Matt

You can have links open in NewPipe by setting it in Android’s settings:

Settings -> Apps -> All apps -> NewPipe -> Open by default

And then set things up in there

They also host a Matrix instance at https://chat.mozilla.org!

https://floorp.app

Firefox fork with features like the sidebar, vertical tabs, and more. It’s a vivaldi-like gecko browser, give it a shot.

In this case, I would check out the Floorp browser. It is a Firefox fork that plans to be more like Vivaldi and have lots of features, including vertical tabs.

Yes, because I want my friends (who aren’t tech orientated) and interest groups (which aren’t tech orientated) to be on the Fediverse.

They’re always complaining about this, that, and the other about the big platforms but they have so many hang ups regarding Fedi software, so they don’t use them.

A lot of it is perception, but you have to try and make it so people don’t have those perceptions or break them.

I don’t get this take - because if this was the plan, why not just shut Twitter down straight away instead of whatever is going on right now?

The actions of the platform don’t indicate they’re trying to kill it, just that they have really bad ideas trying to make money off it.

Hmm? I’m sorry, I’m not following because all distributions follow the same format here, which is that you flash an ISO to a USB stick (or other removable media).

This is, in fact, how it also works for Windows.

I definitely agree their website needs work, it is very confusing to browse if you need anything other than the net installer! I find everything else by using search engines instead.

Your issue seems less the command line and that things aren’t “working”, or the tools you want aren’t pre-packaged.

Using Arch Linux was not the best idea if you want something that “just works”, as it works on a philosophy where you install the minimum amount required and then add things, such as drivers or packages, as you need them. In other words, it’s a distribution where you know what you need for your system. It is also a command-line centric distribution, so it’s strange that “GUI” is your bug bear when you picked one that deliberately forces command line.

Regarding overclocking and GPU configuration, you just get CoreCtrl, which even has a GUI.

Now don’t get me wrong, I absolutely agree that everything should have a user interface as much as possible, but the whole “Linux means you have to use command line all the time!!” is simply just not true anymore, and I feel this issue comes from people recalling memories from 10 years ago or using distributions where command line is necessary, rather than something like Ubuntu or Linux Mint where it mostly isn’t.

Have people installed Debian since Debian 12? The installer is very straight forward, and Debian 12 also comes with all the firmware modules to make things “just work” for people.

I would like to know exactly what Debian does wrong other than a blanket statement of “it’s hard”.

Yes - but the vast majority of people are not going to be downloading forks or modified versions of software, they will always get it directly from the source.

The “default”, so to speak, has a lot of power.

Petitions have weight providing they’re coming from the right places. There’s a difference between the random internet petitions that random users make, and petitions coming from bodies such as unions or regulatory bodies.

This is a petition being put forward from a well known organisation, so I would gather it actually has some weight.

They definitely exist - quite a lot of them in fact - it’s just after the big migrations in 2022, the kind of people who tend to get popular on Mastodon are the more “serious” posters, as they’ve eclipsed the memers in popularity. (Eternal September kind of thing)

If you check out the explore and local feeds of instances such as Wet Dry World or Beige Party, you’ll find the meme posters, who you can then follow.

What doesn’t help either is that meme posters never use hashtags, even though they’re the primary way to be discovered on Mastodon. On the other hand, people who are posting “serious” takes tend to use hashtags a lot - this also helps skew the meme posters away from people. Unfortunately, hashtags have gone completely out of vogue and just aren’t used by most people.

Mastodon is implementing full text search soon though, most likely with 4.2.0 (the next version), which should hopefully make things easier.

Problem: Who is Mastodon for, and what is the goal of Mastodon?

From my perspective, the issue is that Eugen made something, a certain community and culture ended up forming (not Eugen’s goal, but it is what it is), and now that a different community and culture is starting to take notice, the old community and culture wants to preserve what it always was.

However, I think Eugen wants Mastodon to be for everyone, and Mastodon doesn’t exist in a vacuum, so sometimes you do have to override the opinions of those who are already there. You’re hearing the voices of those already there directly, but you’re not hearing the voices of the people who aren’t there. (and in my opinion, they should be on Mastodon / Fediverse, we’re all aware of why centralised social media is bad)

There’s a lot of opinions and views on Mastodon, and while “the users” are important, if Eugen wants Mastodon to have reach, sometimes he has to do different things. An example write-up of why Eugen could be making the decisions he is currently can be seen in this blog post: https://erinkissane.com/mastodon-is-easy-and-fun-except-when-it-isnt

And lastly, my final point: Whatever Mastodon itself becomes, users and administrators are still in control, so does this really matter? With the code being open source, with the ability to federate and defederate freely, ability to turn off features easily with toggles and options, Mastodon is not being compromised. The question comes down to what the default experience should be, and the Fediverse gives people control to still keep the community and culture they want, just somewhere else.

Problem is, like 80% of people are on Mastodon, and many features (quote posts being the most obvious one) require the people you’re posting to to have the same interaction with the post.

Using the quote post one for an example: If Mastodon never implements quote posts, what’s the point? Most people will only see you posting links and it ruins the whole interaction you’re looking for, so using another piece of software isn’t going to help.

In regards to people disagreeing with decisions that Mastodon makes (such as full text search like this), it’s a bit more complicated. Depending on the feature as well, it’s possible for the things you don’t like about a feature to still affect you, even if your instance doesn’t have it implemented. A LOT of people complained about universeodon.com having full text search, and there was nothing they could do about it (other than just blocking universeodon.com).

I’m personally of the opinion that Mastodon should use its success and mindshare to be a little more like what people expect to get people on decentralised services (within reason - we still want good privacy controls and anti-abuse tools), and then other platforms (or instances!) can then take it further when it comes to things like no search, no quotes, etc. for insular and private communities that people want.

Personally, I’d rather just keep it as “Infinity for Lemmy”, although I can understand the concerns of people thinking it’s Docile Alligator working on this (when it’s not). While the “for Lemmy” part is completely unnecessary, I also think it’s kind of good for searching purposes as it makes it obvious what it’s for. The fact that it’s called Infinity though made me realise what it was and it was quite good news honestly - if it had another name I doubt it would have been discovered/picked up quite as fast.

If you were to rename, I’d just keep it a short, related name. The Eternity suggestion is quite good, another one could be Forever or something related.

Also I personally think the icon is great - though I do wish it was darker rather than light, but that’s personal preference.

Hard to say exactly what Mastodon does, but mastodon.social’s privacy policy should give you some direction in how they handle data: https://mastodon.social/privacy-policy

As mastodon.social is based in Germany, they will know about GDPR and have to follow it to the letter.

Kind of surreal seeing my own Mastodon post linked, damn.

If you’re curious about the details I refer to, there’s an indepth article on lwn.net regarding this from 2016 here: https://lwn.net/Articles/687294/

Not sure how I feel about this being a standalone app, it already feels like there’s so many vying for attention, with IRC, XMPP and Matrix being federated already. While Signal exists, I’m not sure how I feel about it being a walled garden despite being open source.

I do love the idea of it hopefully being added to Fediverse platforms though - even though it makes sense to use an actual messaging app for messaging, it’s user expectation that you can just message people on any platform you’re on easily, it’s something Mastodon desperately needs.

Edit: Really though, what I want to see is an interoperable protocol being picked (Signal is actually one of them, FWIW, the Foundation just doesn’t federate with its flagship app due to “user experience and innovation” per Moxie), and then people make their platforms on that, just like how ActivityPub has become the standard for interoperable social media.

In your example, people who have the “bad instances” blocked won’t see the replies under the posts in question, as the instance will not fetch replies from said source.

With how Mastodon works as well, it won’t fetch replies from instances until they’re known either, so brand new instances aren’t going to flood popular comment sections - this is a bit of a con though in a way, as it degrades the user experience when trying to read threads and causes people to constantly post the same stuff as they can’t see all the replies.