Not federated Lemmy instances?
from IlIllIIIllIlIlIIlI@lemmy.world to fediverse@lemmy.world on 01 Jan 03:31
https://lemmy.world/post/23759181

Do you know any Lemmy instances not federated with other ones, living by themselves? Do you know any interesting or creative use case for a not federated instance?

#fediverse

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originalucifer@moist.catsweat.com on 01 Jan 03:34 next collapse

there are already dozens of good stand alone forum products. there would be no need to use a purposefully federating platform where half the code is put to federation. silly.

IlIllIIIllIlIlIIlI@lemmy.world on 01 Jan 03:40 collapse

That is the reason I asked if there is a reason that maybe I’m not aware.

originalucifer@moist.catsweat.com on 01 Jan 03:41 collapse

no. its the wrong tool for that job.

breadsmasher@lemmy.world on 01 Jan 03:36 next collapse

do you mean basically any forum not based on federation? like 99% of other communities?

IlIllIIIllIlIlIIlI@lemmy.world on 01 Jan 03:38 collapse

Yes, but using Lemmy and not federated.

unknown1234_5@kbin.earth on 01 Jan 03:44 collapse

why use Lemmy instead of just being a normal forum if you aren't going to federate?

IlIllIIIllIlIlIIlI@lemmy.world on 01 Jan 03:48 collapse

That is exactly why I asked. Maybe there is a reason I am missing. I expected some out of the box thinking.

breadsmasher@lemmy.world on 01 Jan 03:55 next collapse

It makes no sense. lemmy is a forum + federation. Removing the federated side, why bother with using lemmy or similar software? its like wanting a car to use to solely generate heat with the exhaust. Theres far better options for that

comfy@lemmy.ml on 01 Jan 09:21 collapse

Federation doesn’t make the rest of the software worse.

It’s not like wanting a car to solely generate heat with the exhaust, it’s closer to using a four-wheel-drive car on regular city streets.

unknown1234_5@kbin.earth on 01 Jan 03:56 collapse

well I'd say since non-federated Lemmy is just a forum with a bunch of stuff for federation that you won't use, there's no point. if you want a forum, then Lemmy is the wrong answer. Lemmy is (or at least is designed to be) an open-source, federated copy of reddit, keeping the good parts while removing the corpo stuff and adding the benefits that open-source and federation bring. with only one instance, it's little more than a mediocre forum.

Kichae@lemmy.ca on 01 Jan 04:44 next collapse

Lemmy is not a forum, though, any more than Mastodon is. It’s a totally different, if relates, form factor and provises a radically different user experience.

originalucifer@moist.catsweat.com on 01 Jan 04:51 collapse

i disagree.lemmy absolutely is a forum (subject-based threaded discussion). mastodon absolutely is not.

comfy@lemmy.ml on 01 Jan 09:27 collapse

well I’d say since non-federated Lemmy is just a forum with a bunch of stuff for federation that you won’t use

It’s not the same as every other forum software, or even every other content aggregator.

with only one instance, it’s little more than a mediocre forum.

What would make it mediocre or not is the community, and pre-federation Hexbear, or even reddit itself, is proof that you don’t need federation to have an active community, it simply makes it far easier.

ada@lemmy.blahaj.zone on 01 Jan 03:37 next collapse

Hexbear was the only instance with a sizable user base that used to do this, but these days they federate too

IlIllIIIllIlIlIIlI@lemmy.world on 01 Jan 03:41 collapse

Do you know why they were not federated and then changed to federation?

Diva@lemmy.ml on 01 Jan 04:26 next collapse

I believe they forked from Lemmy before federation existed close to 4 years ago, added things like custom emojis and then only re-merged after federation was implemented then turned it on.

Cethin@lemmy.zip on 01 Jan 15:48 collapse

Ah, that explains why their custom emojis don’t render correctly anywhere else. I wish that piece of code would get merged into the main version so it’d be less annoying.

Diva@lemmy.ml on 01 Jan 15:55 collapse

I wish they would merge in the pronoun support too, one of the better hexbear features imo.

Draconic_NEO@lemmy.blahaj.zone on 08 Jan 07:58 collapse

I’m not a fan of forced pronoun badges as an Agender person. Allowing people to have pronoun badges is good but only if it is optional. When it isn’t it creates a dilemma where a person has to choose between outing themself, or lying if they don’t want to out themselves.

As it is though, their implementation of it simply uses (or rather commandeers) the display-name feature Lemmy has, so in a way we already do have an optional implementation of it for people who want it. It’s just not mandated. The way they did it was to replace display names with Pronoun tags and have them be mandatory.

Diva@lemmy.ml on 08 Jan 12:24 collapse

The display names option does limit your actual name length combined with pronouns, hexbear it’s a separate field. I do appreciate the arguments against having it mandatory/integrated into the main lemmy. Here’s the github post about it, the lemmy.ml admins agree with your line.

That said, on hexbear I see plenty of people keep none/use name and they’ve also got specifically agender ones like null/void, undecided, any.

Draconic_NEO@lemmy.blahaj.zone on 09 Jan 03:46 collapse

Yeah the big issue with Hexbear’s way of doing it is that it’s kind of forced and can cause discomfort to people who don’t want to out themselves yet. I wasn’t aware they have undecided or any as options, I’ve never tried to sign up there and have little desire to considering among other things how isolated it is. Even so I don’t think their way of doing it is very good since it heavily limits the options people can use, and locks people out of using display names, which are extremely useful. I think a better solution would just be to increase the length of usernames and display names to accommodate users who might want to use pronouns.

Also just want to point out, it does annoy me a bit when people say Agender pronouns, since Agender people don’t have a universal set of pronouns. We all have very widely varied preferences and experiences among us. I don’t blame you for that by the way, it’s a common misconception about Agender and Nonbinary people.

Diva@lemmy.ml on 09 Jan 04:23 collapse

To be clear I don’t think I said agender pronouns in my last reply, that would bother me too- my point was that in the options available for that (mandatory) slot there are agender options - none/use name is actually the default option for all users (I made an account so I could poach emoji links). <img alt="skeleton-motorcycle" src="https://lemmy.ml/api/v3/image_proxy?url=https%3A%2F%2Fhexbear.net%2Fpictrs%2Fimage%2F59107f75-9d28-403f-9b48-ff816861cde7.gif">

I like that it’s more isolated from the rest of lemmy, the vibe is just different in those comms and I have to imagine it’s related to not constantly having people rolling up to sealion about reactionary/anticommunist shit. I do still like to interact with the rest of lemmy at the same time, which is why I’m pretty happy on .ml.

I do hope the support for community/server specific flairs gets some traction, it seems like it would actually have a pretty broad appeal and could be used for pronouns in addition to other things.

Draconic_NEO@lemmy.blahaj.zone on 09 Jan 09:43 collapse

Ah I understand what you were saying now, I wasn’t sure exactly and it reminded me of the “Agender Pronouns” thing, glad you didn’t mean it that way though.

There are other problems I’ve had with Hexbear, I’ve actually been threatened and harassed by several users on that platform, I’ve also gotten some bad vibes in a few communities there that didn’t really make me feel welcome, as a GNC person or as an Agender person. It’s hard to describe, it just didn’t quite feel right.

But yeah I do hope the user flairs get added to Lemmy at some point, it would be nice to have some of the helpful features from Reddit, like User flairs, and either post flairs or post tags (post tags are probably better since they can federate as hashtags).

Diva@lemmy.ml on 09 Jan 14:31 collapse

I do occasionally get some weird vibes outside of /traaa on there, though so far nothing like what you’ve run into. If you have any names I can look into this, I have mod privileges there and it could help me look out for sus stuff in the future.

Part of why I was interested in helping out there is because their megathreads are actually very active and I saw that whenever stuff like /tttt/ brainwormed shit came up there were lots of posters with actually good views on gender constructs chiming in to combat/explain unhealthy gender expectations.

ada@lemmy.blahaj.zone on 01 Jan 04:44 next collapse

They were running a self maintained fork of lemmy that wasn’t compatible, though I don’t know if that was the original reason

OpenStars@piefed.social on 01 Jan 18:49 collapse

Hexbear essentially predated federation iirc, then migrated to Lemmy when that became possible. Hexbear is I think roughly the 3rd oldest instance - sorting its posts by Old shows that it is 4 years old, while lemmygrad.ml is 5 years old, and lemmy.ml is 6 years old. Lemmy.ca in Canada and the Finnish sopuli are both also 4 years old, mander.xyz is 3 years old, but Lemmy.world, by far the largest instance with ~80% of all users, is only ~2 years old, being formed at the time of the Rexodus.

Read some more about it here (*don't* click the link there to follow further - in true hexbear trolling fashion it will simply take you to a picture showing a pig in the act of pooping, you have been warned) and especially here, e.g.:

Two of the sites listed there, Hexbear (aka. chapo.chat) and Bakchodi, do not federate. They are not part of the Fediverse, but they are using Lemmy. Hexbear is actually running their own *fork* of Lemmy.

TLDR: bc they felt like it, then they didn't, now it seems like they almost do again, bc facts are nearly always stranger than fiction:-).

comfy@lemmy.ml on 02 Jan 03:55 collapse

and especially here

Good to know that old post is still useful. (It’s also nice to see that wolfballs, bakchodi and exploding-heads all died.)

bastionntb@lemmy.ml on 01 Jan 03:44 next collapse

Dunno why it seems everyone is misunderstanding your post. It’s a simple question. Why all the grief? I’d be interested to know of Lemmy instances that arent federated and where to find them as well.

IlIllIIIllIlIlIIlI@lemmy.world on 01 Jan 03:50 next collapse

Thanks for your comment, I was thinking that I have done something wrong by asking this.

givesomefucks@lemmy.world on 01 Jan 04:10 collapse

Yeah, waaaay back in the day there was a couple private message boards I was in for stuff like sports.

Nowadays there’s a lot better options for organization, but via one of the big companies which requires accounts and things to happen on their server.

A closed Lemmy server at a discreet address has a lot of advantages compared to a Discord group for example.

I’d never thought of it, but it could be a thing.

rimu@piefed.social on 01 Jan 03:59 next collapse

https://beehaw.org doesn't federate with lemmy.world which cuts them off from most of Lemmy-space.

IlIllIIIllIlIlIIlI@lemmy.world on 01 Jan 04:01 next collapse

Yeah. I mean 100% isolated instances.

originalucifer@moist.catsweat.com on 01 Jan 04:01 next collapse

they do federate with others though... so not stand-alone as op is describing

ComradeMiao@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 01 Jan 05:26 next collapse

Was it for moderation reasons?

can@sh.itjust.works on 01 Jan 05:42 collapse

Context

They had their instance and community before most common ones today existed (pre API bs)

Edit: fixed link

ComradeMiao@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 01 Jan 05:45 collapse

Thanks!

can@sh.itjust.works on 01 Jan 05:40 collapse

And sh.itjust.works too!

AlligatorBlizzard@sh.itjust.works on 01 Jan 04:16 next collapse

I didn’t think your question is as absurd as everyone is acting like it is. It’s absolutely a silly thing to do, but I think a lot of the arguments against doing so would also apply to Mastodon, and wasn’t it revealed that that Trump’s garbage dump was running defedded Masto?

If you find one, I assume there will be many more terrible choices beyond just using Lemmy, and it’s not somewhere you’ll want to be.

Kichae@lemmy.ca on 01 Jan 04:43 next collapse

Why is it a silly thing to do? A non-federating lemmy instance is just another content aggregator site like Reddit.

In many ways, it’s a better experience than federated Lemmy. It’s just harder to recruit members.

Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world on 01 Jan 05:12 next collapse

Well now hang on. What if you were in 8th grade, and started your own Lemmy instance, with no outside sources, and then invite all your classmates? And then all 30 of you have a blog and you all post individual blog posts.

Seems like a very specialized use of it, and I’m not sure if teens today would be interested in that…but you COULD.

Orbituary@lemmy.world on 01 Jan 05:46 next collapse

Federation didn’t create lemmy.

comfy@lemmy.ml on 01 Jan 09:16 next collapse

I haven’t checked around since the reddit API fiasco, but there were unfederated Lemmy instances. As Diva mentions in more detail, Hexbear used to be unfederated and it was the largest of all instances. Even without federation, it’s a viable, actively developed content aggregator. So I wouldn’t call it silly, it’s a valid choice.

and wasn’t it revealed that that Trump’s garbage dump was running defedded Masto?

Gab is also a Mastodon fork, which was originally defederated before being blocked from most instances and bullied by the remaining freeze peach instances, so they mechanically removed the federation code.

I’ve also heard some special interest communities on Mastodon intentionally defederate from the broader network for privacy reasons.

[deleted] on 01 Jan 09:36 collapse

.

SatansMaggotyCumFart@lemmy.world on 01 Jan 04:22 next collapse

Truth Social.

nokturne213@sopuli.xyz on 01 Jan 04:28 collapse

I thought that was mastadon, not lemmy.

SatansMaggotyCumFart@lemmy.world on 01 Jan 04:31 collapse

Aren’t they basically different interfaces for the same thing?

originalucifer@moist.catsweat.com on 01 Jan 04:35 next collapse

they are different server platforms using the same protocol for different purposes. mastodon == federating twitter, ie 'old man shouts into the cloud'. lemmy == federating reddit, ie threaded discussions.

there are so many perfectly good non-federating server products as to make this question moot. lemmy is the wrong platform for a stand-alone environment.

SatansMaggotyCumFart@lemmy.world on 01 Jan 04:42 collapse

What if you’re using it as a honeypot and federating a copy of the data?

originalucifer@moist.catsweat.com on 01 Jan 04:46 collapse

are there jerks in the fediverse? yep. many bad actors.

many server ops will defed known nonreciprocal servers. 'scrapers'

Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world on 01 Jan 05:18 collapse

Well now hang on. Not all jerks on the fediverse are bad actors. I’m a jerk, but I’m a GREAT actor!

holds up human skull all dramatic

Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him,Horatio, a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy. He hath borne me on his back a thousand times, and now, how abhorred in my imagination it is!

throws skull at your head

…what? I SAID I was a jerk!

nokturne213@sopuli.xyz on 01 Jan 04:37 next collapse

No. Mastadon is a microblog/twitter platform. While lemmy is a link aggregator/reddit.

SatansMaggotyCumFart@lemmy.world on 01 Jan 04:41 collapse

What is patriots.win running?

nokturne213@sopuli.xyz on 01 Jan 04:47 next collapse

No clue, i had to tap out while looking at it. That was a hot mess, and i feel dumber for having read anything there.

can@sh.itjust.works on 01 Jan 19:08 collapse

I’m not sure I get it either. Is it just a url to a specific Scored community or somehow its own instance?

It doesn’t mention activity pub or federation. I think it’s just another reddit clone. SatansMaggotyCumFart@lemmy.world (does that ping work?)

nokturne213@sopuli.xyz on 01 Jan 19:22 collapse

It appeared to be a Reddit type site, but without communities. Just all of the drivel in one feed with only upvotes.

can@sh.itjust.works on 01 Jan 19:55 collapse

If you navigate to scored.co directly they do appear to have communities.

schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de on 01 Jan 15:55 collapse

doesn’t look like either mastodon or lemmy, although its structure is similar to lemmy; from the sidebar it appears they are running something called “scored” which I don’t know anything about

Draconic_NEO@lemmy.world on 08 Jan 08:07 collapse

No, they can sort of interact with each other, but the data structure and the functions of the sites are different. Mastodon is Microblogging like Twitter, and Lemmy is a Link-aggregator/Forum type platform.

Nexy@lemmy.sdf.org on 01 Jan 05:10 next collapse

Reddit

ComradeMiao@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 01 Jan 05:27 next collapse

I couldn’t fully figure out how to setup my instance so technically I am fully isolated on there lmao

Suoko@feddit.it on 01 Jan 08:08 next collapse

Those using lemmybb maybe

github.com/LemmyNet/lemmyBB

can@sh.itjust.works on 01 Jan 19:03 collapse

It’s neat, but is anyone a really using it?

Draconic_NEO@lemmy.world on 08 Jan 07:45 collapse

It’s been broken for a while, the devs haven’t really worked on it. It may be fixed in the future but it’s likely it won’t ever be touched again.

hendrik@palaver.p3x.de on 01 Jan 09:46 next collapse

Since the "forums" came up several times: I'd agree. In this case you'd choose something like Discourse or Flarum. Those are non-federated forums. And they offer some nice features, Lemmy doesn't have. A lot of Free Software projects use Discourse. It's more lightweight, has proven to be robust, it offers moderation features that are tailored to the use case, better ways to organize posts, you can mark correct answers, integrate itinto other services and do 50 other things plus install plugins. It's just better and easier to do it that way. And that's why people do it.

morrowind@lemmy.ml on 01 Jan 10:52 collapse

Discourse is more lightweight? It’s consistently the slowest loading software that I use and lags everywhere

hendrik@palaver.p3x.de on 01 Jan 10:56 collapse

I thought I did something wrong and it was just me... Alright, take Flarum then, that seems to work on a Raspberry Pi. Or NodeBB if that's still a thing... Why is Discourse so heavy and at the same time that popular?

morrowind@lemmy.ml on 01 Jan 21:11 collapse

I guess because it’s featureful, easy and they provide a hosted, white labeled service. It’s not great, but it’s a safe useable bet. Most organizations don’t want to worry about it too much

Alice@hilariouschaos.com on 01 Jan 16:10 next collapse

I’m not sure how you’d find them, bc they won’t be listed on the join lemmy page

Rai@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 01 Jan 19:32 collapse

There are some but they are filled with zoos and pedos

IlIllIIIllIlIlIIlI@lemmy.world on 02 Jan 01:19 collapse

Oof.