The little mouse icon is defined by the instance frontend that’s showing the comment, as a placeholder for users with “avatar: null”. Functionally, it’s intended for each instance/app to define how they want to render “avatar: null” user avatars (some apps, like Liftoff, just leave it blank, no mouse).
if you made your account on Beehaw and you didn’t set a profile picture, you get a cute little bee
I understand that would require setting a profile picture for people who didn’t set one themselves, which, given the federated nature of Lemmy, would kind of go against the idea of each instance/app deciding what image they show for people who haven’t set an avatar picture.
Ideally, I think there could be an “avatar” and a “default_avatar” option for the target instance/app to decide whether they wanted to display their own (to preserve interface consistency), or the one suggested by the user’s home instance, but that isn’t part of Lemmy (yet).
The little mouse icon is defined by the instance frontend that’s showing the comment, as a placeholder for users with “avatar: null”. Functionally, it’s intended for each instance/app to define how they want to render “avatar: null” user avatars (some apps, like Liftoff, just leave it blank, no mouse).
I understand that would require setting a profile picture for people who didn’t set one themselves, which, given the federated nature of Lemmy, would kind of go against the idea of each instance/app deciding what image they show for people who haven’t set an avatar picture.
Ideally, I think there could be an “avatar” and a “default_avatar” option for the target instance/app to decide whether they wanted to display their own (to preserve interface consistency), or the one suggested by the user’s home instance, but that isn’t part of Lemmy (yet).