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For the past three years dessalines and I have been funded to work on Lemmy full-time by generous support from the NLnet foundation. These donations are paid out when we implement certain new features. But now we are busy answering questions, reviewing pull requests and urgentlyfixing problems. That means we are unable to work on the milestones agreed with NLnet, and won’t receive payments from them.
:(
I had such a hard time explaining to someone today that there is no universal set of Lemmy rules/politics and you can run your own instance with literally 0 rules
people have forgotten that things can exist outside of the few billionaire/trillionaire closed source walled gardens they’ve become so reliant on
Yeah, I think that’s great. I think it’s awesome that something like Lemmygrad can exist, while also a community criticizing Lemmygrad (there are several) all on the same platform, and without any real central control.
If you don’t want to see certain content, you can block it and move on, while getting the benefits of federation.
I joined communities from a half dozen instances, and I’ll probably join communities from even more as I get better at finding communities.
The communities trying to pillarize the entire fediverse over calling lemmygrad hate speech are, however, not a great thing. Undermining the interconnectedness of the platform at scale by agitating on other platforms that they blacklist or be blacklisted under false pretenses may as well be precision-engineered to negate what is useful about the platform.
liberals crave control over the narrative, which is what they enjoyed at reddit with the site admins putting their thumbs on the scales for their opinions
For us maintainers (dessalines and nutomic), it has resulted in an endless stream of questions and notifications, which is impossible to keep up with. Previously there were 5 - 10 Github notifications per day; now they have risen to over 100 daily.
That is what i was worried about, Feedback for developers probably correlates with the number of active users , more users mean more feedback (github issues and comments) and more stuff to read, I thought this might not be a problem because i looked at mastodon and didn’t see a lot of issues getting opened in a day, but it’s the comments that could be the real problem, unless you will improve your funding and start hiring more people (even temporarily hiring freelancers) things will probably get worst and you will lose a lot of good feedback.
We are increasingly reliant on user donations to pay our bills. These donations currently add up to 1500 Euros per month, which is not even enough to pay minimum wage for the two of us. Hopefully more users can consider donating, so that we can put our full attention to making Lemmy better for everyone, and possibly add more developers to our worker co-op in the future.
looking at liberapay , patreon and opencollective my calculation says you are getting about 4465 dollars (2714+217.58*4.345+806) when this comment was written , that’s about 0.15 dollar per active user (assuming about 28K monthly active users).
For comparison beehaw has about 3069 monthly active users and got this month (6/1/2023 -> 6/17/2023) about $3,461.60 ( 1.12 dollar per user, probably better then reddit for most of it’s history).
So i am pretty sure the problem is with getting funding (most people are not aware of the option to donate, or/and are not convinced or incentived to do it). Lemmy should work on it’s conversation rate.
If you are interested, i worked for a while on a guide to help fund open source and got some good feedback on it, maybe you will find it useful.
From what I’ve seen, the fediverse generally is doing a rather poor job of normalising donations from users. If you have some expertise or experience in this domain, and are willing, I’d urge you to just get involved and gather people or whatever you can to create better tools or design patterns or strategies for this.
I suspect there’s trepidation from developers to get to “pushy” with donations and so turn off their user base, and yet they don’t really no how to go about it well and so it just becomes a lost issue when in reality it is central to a “free” fediverse.
I also worry that getting this right earlier rather than later is important. As people join the fediverse, they absorb the culture, norms and design language of the place. The earlier donations are just a normal part of things, the sooner they’re actually normalised.
On another topic, there are rumors circulating that we are fascists or supported genocide. These claims are completely false, and like most viral twitter threads, are coming from a single Mastodon user on a personal vendetta who didn’t provide any sources. Such slander doesn’t deserve any response and is best left ignored.
- Previous discussion on the moderation policy on lemmy.ml including response from @dessalines@lemmy.ml : Expressing concerns about moderation policy on lemmy.ml
- Accusation of a Mastodon user (probably the one they are referring to): https://mstdn.social/@feditips/106835057054633379
- Essays from @dessalines@lemmy.ml: https://github.com/dessalines/essays/blob/master/socialism_faq.md
So um, no one on the face of this earth hates fascism more than a communist, the evidence you dug up only seems to reinforced the not a fascist and its utterly rediculous to call us that.
Nothing here says he’s a fascist. His “genocide denial” stance stems mostly from the idea of being anti-capitalist and not trusting US-centric sources. Its not entirely without merit. Noam Chomsky for example is accused of the same thing for the Pol Pot genocide, though at the time he was right for the same reasons – accusations started flying in the US based on completely banal sources.
I used to be like this, its not entirely harmful. And in any case, I don’t give a shit about his politics. We should be thinking about how to separate peoples politics from the platform, and the work hes done on Lemmy does exactly that.
Noam Chomsky for example is accused of the same thing for the Pol Pot genocide, though at the time he was right for the same reasons – accusations started flying in the US based on completely banal sources.
You’re giving Chomsky’s version of the story, but it’s such a weird story because one of the only communist projects Chomsky ever spoke in favor of was easily one of the worst ones (along with Peru), ones that even hardcore “tankies” disavow. Like, wasn’t this the motherfucker that said the dissolution of the Soviet Union was a victory for the “left”?
Granted, there is misreporting on Cambodia, which started when it was contemporary and continues to this day, but that misreporting is mostly on the magnitude of the crimes committed, not the basis of calling them crimes (i.e. they were still awful).
He didn’t speak in favor of it. Sources came up saying millions were being killed in Cambodia. Chosmky questioned the sources saying “where the fuck is this coming from? Nothing supports this”. Thats his version of the story, yeah but hardly any evidence he supported Cambodia.
Noam Chomsky for example is accused of the same thing for the Pol Pot genocide, though at the time he was right for the same reasons
It’s also a valid opinion to criticize Chomsky for his reaction to the Cambodian genocide.I can’t recall all the details of how things went down, so I have no comment myself, but I do have other criticisms of him.
It doesn’t make him a fascist, or a Nazi/Nazi sympathizer. That would detract from what I have to say about the people who actually are, since that’s a separate conversation. Same goes for the devs perhaps (but that’s also a separate conversation).
It is extremely harmful when people like them go around non-tankie left wing subs and eventually gain control through nefarious means and eventually transition it into yet another tankie propaganda sub. Or when they moderate a supposedly general left wing sub but any criticism of authoritarian communism gets you muted and called a liberal, eventually allowing their propaganda to seep through to regular socialists as any criticism is shot down. /r/GreenAndPleasant is guilty of the latter.
It’s not really the politics but the way power hungry people get.
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Your point being?
This is doxxing. People have different usernames for a reason.
None of what you linked supports any of the claims that they are a genocide supporter or a fascist, if that’s what you tried to show (in fact you proved the complete opposite on the latter).
See, it’s all this stuff that really makes the
Such slander doesn’t deserve any response
statement feel very Steve Huffman to me. It very clearly does deserve a response because the problem doesn’t end with just saying “nope lol that’s not us” and people like me have to go digging through all this bullshit just to figure out the facts: they believe anti-China news and similar is U.S./media propaganda and will moderate opposing viewpoints with “Orientalism” bans and similar. That’s not a hard statement to type, and if this viewpoint is in good faith then I struggle to see why they refuse to just say that and consistently resort to “if you don’t like our moderation policy feel free to join/start a different instance!” without ever actually clarifying the moderation policy. Even lemmygrad pretty much says outright “if you like capitalism, fuck off.”
makes the statement feel very Steve Huffman to me
Then you didn’t read it, they link a page that clears up their position on it right below that sentence: https://join-lemmy.org/docs/en/users/07-history-of-lemmy.html
I mean, dude’s not CEO, he doesn’t control the instances. He does own a very large instance, but I don’t think it’s even the most dominant instance post-redditting.
I disagree with his views, though I will admit to some sympathy on some aspects (not the genocide stuff), but ultimately, he’s just a dude who makes this software. He doesn’t own it, he doesn’t have a monopoly on its control, and really, the entirety of the Fediverse could, if he went full Huff, say “fuck you” and defederate his instance. That’s the power of a distributed service. Heck, your own instance, kbin.social, could lemmy.ml at any time and it’d have little impact overall.
Even were I to concede to him being “Huffman-like” (which I do not agree with), I don’t think he’s actually relevant enough in the real-world usage of the software to care about as far as that goes.
though I will admit to some sympathy on some aspects (not the genocide stuff)
I mean, no one is supporting a genocide or speaking in favor of one, and the US has a documented history of using atrocity propaganda that is completely without basis. Probably the most powerful thing about that particular genre of slander is that it is taboo to denounce it for fear of looking like a “denialist” in the manner of a Holocaust denier, allowing the west to cynically exploit the generational trauma of a genocide it subsidized in order to degrade the reputations of its opponents on the imperial periphery.
Having gotten involved a bit over the last week, I think he’s generally a good guy. I disagree with his politics, but none of that has anything to do with software development. He writes good code, and when he’s not overwhelmed with nonsense, he’s quite helpful.
There’s another major dev, but I don’t know anything about him. I think they just want to build a cool tool that they can use to provide a safe space for discussion, and they want to make that available to others as well. That’s pretty cool, and that’s something I can support.
Ya, I don’t have any personal interactions with him and am withholding real judgement without. Even his politics, it’s hard for me to really condemn him when I don’t even know the lens he’s viewing things through. End of the day, I’m taking a best guess based on a few (3?) instances where he’s ever been recorded saying something that’s shit.
But also, even the worst tankie’s better than the best right winger, any day.
Eh, I consider myself to be the opposite of both politically, but I have no problem contributing to FOSS projects lead by either. But I agree in general, I’ve had better luck with socialists than fascists when it comes to FOSS.
Slightly contra- the other user that responded to you, I need to ask: You’ve spoken with rightwingers before, right? Most westerners have had the “privilege” at least a few times to allow such people to speak for themselves. Have you ever had an even slightly comparable interaction with a “tankie” where they also got to speak for themselves, rather than be told about what they believe third-hand?
I am a marxist Lenninist, and I can and do speak for myself.
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Just made a donation on Liberapay, thanks for everything that you’ve done!
I subscribed to their Patreon. I don’t pay for subscriptions normally, but for an open source platform I’ll gladly pay to keep it that way!
Same. I also ent ahead and became a regular patreon giver. Only 10 a month but its far better than buying some dumbass blue check or waiting for reddit to do the same since the CEO clearly loves him some Elon.
It’s upsetting to see the shit-talking because I imagine reading that nonsense is emotionally draining, especially when you’re already stressed out with a billion things to do. I’ve seen you guys active in the lemmy community for years and you’ve always been wonderful. I’m sure I’m not the only one who appreciates the work you two have put in and are currently putting in. I’m really happy that your project is starting to catch on.
Honestly we’re all adults here and we all know how the Internet works. Best to not feed the trolls and ignore them. The more attention you give the more it gives the appearances that their rhetoric has validity. Just move on and let’s all focus on making a better fediverse for all
Agreed! I love the laid back feel of this community and not all the hostility you see everywhere else. With growth comes change though, so I hope the spirit of this group endures.
What is the best way to donate to lemmy? According to this article it’s Liberapay. Is that true?
Yes liberapay doesn’t take any commission.
This is extremely well written. Anyone that supports and wants to see this platform thrive should share this in response to the people spreading nonsense with the goal of seeing it fail and upholding the corporate status quo.
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God I appreciate these dudes. I don’t envy them one bit right now…
Yeah, very difficult situation, I truly hope they’ll find the help they need.
Well, I’m lending a hand. I have some patches in production already, and I’ve only been contributing for a week or so.
If you have the means, please help out. There are tons of bugs, important features, etc, and it’s a pretty stable base, so it’s a good time to jump in.
@sugar_in_your_tea About “good time to jump in”: the small size of the lemmy dev community gives you a chance to shift off Microsoft to a community git forge e.g. #Codeberg [1] that aims at forge federation [2] *before* there’s too much #TyrannyOfConvenience inertia. Mastodon devs are reluctant to even *discuss* giving up Microsoft [3].
@ulu_mulu @lemmy #GiveUpGitHub #forgefed #forgejo https://giveupgithub.org
[1] https://codeberg.org
[2] https://forgefed.org
[3] https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/issues/22572Uh reading your third link, no they are not reluctant to discuss it. That whole discussion sadly was about how the original “proposal” was framed, and I have to agree with that person that it wasn’t “proposed” but more stated as a demand.
Well, I don’t get to make that decision. If the maintainers choose to do that, I’ll follow, but there’s a good chance that a lot of the other contributors won’t. For something in rapid development with a lot of community contributions, you want that barrier of entry to be as low as possible.
So if it was up to me (and it’s not), I would say no. I would be open to an official mirror somewhere else, and perhaps moving to a separate feature/bug tracking system (esp. if it’s easier for the community to report bugs), which imo is the biggest barrier to moving the repo.
I guess I’m not particularly worried about it since the project is FOSS and the difficulty in switching is pretty low.
@sugar_in_your_tea As a non-lemmy-dev, I don’t get to participate in that decision either, no matter how strong I think the arguments are.
I’m not convinced that the difficulty in switching is low; as you say, bug/issue tracking is a big barrier, but other features are part of the #EEE strategy [4], and switching later when MS upsets the community like Musk or Huffman will be difficult.
An official mirror would be a good start to make a future move easier.
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace%2c_extend%2c_and_extinguish
There are mirrors of the Lemmy code on Gitea and Gitlab. They are linked in the readme. We also hope to migrate development to Gitea once federation is implemented.
We also hope to migrate development to Gitea once federation is implemented.
That is awesome to hear! Lemmy federating with the code forge it’s hosted on sounds awesome!
I hope this new influx of people will also bring in a nice influx of nerds who will make this platform better over time. :)
I’m a nerd and I’m here because Reddit has forsaken the nerds and is treating its user base like cattle to be herded. I guess most people want to be herded. That’s fine for them, but I want something more, where we make our place for ourselves, to our own liking. Not so that some investors can get richer. I suspect many of you are here for similar reasons.
I would like to contribute, and have the skills to, but unfortunately no time at the moment. For now I am mostly watching to see how things develop, but sooner or later I may just jump in if I find things are moving too slow.
yeah, the 2014 exodus to voat was all pissed off nazis, but now the nerds are pissed off so I think you’re right
I was recently sharing Lemmy to some people and how the entire Reddit blackout is stupid considering everything the platform has done in the past and the mindset of the CEO.
Someone brought up Voat and they were lamenting how that failed, and I decided to check out the WayBack Machine captures for it, and Christ, nothing but antisemitism and racism.
OH BOY VOAT
Yeah. Free speech absolutism does not attract a good crowd, and once you attract that crowd you will not attract any other crowd because the content output they produce is repellant to any normal person.
I spent a bunch of time on Voat as a kid, thinking I could be a free-thinking free speech absolutist who simply disagreed with the things other said around there.
What I observed is a crowd of people of an extreme ideology, who would try and one-up one another with further extremes, moving the overton window within the platform further to the extreme. As it continued, some would hit their breaking point and simply leave due to the toxicity, while others opted to continue the “who can be more offensive” game. The userbase, as it was, was doomed to forever become worse and worse, and smaller and smaller.
I believe that in the later years of Voat, the actually closed down the public-facing site and user registrations. I’m not sure what the Voat devs thought, but it’s pretty clear it didn’t go the way they’d expected as they had to pretty much hide their users from the greater internet.
Thank you for doing this
It’s not much but I upped my contributions a bit. Thank you for everything you’ve done for the open, non-corporate internet.
You guys are doing a fantastic work. Congrats on creating such a cool project like Lemmy.
Gang, I’d never pay for reddit gold but I sure as h*ck will pay monthly to support lemmy. You all should too!
