What are your criteria for choosing an instance other than Lemmy.world?

Blaze (he/him)@sopuli.xyz to Fediverse@lemmy.ml – 118 points –

Hello everyone,

Based on the recent instability of Lemmy.world, a lot of people have been wondering whether they should move to another instance.

I used to look at https://lemmy.fediverse.observer/list and recommend people to pick a generalist instance with as much users as possible (using the 1m column), usually

  • lemm.ee
  • sh.itjust.works
  • sopuli.xyz
  • lemmy.one
  • reddthat.com
  • etc.

Of course, there are also the regional options

  • feddit.de
  • lemmy.ca
  • aussie.zone
  • feddit.nl
  • feddit.uk
  • midwest.social
  • etc.

And of course, the thematic instances

  • programming.dev
  • lemmy.blahaj.zone
  • discuss.tchncs.de
  • lemmy.dbzer0.com
  • etc.

I used to recommend the most populated instances, as we know that All depends on users subscribed from the instance.

However, now with the introduction of the Lemmy Community Seeder (https://github.com/Fmstrat/lcs), which

tells your instance to pull the top communities and the communities with the top posts from your favorite instances

do you think this should still apply? I have seen promising instances (high uptime, already on 18.4 that was released today)

  • discuss.online
  • lemmy.ninja
  • unilem.org
  • etc.

Would you recommend users to join those as well, assuming that the admins use the LCS to populate the All feed? Most of us remember the Vlemmy.net disappearance, and it's difficult to tell users to join small instances based on good faith, but at the same time, every instance needs to start somewhere, and they should be given a chance.

What do you think?

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High on my list of important attributes is an instance that specifically does not defederate from others. If I see something I don't want to see anymore I just block it myself. But I'd rather be treated like an adult capable of making my own decisions about what to see and read. If you're also looking for this I suggest unilem.

Not even the the instances that host outright hatred or drawn CP? Having that federate in is pretty bad.

No illegal content so definitely no CP. I believe that hate speech is banned of it meets the threshold of incitement to violence.

AFAIK you can't block an instance from your account. I.e. I like to keep tabs on the invasion of Ukraine, but one of the instances I used to use for that still federates with lemmygrad, so I would get russian propaganda in my feed from time to time. I would block that user, but there would always be another one eventually. I just don't usually use that instance much any more.

Yeah it's a pity - I hope the core Lemmy devs can find a way to facilitate personalised instance blocking, but I have a feeling that it's not as simple as it sounds.

I went with Feddit.uk as I am in the UK and it also helps give a more local spin to things because, increasingly, the English-language web seems to default to an American take on things and so going local helps counter that.

Plus uptime is good and the admin has said they will wield the defederation hammer sparingly.

with as much users as possible

Wouldn't this lead to the same problems lemmy.world is having?

I would recommend choosing based on interests, rules that align with you, proximity to where you live, stuff like that. Population is not a problem, you can still participate everywhere because of federation.

The issues with choosing a small instance (let's say less than 500 users) is that your All feed would be quite empty, as only communities that people on your instances subscribed to would show up, which is an issues with discoverability of new content.

As I said in the post, the LCS tool can be a mitigation against that.

Otherwise, I generally agree with you

I joined the fediverse a couple months ago, before the reddit protest started, admins of lemmy.ml were asking people to join smaller instances because they were being overloaded.

So an instance with less than 500 users was the parameter I used to choose, that instance was lemmy.world lol, look at where they are now.

I created a second account on lemm.ee only a few days ago for various reason, being populated wasn't one of them :)

You can lurk all the federation in clients, better choose an instance of your liking and is federated.

That's what I did, but some users are really afraid of having to change instances

I advertised my instance in a different thread. It's been almost exclusively a single-user instance, and I use both LCS and Lemmony to federate popular content. I've been exceedingly happy with it and don't plan on going anywhere, so I figured I could handle a few extra users.

So if your criteria include:

  • High uptime
  • Federation with popular content
  • Sensible rules

... feel free to check my instance out. Do note that so far, I've only defederated from exploding-heads (right-wing trolls) and threads (preemptively, of course).

I'll probably cap registrations at 100 users or so, just to make sure my systems can handle the load, then see where things stand.

If I were to move instance for some reason, my primary concern would be that they aggressively and pro-actively moderate bigotry of all sorts, rather than "both sides"ing it

100%, I'm weary of instances with little to no defederations

Lol I love the duality of lemmy: the first top comment says "the least defederations, the better", while the second top comment states the exact opposite.

I'm somewhere in-between. Defederation from obvious problematic instances (like lemmygrad, explodingheads etc.) is important, but there's no need to overdo it.

Yeah. The reason why mine is so large is because it copies over from across the fediverse, not just in lemmy.

So…beehaw?

TBF, I have accounts at beehaw, world, and sopuli in addition to kbin. Each one has its own feel, and sometimes I’ll pull one up just based on my mood.

My three top criteria for picking an instance were:

  1. Little to no defederation issues, in either direction.
  2. Likely to stick around for the long term.
  3. Relatively small.

I'm the admin of mine. Why? Because I enjoy doing, it's in the spirit of decentralisation, and I didn't want to risk being part of an instance that defederates from leftist instances like Lemmygrad or Hexbear. I only intend to proactively defederate from fascist and troll instances, and NSFW to reduce legal drama.

And this is the big advantage of Lemmy being decentralized, people don't need to choose an instance with your political idiology.

I like the sound of that, is hexbear federated with your instance yet?

Yes, has been for maybe 48 hours now and I have seeded their popular communities.

Hell yeah, I'm concerned that if SDF decides to block instance they will include Lemmygrad and Hexbear so I might make an account on yours. I assume you're defederated from stuff like exploding heads, rammy, and burggitt?

Actually just checked your list, perfect blocked instances list and absolutely sick instance theme. Love it. I'm in 😎

Yeah, all of those are blocked. You can see the current list here

Alright, I'm here. Also I would recommend including a link to lemmyverse.net as well as the feddit browser in the sidebar. Feddit hasn't shown some Lemmygrad stuff for me before.

Welcome! And thanks, good tip. I'll try and update it later today.

Also I'd recommend blocking the lemmit.online instance, it's just bot spam. I block the bot itself so it doesn't worry me but for newer uses it can flood the all feed.

"I don't defederate from leftist instances, but do from rightist instances". Okay

Uh, yes?

Just saying it's called biased

Being able to run your own instance with any policies you want is a strength of lemmy.

When you are running a mainstream public service, you should be automatically obliged to uphold every dissenting speech. Otherwise, you will end up effectively censoring free speech

I know instances don't have to technically do that. But the same argument can be said for countries too. Islamic fascist countries like Iran say, "we will run our country whatever way we want", which translates to murdering atheists, homosexuals, non-muslims and apostates, axing every obvious right, etc etc

Hey, I get where you're coming from, but I don't see this as being a 'free speech' issue. This isn't a public service that anyone is obliged to use - it's social media that I'm spending my time and money administering, and I don't want that effort to in any way spread right wing discourse, because I see it as harmful.

Similarly, even if it was a public service that we're talking about, say a national broadcaster, I don't buy into the notion that they should carry 'both sides of the story' out of a sense of 'balance', or upholding 'free speech', if the other side are nutters.

You have to right to do what you want, people criticizing your choices are those who are confused about what free speech really means (hint: it's about the government, it doesn't apply to private entities).

Free speech means they don't arrest you for what you say, it's about the government, not private entities.

Private platforms are free to do what they want, free speech rules don't apply to them.

I have already answered your line of argument in my comment you replied against. I'm not going to repeat it if you can't comprehend

When you are running a mainstream public service

What government is running a Lemmy instance and allowing regular people to make personal accounts?

I know instances don't have to technically do that. But the same argument can be said for countries too.

Any individuals claiming sovereign immunity likely need mental help.

Imho, the argument doesn't translate to countries. In Iran, the government has a monopoly on governing, and most people can't just hop over to another country with different laws. In effect, you can be stuck with a system you don't like.

In the digital world, and Lemmy in particular, the same is not true. If you have a computer, you can "start a new country" with your own rules. No one is forced to join, and you can't force anyone else to do anything. As a whole, Lemmy allows all opinions. The problem is central power, and free federated software is a solution.

I get that. It's an analogy, so it's not going to be exactly the same particular situation. My point is when MANY BIG instances choose to censor one set of opinions, it's going to stifle free speech. Until the censored people, make and grow their own instance up to the same level of popularity

I agree with that. Big players have too much power. In theory there's nothing that stops us from self-hosting e-mail, but in practice today it takes a lot to make it work and be accepted by the big players. I think free speech is desirable and wish that it was the norm. The best we can do is to use services that align with that ideal, and make sure that the system itself is built so that it is open for anyone to be in control over who they interact with. Even if that means someone choosing to not interact with certain others. As long as it's easy to use an alternative when there are restrictions.

So you're obliging people do something just because you don't like the way they operate? And at the same time call out fascism yet here you are demonstrating yours.

A resouding yes. Why should you not call out and put an end to the way Nazis, Chinese communists, Muslim Brotherhood or KKK operate? Is fighting against violent fascists fascism, in order to clear way for a free and just society?

The irony here is that you are being hypocritical. You want to end Fascism with Fascism. So you're no different than the fascists themselves.

is fighting against fascism fascist?

Yes. Because you are just going to start dictating your way of life on them. So you're back to square one with another fascist in power.

If a band of deranged communists came running towards you with weapons, because you don't agree with their idea of establishing the perfect marxist utopia in the whole world, what would you do? Sit there and try to negotiate with them? They are too brainwashed for even a single rational conversation. By sitting there helplessly, you are making their job easier for them

By your logic, the Allies shouldn't ever have fought wars against the Nazis. They should just have went to some "international peacekeeping organisation"

I just went with sh.itjust.works cuz the name was good and they were into piracy. Sounded reasonable.

it would be really funny if that instance stopped working

It frequently does sadly. it's run by one guy and I think it is starting to cost quite a bit to host. I'm pretty sure it's hosted in Canada and our Internet and hosting costs here are asinine.

I started with lemmy.ml because I didn't know what other server to use.

Then I found out that SDF, which I've used since 2000 or so, was hosting its own Lemmy instance. Since I've already been in that community for decades, I migrated my lemmy there.

Beehaw is really nice as well, that is where my spouse, who has zero Fediverse time, joined.

SDF is indeed a nice community.

The issue with Beehaw is their defederation from Lemmy.world and sh.itjust.works, which prevents accessing some communities (even though I'm not a 100% if it's bidirectional or only one way)

I went with lemmy.one because of privacyguides from reddit, and I liked that the move of actually being serious about the protest by making an alternative to move away from. Very few of the subreddits I subscribed to ever decided to make an instance or a fediverse community, so lemmy.one was what I defaulted to in the beginning. Since then Android has made an instance too, so that'd be my second choice. Anyways, that's how I decided by going with what I was familiar with.

I like having an instance with local communities that match some of my interests. I also tried to find one a little more niche, but not so small as to be run out of someone's closet. And of course, always donate to your home instance. Bandwidth doesn't grow on trees!

On the privacy side, it was also important to me to have an instance that didn't want my email address.

always donate to your home instance

Couldn't agree more. I treat this as a rule across the fediverse. Hell I spend more time on various fedi platforms than I do playing video games, so I may as well put my money where my mouth is

I started on lemmy.world, right up until their "wait and see" approach to Meta/Threads, which is when I moved to lemmy.ml.

Not going to lie though, it also seems like most of the low-quality memes/shit posts come from lemmy.world, so I don't feel like I'm missing out on much.

I initially went with Kbin and Beehaw since it was clear that kbin and lemmy were going to mostly diverge on key features from the start. At the time, Beehaw was getting a ton of traffic thanks to the join-lemmy homepage placing them at the top of the suggested instances list, so there was no real criteria that went into my choice other than that.

Eventually deleted my Beehaw account though, after the admins made it clear they were not prepared for the influx and were being rather dramatic about their defederation choices as a result. It left a bad taste in my mouth, and while I understand their stance was "safe place first, popular site second" it just didn't vibe with what I expected from an open reddit alternative.

Moved to VLemmy after that, and we all know how that went, but my rationale was that it was a growing but moderately small instance.

Afterwards I made 2 new accounts: one on infosec.pub and the other on lemdro.id.

At this point I'm mostly sticking with the Lemdro.id account, since they seem to be offering some very friendly support via their matrix space, and they have some apparently unique changes to backend to make it a very fast and easy to scale instance.

My kbin.social and infosec.pub accounts are mostly just alts gathering dust as a result.

Interesting, thanks for your feedback.

they have some apparently unique changes to backend to make it a very fast and easy to scale instance.

Shouldn't that be merged into the Lemmy platform at some? It would probably benefit everyone

I don't know enough about the specifics to say whether or not it's something that would be useful upstream. It's possible that it's just their unique combination of software & hardware that makes it work the way it does.

I'm sure someone in their Matrix server could offer more insight.

I have an account on Beehaw.org because I like their vibe and moderation policy, an account on sh.itjust.works for the occasional community creation (!olympics@sh.itjust.works promo time) and my main account on jlai.lu which is in my country and language.

So my main choice is regional, and then it's based on moderation policies & community creation permissions, etc., while on generalist instances. I'm thinking of swapping sh.itjust.works for a smaller, better moderated generalist instance that still allows community creation.

Really only used Reddit for programming related content so I chose to go with programming.dev and it's been the best choice for me to migrate to.

New communities are being added and it's broadened my horizons with a wider scope than what I ever had on Reddit. Obviously some of it is irrelevant but can easily be blocked.

I automatically selected sopuli.xyz because it is also regional instance for us finns.

Lemm.ee is similarly estonian.

A probably too long post about an entirely different way of viewing things:

I have accounts at... I guess about eight instances. I didn't see any reason to pick one, so I just signed up for everything that looked interesting and promising.

I expected to eventually settle on one, but as it turns out, I actually like having multiple accounts. I have four that I rotate between at the moment. Oh, and with the same username on each, though I still haven't decided if that's a good idea or not.

First, I have a kbin account and multiple lemmy accounts. Even though lemmy has more users, I much prefer kbin just as far as the software goes - it's just a better UI. And Ernest is awesome.

Beyond that though, each instance is a different experience, since the federated communities on each one are different, depending on what other instances they're federated with and which communities from which instances people have subscribed to. And I've amplified that by having different sets of subscriptions on different instances.

Kbin.social has a good mix of content but without most of the botfarm instances. I like that. That's where I do virtually all of my serious posting.

Lemmy.world (when it's up) has a wide range of content, but too much of it, even not counting the bots, is too shallow IMO. It feels too much like Reddit for my tastes. It is the best one to check in on for the most popular topics though, and it's where I'm most likely to be subscribed to communities for memes, humor, drama, pictures - all that sort of junk.

Lemmy.one actually feels like what it is - an instance that demands that users behave themselves. It's nice when I want to just unwind, because it's already the case that problematic instances are defederated, and I have a limited set of feel good subs there. I almost never post from there though, since I don't trust myself to behave.

Lemmy.ninja is my favorite. It's just quirky little instance with terrific admins and an amusing aesthetic. It's little though - 120 users last I heard. That shows in its all, which is fairly limited, presumably just because few people means few subscriptions so few federated communities. That's fine though - it's a selection that matches my interests fairly well. And ninjas are cool.

And I'm still on the lookout for a serious, scholarly sort of instance - somewhere that will be a comfortable home for subs to philosophy communities and the like.

My Mastodon account is on mastodon.sdf.org When the whole Reddit-o-pocalypse went down SDF spun up a Lemmy instance a few days later I asked to join They now have a handful of Lemmy instances regionally

There's also the niche hobby based instances. Such as the TTRPG, pathfinder, startrek, etc. (There's also mine for books & writing..)

I've been on quite a few. But I mostly was on lemmy.world but their reliability is low. So I switched to Lemmy.ca who federated with basically everyone. Unlike World. I was on .ml for a while too but left for some reason. I'm also on Beehaw, I like it over there but it'll never be my home instance mostly because you can't create communities and they don't federate with most of the ones I like. Being on Lemmy.ca allows me to interact with World and Beehaw from one account which is really nice. They also have really high up time!

I went with Aussie.zone and have been very happy with it so far.

I made my first account on aussie.zone since I'm Australian but wanted access to Lemmygrad, and now Hexbear. Aussie.zone is great apart from that, I'd love a local feed full of Australian stuff.

As a new lemmy user, I made an account on lemmy.world and programming.dev as I am a developer. Still trying to figure it all out but I think making my home base programming.dev since it's I think it's federated with most other instances and my all feeds remains about the same. I mostly joined for the dev communities but also want to mix in some memes and general news so I can follow the goings on of the world

I'm new to it all so I registered on lemmy.world and subscribed to several communities. I also registered and subscribed to the same communities on lemmy.ee. When lemmy.world is down, I use lemmy.ee, but those subscribed communities that are local on lemmy.world are no longer accessible. I thought communities synced over instances so if an instance goes down, communities are still accessable. Is this not true?

I thought communities synced over instances so if an instance goes down, communities are still accessible. Is this not true?

This is not true. ActivityPub (the protocol Lemmy instances use to speak with one-another) does not intend to be a redundant, distributed datastore. There are a few reasons for this. One is practical. It needs to be affordable to start a new instance. If the requirements for starting a new instance entail mirroring significant parts of the fediverse (a network of over 2 million users and 22,000 instances) it would be impossible for anybody to do it unless they were Google/Facebook.

Another has to do with trust. A community has a home. That home is chosen (ideally) because the admins can be trusted. That instance is the universal source of truth for that community. If communities didn't live on a specific instance, they would be vulnerable to various forms of hijacking. The home instance has the final say on who has permission to comment, and who has permission to perform moderator actions. None of these actions could be trusted if they weren't cleared by the home instance first. Third party servers perform basic validataion against the currently known ban list / mod list / etc, but this could easily be spoofed by malicious instances.

When an instance goes down, it is kind of similar to a netsplit on IRC. A queue of outgoing messages build up on your instance, which can be seen on your instance. Queues of messages queue up on other instances, which can be seen on other instances, but they won't be synchronized until the destination instance returns (this depends specifically on which inbox the messages are directed towards - I'm not particularly familliar with the specific implementation in Lemmy).

Finally (though not really), ActivityPub isn't designed to be a broadcasting protocol. In the case of Lemmy, and other Reddit-like clones, it effectively acts as such, but it is intended only to send messages to the places they belong. If you post a message and the subscribers to that message only exist on 3 servers, that message ONLY gets sent to those three servers, even though there are thousands of servers in the network (at least, this is how it is supposed to work in theory).

I might have some details wrong here. I'm more familiar with how Mastodon works (and how it fails) at this point after troubleshooting various problems on my instance.

Hello,

Thank you for your message. You might want to have a look at https://github.com/CMahaff/lasim to sync subs between accounts.

I thought communities synced over instances so if an instance goes down, communities are still accessable.

They are, but not in the way you think: if you follow community@lemmy.world from lemm.ee, and then lemmy.world goes down, you can still see the content of that community on lemm.ee, it does not become unavailable to you.

I hope this answers your question

i went regional for a friendly region in my main language. It has a comunity for pudus which gives it extra points tbh. !pudu@feddit.cl if interested.

I liked the aesthetic of the lemm.ee domain. Also want a general domain that has the minimum for defederation, getting really just the super problematic ones and ones with illegal content.

Same reason I moved to it from .world, although I use both.

I went with lemmy.ml

I'm glad I got in before they closed registration. They definitely seem focused on stability over uncontrolled growth.

Over the last month or so it has gotten a lot faster too, but I think it is mostly due to software optimizations

Stability – So, uptime and rate at which it updates with Lemmy.

Moderation – One or two good Admins at least to keep things running smoothly and communicate with us Lemmings effectively, and have a decent ruleset.

Federation – Wide enough that I can get the content I'm looking for whilst (likely) not dealing with nutjobs.

The rest is all good, the federated nature of everything means I don't really need to be where the communities I use the most are.

The reason I picked sh.itjust.works has my backup. Because I only heard good things about them. My main is lemmy.world.

Links to:

Sh.itjust.works is my backup too. I signed up for it first because ease of access, but then I found mander.xyz which is more in line with my interests.

definitely worth taking a look at different instances stance on defederation. after the whole ordeal with lemmy.world defederating with hexbear prematurely its worth taking the time to find an instance that aligns with your ideals and won't remove communities you may find valuable. I personally dont align with hexbear's politics but I think that its important to have an open federation policy.

For me, I would want to to federate and not be defederated by with Lemmygrad and Hexbear, while also having the same for things like aussie.zone, pathfinder.social, slrpnk.net, and the larger instances so I can pick out good communities from them. Stability matters more than size for me, I have no issues with the all feed and actually have had to block some communities due to spam or lack of interest as it is.

Also, is it the case that it only shows communities someone is subscribed to in all, or is it discovered communities?

Who are Hexbear? And why are people defederating from them?

Hexbear was a fork of Lemmy made by former chapotraphouse users when they were booted off Reddit. They have recently worked to refederate with a select number of instances, with the potential of adding more in the future if it doesn't disrupt the community they've built. Luckily for me, SDF is in the whitelist, although I also have an account on Grad and TTRPG.

Lemmy.world preemptively defederated with them based on a pretty bad reading of a hexbear announcement on how to behave in other instances, despite world's reluctance on federating from exploding heads originally.

I usually use my lemmy.world account, but with the recent downtimes there, I've been using my alt account more. I choose this one because it's somewhat local to me, and it's nice to be able to see more somewhat local news and info.

Did not know about that seeder. Super useful tool! Thanks for sharing.

I went with dbzer0 for two main reasons - pirates have a long history of maintaining server infrastructure, and joining a smaller instance fights centralization.

General-purpose Lemmy instance. New users and communities welcome! Has upvoting and downvoting. Also, federated with most instances.

I went to sign up. There was a notification that advised me to not use the main servers and listed others. I picked one randomly and I've been happy since. I pay them through Patreon voluntarily because they deserve support but they don't solicit. You have to dig a little to find it.

Kbin is superior

Seriously, what's the difference? If you are accessing and contributing to the same data pool, what's the difference besides the UI?

I haven't used kbin, so I haven't seen the difference yet.

we have access to mastodon feeds, as well. we can also block entire instances. the default site works very, very well as a PWA, the base interface has more settings options.

kbin is a lot more than just "a different lemmy interface", it also has an entire microblogs like system that allows you to make mastodon-like posts, and the reputation system is different (upvotes and downvotes don't affect how high up a post is shown, boosts are a kbin feature that does affect reputation, and also shows it to anyone who follows you)

I see the appeal, but the lack of apps is a dealbreaker for many. I know Artemis is in beta, but the dev having to build it without an API is a high entry barrier