I use discord extensively. I’ve been on lemmy for over a year. Heck, I’m on a server that got pulled together in lemmy. I’ve seen a lot of complaints about discord, but nobody’s actually ever condemned me for using it.
Let me be the first one. It has nothing to do with FOSS or decentralization, I just think it’s a shit software.
Afaict, it doesn’t really have any major competitors. No, if I have to self host, it’s not a competitor
I agree. I just think the reason it doesn’t is because it doesn’t need to exist. Seriously, 100% of its usecases are better served by something else.
Um. As a simple place for a group to chat and communicate via text?
Is it better than Signal/WhatsApp for that?
Signal / WhatsApp are messengers, they’re meant for 1 to 1 or small groups. They don’t handle large groups well, for which you want things like rooms, roles, moderation, etc. Different niches.
Ah, so large groups specifically? Fair enough
Discord’s great for that. But so many games and software are using it instead of forums or proper issue trackers now. It’s a pretty serious downgrade.
Yeah I get the downside of those. But I find it weird how so many people blast discord when it’s just about the only option for simple modern text based chat groups
It reminds me of MIRC but if MIRC was soulless and made you pay to do the “fun” stuff like change colors and script things.
I still like pIRCh better
I’ll take “Things that don’t happen” for $2, Alex.
Why do people think they’re entitled to some sort of validation for their poor software choices? No one is being banned or blocked just for not using linux or for using discord. People are free to disagree with your choices- thats not gatekeeping.
sure but like. if you moderate a comm here and wants a chatroom, please spare me from discord.
You should gatekeep Discord because it fucking sucks
It’s not like there’s any actual alternative with decent UI that doesn’t require self hosting or a subscription.
element? it has its fair share of criticisms tho
Giving Up on Element & Matrix.org
Yeah, I looked into it at some point but it does not look suitable for big groups that include non techies.
why would you care what a few hundred nerds think at all?
the fediverse is big and diverse, find a place where people aren’t weird about shit (or are your kind of weird)I’d imagine gatekeeping based on a percentage of FOSS used isn’t going to win many hearts and minds in the long run for our communities. Imagine if the Linux community decried using the Steam Store on FOSS operating systems.
If the tool is best for the job, people will use it. Our role is to make FOSS that tool in each category.
Yeah, and in terms of usability Discord alternatives are really quite substantially behind Discord in terms of functions.
I don’t think the same is with Reddit and Lemmy/Piefed. The distance is not so vast.
Having used Discord, it’s hard to see how anything could be behind it in terms of functionality, since “using nothing” is literally an improvement over Discord.
If you want to make a comprehensive chatroom, and specify how it works to minor details - Revolt (for instance) is far behind. If what Discord is doesn’t appeal to you in the first place, then neither would any of the Discord alternatives.
Discord is supposed to be a chatroom? I thought it was a voice chat service for videogames that didn’t have it built it.
Many people use it exclusively as text chat.
It has extensive text chat
IMO that’s the very reason why the FSF failed to gain significant traction over the years. Using a 100% libre device is HARD, even if you really want to. But yeah, gatekeeping is never gonna be helpful to push people towards better habits…
However, I would politely disagree with the “best tool for the job” argument. I believe that FLOSS software is an inherent quality, and that some degree of trade-off is acceptable, and even needed if we want to further promote it. Like, is Darktable worst than Lightroom? Sure, but it’s an awesome piece of software with minimal trade-offs for most people, so I think it’s still meaningful to promote it above a potentially better software for the job, feature-wise but that requires to give up all freedom to Adobe.
Eventually that limit of acceptable trade-off is matter of personal choice, and again, it sound silly to gate-keep people on the Fediverse for that…
The principle of copyleft is that you can’t encourage a free environment without some level of militantism. If you accept user hostile software like Steam alongside copyleft applications, then you’re fighting on the side of that hostility, on the side of theft and oppression.
Many newer popular FOSS softwares advocates stronger for libertarianism than collective protection, but it’s the strictly libre software that has been the backbone historically.
Users benefit from software, not from other users. Non-FOSS software already exists, and would exist without libre initiatives.
Do you think more users, even if apolitical or incidental will best increase the amount of quality FOSS software being written in the long run, or a smaller but principled and politically motivated user base? Will no-strings free-to-use softwares encourage more new FOSS software or a treasure trove of existing quality libraries that can only be used if you agree to stop oppressing the user?
If we use Valve as a case-study, then they have taken freely available software and created a product out of it. They have contributed back to that software, and because of their contribution Windows-emulation is now better for FOSS users. But they haven’t made any of their previous products less oppressive. They created a Linux-product to escape Microsoft’s power over them, and their business is charging rent from all game developers. Compared to almost anyone else, they have very little to loose by making their products user respecting and FOSS. They didn’t chose to do this. Would they have had, if the work they appropriated to create the Steamdeck software had even more militant terms of use?
you butchered the hell out of that format
Lol, actually rejected by the community.
Yeah I love Lemmy and I love that people aren’t afraid to be extreme on here but sometimes it’s exhausting that it’s just so omnipresent. It’s like there’s a whole lifestyle associated with Lemmy. And some people really take it too far. I think there’s a balance to be struck between being full of normies vs being all extreme all the time.
Well ummm… normies ruin everything.
I had some dickhead coming at me the other day on Lemmy for not having completely erased Facebook from my life. As though that’s a remotely reasonable thing to expect everyone to do.
It’s not like making a personal decision not to use Amazon or to install Linux. It’s a social network. It’s literally not possible to make the decision unilaterally, unless you want to cut yourself off from people you care about IRL and from real political organising.
It’s literally not possible to make the decision unilaterally
Sentiments that would be completely incomprehensible 20 years ago.
Eh, it’s not that different from the way humans have always been. Maybe you didn’t like drinking in the 19th century, but if the local pub is where all your mates meet up to hang out, then the pub is where you go.
based on the replies it’s incomprehensible to some people right now 😂
I did it. There’s plenty of other ways for people to get in touch with me.
there’s one right there!
Obviously a personal choice, so noone should be giving you shit about it, but I moved all the people I want to talk to onto Deltachat/Signal/SMS (in order of my preference), that works perfectly fine and I havn’t found someone who is opposed to all of those options.
Moving your 1-on-1 chats is one thing. Moving political organising, sports clubs, social clubs, and your various group chats is something very different.
If Facebook is so central to your life… Not sure what to tell you. I got banned from FB for posting that fake nude of trump and it’s the biggest favor they did me. So glad to be away from that garbage fire.
Facebook is central to my life. I use it because that’s where local support groups for the disease I have are. I need this location-specific information to keep up to date on disability benefits and so on. Not everything is about politics.
Same why I’m still on Reddit. I’m definitely not getting people who struggle with the same illness that causes fatigue and brain fog to spend more energy they don’t have on switching to another platform that doesn’t even come up when you type it into a search engine to seek support from other people affected by the illness. It’s easy to say “don’t use this, don’t use that”, if all they use these platforms for is for memes and messenger.
I had to create an account and use Facebook in my support job days, because that’s where everyone was posting shift exchange requests. An entire department won’t just switch to Signal for this just because the new person refuses to use anything not FOSS.
Same witht cars. I prefer not to use my car, and I’m happy that in my day-to-day life I can just walk, cycle or use public transit. But if I’m visiting my parents in the countryside of another country, I’m sure not spending—checks notes—9 hours on train with multiple connections instead of just under 2 by driving the car.
Do what you can to avoid using all these, but don’t go to the extremes where you’re not getting the info you need or getting to places you need to be. Should the the message.
That sounds like a defensible use of it.
You can safely assume that most Fedi users that are still on Facebook have a defensible use of it. It’s quite unlikely that anyone around here uses it for entertainment which is why the tone you or others use is unnecessarily condescending.
I don’t think I was condescending. It’s possible you’re just tired of hearing about this topic.
And no, I cannot assume that at all. 99% of fb use is indefensible, if not more
I don’t think I was condescending
99% of fb use is indefensible, if not more
Uh huh.
Sorry you’re mad about the truth. Guess you’re telling me you don’t really have a defense. Because I certainly didn’t say that
K
Have you seen anyone on Fedi saying „yeah, I need Facebook because otherwise where would I get my daily AI shrimp Jesus fix?”. Your mental health will improve when you stop assuming everyone you don’t like is evil.
… Okay. You don’t really understand anything about what I’m saying or my mental health
I got banned from FB for posting that fake nude of trump
See, I don’t post posts to my Facebook wall. Haven’t done in years. I use the Groups, Events, and Messenger, because that’s where people already are. Responding to a person with “Why are you using Facebook?” and, when called out on how shitty and judgmental you’re being, doubling down on your own (in the general sense, not you specifically, Dacy) shitty behaviour by saying you should avoid it “because they’re using a website that is complicit in making the world a lot worse? not sure how this is a strange concept on lemmy” is just ignorant of how people interact with other people.
It’s the same shitty judgmental attitude that the OP was calling out in this post.
There is being a dick about facts people don’t want to hear and there’s better deliveries. I can’t disagree at all that the world is worse because of Facebook or that people using it is the only reason it can make the world worse. But I’m trying to be less of a dick about it. I try not to be one of those extremists.
One of the problems with Facebook is also present on Lemmy, which is where people dehumanize each other and act like total extremist dicks. At least on Lemmy, it’s not generally going to pay dickheads who profit from that or for genocide or other suffering.
It’s a complicated world out there but some facts aren’t complicated and that increases the likelihood of people being blunt extremist dicks about those facts. Sucks but that’s just how it is
I can’t disagree at all that the world is worse because of Facebook or that people using it is the only reason it can make the world worse
Neither can I. And I’ll take any opportunity I can to try and persuade people to organise in other spaces and espouse the benefits of doing so. (Check my Reddit account: it’s been mostly inactive since the API debacle, but literally every contribution it has made has been friendly nods towards Lemmy and Piefed.) What I would never do is belittle someone for using it, apropos of absolutely nothing at all.
I deleted my Facebook account when they said they were going to stop fact checking. I just made a post telling anyone who wanted to stay in touch to text me, gave them a week, then deleted the account. I’ve also been more politically active since leaving Facebook than I ever was before, as most major movements these days are using email mailing lists instead of social media groups.
I’m not going to say you have to delete Facebook or anything, but like, this sounds more like excuses than anything else to me. I have friends who still have Facebook who only keep it purely because they originally signed up for various apps and shit using their facebook account, and so they don’t want to lose access to those things if they delete the Facebook account, and they are honest about it. I don’t see them going around telling people like me that it is unreasonable to delete your Facebook account.
Also, it is 100% a personal decision to not use social media. You do not Need to be on social media. You don’t need to be here, or on Instagram, or Bluesky, or anywhere else. You Do need real life connections and interactions. If you don’t want to give up Facebook, fine, but don’t act like it is an impossibility to make that choice, just don’t make excuses man.
as most major movements these days are using email mailing lists instead of social media groups
Ok. I don’t know where you are, but that’s definitely not the case here. It’s literally all done through Facebook Groups and Events.
Same for sporting and social clubs. If you’re not on Facebook, you’re not getting updates.
America. I took part in the No Kings rally, among other events, and all of the information was communicated through email.
Also, sporting and social clubs? Ew.
sporting and social clubs? Ew.
Like, WTF? Is there something wrong with social and hobby clubs?
What’s with the random dunking on social/sporting clubs? It’s one of the few ways available for many people to enjoy their hobbies and make new friends. “Ew?” Are you serious?
Email might be a good way to alert the broader public about things that have been organised. But for the smaller-scale stuff? For organising what your group’s response should be to begin with? That needs to happen either face-to-face (in which case the question becomes: how do you organise a time and place for that) or on real social media. Email just isn’t really cut-out for that kind of task. It doesn’t have to be corporate social media. Matrix chats or a Friendica group would be just as good in theory. But in practice I’ve never heard of that actually being done.
And just because you’re apparently anti-social or whatever, doesn’t mean everyone else is. “Ew.” What is it the kids say? “Touch grass”?
Yeah I found it weird to read that the thing I gave up and feel better for being rid of is not possible to give up :/
that isn’t what Zagorath said though
They said something akin to it’s almost impossible to give up. But I have no intention to argue about it. My comment was more about how it read to me in the moment. I can’t say exactly what they were thinking.
deleted by creator
It’s literally not possible to make the decision unilaterally
I have had lots of meme ideas, some even made it into production, before ultimately deciding to shelve it because it was on a topic that wouldn’t have been very welcome.
Like a meme on Amazon being late yet again (if I were to order from Amazon, not saying I do! 😅) or something. Or a meme on how sometimes I use AI and it’s actually helpful (Again, not saying I do! 😅(I want my threadilawyer)) LMAO
Dbzer0 is pro ai
It can catch you off-guard with how some people can react towards a certain topic. I would be in big trouble if I said I think self-hosting is a lot of work. Then there’s users from instances with unique rules enforcing them in neutral spaces. I was told by a Reddthat user to not post too many articles at a time. They have a 5 article limit rule per community a day.
Cool if I quote you in my email to Linus torvalds and the pope?
I think self-hosting is a lot of work
I’m sorry but… what is FOSS? I’m new here.
FOSS = Free and Open Source Software. Open source means the source code of a program is available for anyone to view, and free (as in freedom) means the community can contribute to it (this is an oversimplification). FOSS software, like Lemmy, is not owned by a company and as such the software is (usually) developed for the benefit of everything rather than for maximum profit.
Free open source software
The future! (for nerds only)
I will take Cinny any day over Discord. I just wish the matrix protocol was more reliable since sometimes there are issues with joining rooms and you cant always see the messages in the encrypted group chat.
Matrix here too. I can’t (and don’t) force others to not use Discord but for the things I set up I can choose Matrix instead.
There’s a critical need for more public servers than just matrix dot org though.
no but fr. we need a better alternate than the matrix and XMPP protocol, theyre both too buggy. I use them but fuck its annoying sometimes
WTF do you mean XMPP is buggy ?? It’s one if the most feature-complete things out there only beaten by IRC
It does seem like XMPP has their fans
Does anybody else? I’ve never been to Discord on purpose, but that’s the trick with digital oligopolies, I don’t get a choice in the matter. I don’t need an app to talk to myself, but to talk to the people I need to talk to on Discord I need Discord.
Meh, block and move on, I use Discord to game with friends, we have used a Mumble server in the past, but Discord was just easier and had a better chat.
Though I will absolutely admit that I am missing the sound quality of Mumble
It is not really open source without an open transparent mod log. Anyone that needs to hide their actions should never be a mod, admin, or dev
