ask me of communities that you want to join feel free to. And welcome :)
I just checked that one out, I’ve been trying to limit my social media to only computers, so no apps is almost a plus, at some point I might move my main over to piefed. Mbin seems mostly confusing to me rn.
Welcome! Other people have answered you, feel free to also post to !newtolemmy@lemmy.ca
Great work here. I wonder what the most impactful title might be. A person on Twitter may not want to join the fediverse because they might not know what it is yet, but they might be amenable to a question like:
”do you want social media controlled by the people, not bad people?”
Hmm… “Features tell, benefits sell“
Yes, features alone cannot sell the fediverse. We have to explain it to them in familiar terms no matter how good the fediverse is. You raise a good question though, thanks
Great — Just I would characterise feddit.org as for german speakers — because characterising it as for germany austria switzerland might confuse a french speaking swiss when they would be much better served by jlai.lu which has french speaking swiss communities.
Thanks! i had no idea what to call it.
Thanks!
Mobile clients: For android, I like Jerboa https://github.com/LemmyNet/jerboa
Available on F-Droid at https://f-droid.org/packages/com.jerboa/
Added, thanks!
Conversely, for iOS I think Arctic is among the better options; versus the standard compact feed view, it has a ‘headline’ feed view that makes scrolling through one’s All feed take less time.
it is quite pretty. Now we have 3 clients based on apollo x)
Awesome, thank you. Anyone who misses baconreader for reddit will feel mostly at home with Jerboa.
The Connect mobile client is really good IMO.
Tested it out but it seemed too buggy to recommend, fsr the images are incredibly pixelated? Wouldn’t be a good first opinion for a newbie
Wut?
I have tried around 8-10, like jerboa(slow but steady), voyager, summit, etc and Connect is the best IMO. I mean to each their taste but it is totally solid IMO. Have never seen any pixelated images.
How do you find it compares to Thunder? I find that Thunder has fewer bugs and more features.
Thunder was when I tested it, a perfectly fine app, I use Connect only because I like the layout better IIRC.
The only one that is really different is jerboa IMO, it’s the official app and has all the bells and whistles, but also it’s slow and has some “bugs” (error message galore for example) but it’s a totally ok app too IMO.
Maybe it’s just me. I’ll add it
Thanks!