this post was submitted on 08 Aug 2023
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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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[–] [email protected] 34 points 1 year ago (2 children)

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.

[–] [email protected] 28 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

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

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (4 children)

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.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

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.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

Sync for lemmy let's you do this.

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[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 year ago

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.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 year ago (4 children)

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.

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[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago (2 children)

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.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (3 children)

What country is it hosted in?

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[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago (2 children)

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

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago (1 children)

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

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

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.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

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.

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago (1 children)

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.
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[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (32 children)

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.

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago (3 children)

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

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

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.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago

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.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

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.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

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

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago

Star Trek is cool

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

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.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

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.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

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.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

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

Lemm.ee is similarly estonian.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

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!

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

how about an instance that isn’t down like 20% of the time or whatever.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

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.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)
  1. Local
  2. Good rep
  3. Active community, admin(s)
  4. Open books, accountability
  5. Intolerant of racists, bigots, etc
  6. Cool domain name a plus
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[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

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

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

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 ([email protected] 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.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

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

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (3 children)

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

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

I take the host my own instance path. It's safer and more stable than relying on a third party.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

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

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

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.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

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?

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

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.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

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 [email protected] 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

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