I’ve seen many comments and posts regarding the API fiasco on Reddit, with the claim that there will be a huge influx of users when that happens. I’m all for it, but I find it hard to believe that the average or even above average user will make the effort to switch.
Nobody knows the future, but speaking as an instance admin, the ideal scenario would be a continued steady growth and not a huge sudden influx 😅
I think it is great here on Lemmy but tbh, the content is limited. My enjoyment here is partly watching it develop. Im like 1 week in and I can see it growing day by day. I don’t think that is what most eventual users want to experience. They want it all set up with the party in full swing.
I love the conversations here. It’s just normal people talking. No amateur comedians at the top of threads with their crappy jokes. It’s so nice.
I love it here too. I’m finding that im connecting with people, getting into your head reading your words and it’s nice. Watching the whole process is pretty awesome. Definitely not the average users expectations, im sure.
It honestly took me a moment to get used to such a high percentage of civil discourse.
Yes this is like Reddit was back 10-16 years ago when I joined. Much better discussions here than Reddit now. I’m honestly pretty happy where everything is already, I’d like to take the growth nice and slow so that we can stay in the good zone longer. Both digg and Reddit were too banal for me towards the end.
I also don’t miss the ragebait and troll posts, those can stay on reddit.
While I’ve seen a few merry pranksters pop up here and there, trolls (thankfully so far) not so much.
I like that I am talking to real people, not potential comment reposter bots. Feels less like a psyops experiment and more like actual engagement.
Thank you for your service. Would you be interested in testing my modern UI theme for Lemmy on your instance? It works with Lemmy 0.17 and 0.18.0. You can get the CSS files from the releases page.
Hey! I have had a few questions about themes. At this point, I am asking users to apply non-mainlined themes through userscripts - I am wary of taking on extra responsibilities in maintaining compatibility for additional themes. Sorry about that!
But all themes that get added to the main lemmy-ui repo will always be available out of the box on lemm.ee as well. The repo is open to contributions, so you could have a look at that option if that’s something you’re interested in.
I already made a proposal to improve the default theme, but my issue was closed without any response from the developers. The required changes were small on purpose and should be easy to implement for anyone already familiar with the code. So it seems that UI is not a priority to Lemmy developers. That’s why I had to develop my addon, which I then also turned into a theme. I hope that one day Lemmy instances will start using some kind of modern theme (doesn’t have to be mine), so that my addon is no longer needed.
My theme is just a small amount of styles applied on top of the default litely and darkly themes, which should make maintenance easier. Unlike an addon, a theme doesn’t need to support multiple versions of Lemmy at the same time, so we could simplify it even more. Lemmy 0.18 uses CSS variables now, so that also makes things easier.
Something needs to be done about Lemmy’s outdated UI and I’m not sure if the current approach of developing multiple userscripts and addons is efficient. I understand if you think this might cause too much work for you though.
I already made a proposal to improve the default theme, but my issue was closed without any response from the developers.
You’re misinterpreting what happened there - the issue was not closed to shut it down, it was actually converted into a discussion to make it easier to track: https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy-ui/discussions/1503
It wasn’t exactly one specific issue that could be fixed, it was a longer discussion with a bunch of branches. For such things, the discussions format is much more usable.
So it seems that UI is not a priority to Lemmy developers.
I just want to point out that there has been a massive amount of UI improvements in 0.18 and 0.18.1 (just take a look at all the changes by @jsit for example: https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy-ui/pulls?q=is%3Apr+author%3Ajsit+). In addition, new themes are being created directly for the lemmy-ui repo as well, for example: https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy-ui/pull/1682
I don’t know the developer’s exact intentions, but my issue was a specific, easy to implement proposal. It wasn’t meant to be a discussion.
There have been UI improvements, but the design is still outdated. The theme you linked to is also not a modern design. What we need the most is an improved default theme, so that everyone could enjoy an easy to read website.
I’ll be directing all of my users in Sync to lemmy.world tomorrow.
I’m so excited for you! Sorry Reddit just disregarded third party app developers like you guys were nothing, absolutely disgraceful. Without your app, my SO & I have no desire to browse the site for fun anymore. Thanks for aiding in hours of fun for us!
Wow this is actually the dev of Sync! Guys this is big! Thank you, this will be huge, hope it her dev will follow.
Loved sync, hope that the Apollo dev does this too.
king
Very exciting! And Sync for Lemmy is even more exciting! Question, do you plan on adding Kbin support in the future? Maybe when their API is released?
He has said he plans to support kbin in the future. But he is working on a MVP minimum viable product right now to get something that works out asap and then start addressing things like kbin support down the road. He just needs time and the support of the community. You can follow the project at !lemmy.world/c/syncforlemmy (hopefully I did that right…)
Very understandable and very exciting! Thank you for the info!
just curious…
how many users would that be?
roughly
It’s had over a million downloads and 70k reviews. So, a few.
Gotta be at least 5. Minimum!
I’m one of them and I’m here now! Only 4 more to go… but seriously I hope there’s a ton more to follow.
I think the influx will be on the 1st. People are gonna try to fire up reddit on their fav app, it won’t work, and a good number of them will do something else.
A portion of those will look for alternatives. Most of those people will probably end up here. I don’t think it’s going to be a gigantic number or anything, due to how many “gates” there are to go through, but I’m expecting the biggest single-day increase so far.
I agree. Reddit has been trying to sweep all this under the rug, and as pathetically transparent as their efforts are they have worked well enough that a lot of “casual” users probably have no idea what’s coming. When the 1st rolls around and they suddenly can’t use Reddit (as far as they know it) then quite a few will be looking for somewhere else to go.
I mean a lot of them will probably just grab the official Reddit app, but 30 minutes using that ad-infested garbage pile may dissuade them from sticking with it.
30 seconds more like.
They can sweep whatever they want wherever they want to sweep it to. That doesn’t cure early-stage internet cancer.
Unfortunately, filthy casuals tend to grin and bare early-stage cancer on the internet. I dare say most of us who cared have already made the switch with the minority choosing to hang on as long as possible with the more tech-savvy casuals coming over in the first few days of third-party apps getting killed.
And at least the dev of Sync will or has already rolled out an update to explain why the app isn’t working anymore and that Sync for Lemmy is on development.
There’s no better advertisement, really.
Not gonna be a sudden exodus.
More that Reddit’s entered a slow death spiral. Redditors will start seeing an upsurge in toxicity, since mods will have left, been replaced with stooges, had their tools taken away, and most of the good mods will have abandoned ship.
Some may come here. Some may move on to Discord or other social media. Some will stick it out on Reddit, but notice that bots and trolls are taking over, whatever moderators are left can’t or won’t keep up, and the admins are seemingly asleep at the switch.
In a few months, discourse there will have assumed Youtube quality, with bots shouting down human discourse, and trolls scaring anyone remotely normal away. They’ll limp along like that for years.
Like Twitter.
And eventually it’ll end up like 4Chan, only technically still existing.
It won’t be instant, but quite a few 3PA users will find it incredibly difficult (maybe even impossible) to make the switch to the official app; it’s just that bad. Hell, I can’t imagine using Reddit without the crutch Apollo provided.
I dunno, but the fact that I’m browsing a post with 118 comments using a skin that looks a lot like Apollo tells that things are going in a good direction.
Using WefWef too and I’m surprised how good it is for a PWA. Only thing I miss is haptic feedback.
Ugh, I will implement haptics literally the second Apple gives PWAs installed to home screen an api for that.
Are there any plans at all for a traditional app? I understand that there is an appeal to keeping things completely free from any App Store shenanigans, a certain freedom that comes with web apps over native apps.
Posting with Connect for Lemmy rn. I have 4 o 5 apps on my phone, so I’ll be testing waters before I can land somewhere safely.
The average user would not know about lemmy without a reddit post linking and explaining. It’s what got me here.
It depends. From what I understood, moderation on Reddit will become really hard after this. So the site will go down in user experience on content, worse than it is now. That’s outside of the 3rd party apps like Apollo no longer working but will have a negative impact. It sounded like some mods would just walk away than deal with not having robot spam bots to help, which it is volunteer. That could spur on further churn, again, because quality suffers.
I removed my Reddit apps and don’t plan to go back. Having said that, the tech here is still in its infancy. I see bugs daily, the native app version of this experience is not super adoptable by a mass market yet, but it can all improve with time and more bodies interested here.
Long term, this broad concept of decentralization seems to be populous. I think people don’t understand it yet, when they show up it’s rough, and there’s alternatives. But that will all continue to change in the coming months.
NSFW content (posts, profiles, and subs) will also not be available via the app, so moderators and users won’t be able to see any, which will also make moderation more difficult.
It’s unclear whether the official app will be affected, or whether Reddit has a secret API that will exempt it from those restrictions, similar to how they implement the other functions.
I think the majority of people who will go to Lemmy are already here. Nobody waits until reddit has died to search for an alternative. And I think the amount of people who are active on reddit and who haven’t heard about the changes that are about to come at all is very small
But at the same time, there are those who won’t move unless they absolutely have to. Reddit has not forced their hand, so they don’t need to bother as much.
Maybe, but being here and actively participating in the community are two different things. I’ve had an account here for a few days and even though I browse it daily I don’t really comment or vote much cause I still have RIF. Once that’s gone so am I so I’ll just focus on Lemmy. It could still make a significant difference.
I wonder. I started with a kbin account, no made an account here. I removed all my Reddit accounts but one; waiting to see what happens on the 30th. I don’t use it anymore, but am waiting nonetheless to see what happens, on Reddit and elsewhere. Alternatives still need a toooon of work to be usable by the masses. Please someone provide us with some good UX. I have a feeling that people who were gonna leave already left, the rest just started using the app or simply using the web version. I’m not gonna lie, whilst I’m here, I don’t find the “need” / fomo to visit. I don’t know if it’s the content, the curation or the UI; but something takes getting used to that’s for sure.
I don’t find the “need” / fomo to visit
I wouldn’t say that’s a bad thing. Reddit is purposefully designed to hold your attention, just like every other corporate social media platform. They have a monetary incentive to do so. Lemmy doesn’t, and hopefully never will.
There are a lot of alternative UI’s for lemmy out there. You have themes for browser based, quite good web apps like wefwef and lots of native apps in various stages of development. I’ve already been able to settle in nicely.
I think it really depends on how real the 1% rule of the internet is.
TBH I believe that 90% of mobile users uses the official app. Maybe they don’t know about 3PA, or simply just don’t bother. 3PA might be “for power users/advanced users” to them. All they want from Reddit is just the laugh (and porn probably) when doom scrolling. Not to mention because there is an official app, it’ll be the first result when searching “Reddit” on the app/play store. Most of the time people will just go for the first/official one. This whole API/protest thing will just be another Reddit drama for them and they just don’t care.
However, I believe that this whole thing affects those 1% users the most. For mobile users (of the 1%), I believe most of them are using 3PA. As the official is just too bad. For everyone else (of the 1%), if they care (even just a little bit) about Reddit, they will be greatly disappointed with how Reddit handles the whole situation. They will either have left already, or will be leaving soon. Which then the question will be, to where?
Obviously, users tends to go to wherever places that has the most interesting content to them. If enough 1% users left Reddit, migrated to Kbin/Lemmy, and continued to create content over here, I think those 99% users will eventually migrate as well - especially:
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The content are created by the same 1% users, so the content will be similar to what they consumed back when they were on Reddit.
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Reddit is full of repost bots, which hopefully should be more obvious when no new contents are being created anymore.
There’s also another possible but quite pessimistic possibility:
Some of those 99% users became the new 1% users, and began creating content with the redesigned UI/official app.
*Puts on tinfoil hat* Which is what Reddit wants - to kick out the “old”, power/advanced users (users who can and will protest/rebel, in essence), making Reddit into another generic social media platform. With everything under the complete control of Reddit, not its users.If enough 1% users left Reddit, migrated to Kbin/Lemmy, and continued to create content over here, I think those 99% users will eventually migrate as well
Yeah, that’s what I think will be key - if a decent percentage of the experienced moderators of the big subs and most active posters make the move then the quality and usability of Reddit drops hard as they are contributing disproportionately to the site. That would then drag over a good number of ordinary users because without them it becomes a bot haven and OnlyFans aggregator.
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I think many are simply not doing anything until they have to. Once their app quits working, they’ll make a change at that time. Of course not everyone uses Mobile. Personally I don’t use mobile much for internet access, mainly desktop browser. In that case I could keep using Reddit same as before, but I don’t want to.
So the question is what portion of Reddit users are on mobile, how many will relent to the Reddit app, how many will quit using Reddit altogether, how many will look for an alternative, and finally how many will land on Lemmy or Kbin. Could be a lot, could be not many. We’ll find out pretty soon here.
For those that do come this way they’ll have a transition phase. There’s a lot that’s different here and takes some getting used to. Also the lack of certain features may result in some angst. There’s bugs too. They fixed some stuff with 0.18.0, but searching for and subscribing to communities is giving me fits now.
Using on Android mobile has been a pleasant experience for me. Just added a shortcut to my home screen. But, I tend to not download an app unless I have to. Years ago when I was on Facebook and Twitter, I always did it that way. I never used their apps.
I am old-ish so I am not sure if that is why when I joined, it was very easy for me to find my way around. I say this because I’ve been on the internet since the '90s and have familiarity with hunting down what I need versus it just being there in an app.
Ironically, when I started on Reddit back in 2012, I quickly found bacon reader and have been using it ever since. It is one of the few apps I do use. And I will not be using Reddit any other way so I am here for the long run.
I also used Bacon Reader, and was kind of mystified that it wasn’t mentioned in any of the dozens of articles about this that I read. I haven’t been on it since the blackout and I’m definitely not going back until they realize that their data, as they call it, is actually OUR data. But I won’t if BR will be closing up too.
The only thing we can do is wait and see. It’s only three days from now. My personal belief is that there is definitely going to be an influx of new users, but that number won’t be too big or unmanageable.
I find it hard to believe that the average or even above average user will make the effort to switch.
Not really impossible if said users “dopamine fix” gets cut off. Which may happen (or not, depending of how intense it is.)
Yeah, I’ve definitely found my methadone here in the fediverse.
Doubt it. Most people who use a 3rd party app should be aware of the API changes already. If they are interested in the alternatives they would have tried by now.
People who are still unaware of what’s going on even after the blackouts, would probably just download the official app.
Perhaps. Or they are biding their time until the blackout then will actively be looking for an alternative.
I’m on here obviously, but still using Reddit until Relay croaks. After that I’m not going to violently l completely quit reddit but without being able to use Relay I’ll be using it a lot less, not as a regular contributor. It’ll be like how often I use Facebook now compared to how I used it a few years ago.
This is exactly what I think. We might see a fraction of a spike from the few holding out until the very end, but it won’t be this mass exodus people keep proclaiming it to be.
Apollo has published many blatant warnings to the app about the shutdown, you literally can’t use the app without seeing them. Nobody using Apollo is going to be surprised at being cut off.
I assume the other apps are doing something similar to warn their users.
Those who care are already finding their way over here. Those who don’t care are using the Reddit app. Those who are somehow still ignorant of what’s happening probably don’t use Reddit enough to know the difference.
I have spent very very little time on infinity since June 11th but I have seen absolutely no warnings and had to actively search for what they will do come July (subscription).
I was on Boost and finally deleted it about a week ago. Couldn’t understand why they were still updating their app and pushing for users to rate them on PlayStore.
Not as many as you would think. I work in a technical field and most people had no idea there was a protest going on. They also didn’t even know of alternative mobile apps. Most didn’t care and just used the official app. There may be a slight bump, but nothing significant.
I think it’ll be significant, but it won’t be an exodus. I can see a solid ~5-6% of Redditors leaving at once, then a small steady trickle afterwards. 6% would double our current active users.
