• Razzmadazz@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    In other news lemmy engagement is up 200% on the week

    Don’t fact check me I pulled this out my ass

    • bobs_monkey@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      Yeah FOMO is a helluva drug. I’d be willing to bet that while there are plenty of users on the newplaform, people actually posting is not there yet, and with the lack of content for users to doom scroll they’re hopping back to whatever app they came from. Most people don’t give two shits about actually engaging with a given userbase, they just want to doom scroll content and zone out.

        • Coelacanth@feddit.nu
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          1 year ago

          It’s generally when you’re stuck in a loop of reading negative posts/articles. I think the phenomenon comes from how when you read a negative article/piece of news you feel down, so you want to scroll further in the hopes of seeing something positive to lift your spirits. But then of course it’s only more negativity, and so you keep going. And the algorithms of Twitter/Facebook knows this, so they don’t tend to help you find something positive.

          • another_lemming@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Nothing positive is needed. It’s an outrage engine that keeps you involved by edging on the max level of disturbance you are comfortable to consume. Seeing, posting reactions, having likes enables you to keep it going.

            • Coelacanth@feddit.nu
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              1 year ago

              That’s fair, I don’t partake in that side of the web myself but when I get stuck in it it’s usually because I read something depressing and am scrolling desperately hoping for good news.

        • paddirn@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          I think alot of it relates to just scrolling through news and wanting more content/headlines. It’s not that users are necessarily seeking out bad news or “doom”, it’s just that, given the state of the world today <motions broadly>, that’s what a lot of the news ends up being. I think I often engage in “doomscrolling”, but I’m not doing it because I want to see bad news, I’m an information addict and I’m just trying to get as much content as I can. Reddit fed that habit well, but I’ve moved on from there. And it’s not necessarily a bad thing if Lemmy can’t feed that addiction, not seeing new content pushes me off and forces me back into the real world or on to other sites/apps. I’m fine with that, I hated my constant need to flip through Reddit whenever I was bored before.

        • bobs_monkey@lemm.ee
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          1 year ago

          It’s been a thing for a while, basically just mindlessly scrolling for hours on end on a neverending feed

        • zeppo@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Covid era when many people had nothing to do, were more worried and anxious than usual, and the internet seemed full of concerning and bad news. The term has never meant that much to me personally. I’ve only regular scrolled.

      • nLuLukna @sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        I also think that there were linch pins with in the threads app, people followed shadow accounts for there friends etc. Now I wouldn’t be surprised if alot of those friends then didn’t get the app, making said shadow follow pointless

    • collinrs@lemmy.world
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      I wouldn’t say its FOMO, I think most people just had higher hopes for it as a direct Twitter replacement instead of the cesspool of reposters, uninteresting celebs, and wylin’ out social media managers that it serves up in its feed. I don’t mind Meta, I don’t mind that they want to eventually federate, I just wish the feed wasn’t pure trash.

      • ox0r@lemmy.fmhy.ml
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        1 year ago

        All the celeb shit is the number 1 reason I always hated these platforms. I also feel like the only people somewhat defending twitter are those with a large following/celebrity status

    • Chailles@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      What you described isn’t FOMO, that’s just curiosity. Just checking out a new popular app and then just not using it due to a lack of engagement.

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    I mean, to be honest, I feel like it’s the quality of the content in there. I used my old phone (the one I use for apps like threads) to get a threads account and people are using Threads as if they’re using instagram.

    For example, you see a pocture of someone or a drawing, you get into the post to see the 45 comments people left and all of them are:

    Comment #1: “Magnificent 🥰😍” #2: “Amazing 🤩” #3: “WOW!! 🔥🔥”

    And so on.

    At least in twitter there is more “discussion” (albeit toxic and usually useless) or at least more people sometimes talking about interesting things.

    • dinckel@lemmy.world
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      That’s pretty much exactly what I expected. Instagram is exactly like this. Filled to the brim with fake engagement, bots, and an occasional real person account, who also happens to be doing things that horribly affect people’s mental health

    • buttsbuttsbutts@lemmynsfw.com
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      1 year ago

      I guess it turns out that when you pretty much automatically port over so the Instagram users they treat it like Instagram.

    • Ben Hur Horse Race@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      toxic and useless dont really summarize it imo- last few times I went there the top 10-15 comments were just screaming right wingers yelling about a conspiracy of some sort no matter what the topic is

      • Ultraviolet@lemmy.world
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        Looking in the replies of any new scientific discovery is infuriating, they’re all spouting inane shit about how “science changed its story, so it has no credibility, this is proof that the earth is flat and 6000 years old.”

    • steelrat@lemmy.world
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      the only reason it has any users is that it gave some fakeout on insta UI that your friends were talking about you on threads and, as per Meta usual, it was all bullshit. typical zuccing egotism for his upcoming cagematch.

    • RhetoricalOrator@lemmy.world
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      I haven’t, but thats actually surprising. Back in 2001 someone had my name for their Yahoo email (it’s an unusual but common one) and decided then that I wouldn’t let it happen again.

      For the next few years, I would immediately register for everything that looked like I would use it.

      Got a good Hotmail in the 90s. But later on I would register for every little thing like Hushmail. Shushmail. Then MySpace. The best, though, was when I managed to get an invite in late 2007 for a little email service provider that was called Gmail.

      Suck it every other variation of [email protected]!

      (Not my actual email.)

      • nerin@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        I got firstlastname on Gmail and I find it a curse now. There are old people all over the place with the same name that simply can’t remember their email address and end up using mine. I have had everything from non profit fun runs in North Carolina to aerial crop photos from Idaho that apparently farmers pay for? It was like a $100 a month service… . Luckily I use first.lastname so I can filter out their emails quickly since they never have the . Occasionally when it’s an email from a small company or something like that i send responses but most of it I just junk now.

        • teuast@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          i have what i imagine is a fairly unusual variation: my firstname.lastname is pretty common in the english speaking world, but my last name is apparently derived from a place if you go back far enough, so i use firstname.of.lastname. subtle but different.

      • xXemokidforeverXx@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        This is me too, including every janky MMO I think I might remotely like. Gotta grab my character name. But Threads, haven’t bothered to touch it.

        • Wrench Wizard@lemmy.world
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          I see exactly where you’re coming from but personally when making usernames I can never re-use one because I always feel like the next one I make is going to be “the one” and trump all of my pathetic previous attempts lol.

          That urge to be better, to continue growing has entire life. Never satisfied. New vehicle? First thought is “how can I tweak it to make it better?” Then I begin tweaking with things and am happy. The second that I can’t find more things to tweak and feel that it’s as close to perfect as can be within my capabilities it becomes stale and I lose interest.

          This is a cancer for my passion in writing lyrics as in my opinion art can NEVER be good enough. The more time you put into it, the better it gets and if a change I’ve made makes something worse I start from square one and begin again. I’ve been writing music for nearly my entire life but only ever actually recorded music in the beginning when it was just a hobby. Then I realized that it was something I could actually be good at and became serious. Haven’t recorded a single track since. I just write and write and write. Even when I make something beautiful, to me, that I made that? Just means I’m capable of making something better on the next page so the beauty is forgotten as soon as it was realized.

          Sorry for the rant and personal details! Sometimes I use my comments as a means of introspection. Would just paste them into my notes app but I don’t. I leave them in the hopes that maybe someday someone can maybe help me figure myself out or at the very least not feel so alone if they are similar.

          Have a nice day/night.

            • Boz (he/him)@lemmy.one
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              1 year ago

              … another terrific username, notelonmusk, although I am slightly concerned that you might be lying.

          • KlossN@lemmy.world
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            See someone called me KlossN in high school because it was similar to my last name, and now noone calls me that but it’s been my username everywhere since. Not making a fucking threads account tho, if y’all want my name you can have it

      • Gork@lemmy.ml
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        That’s why I believe that the username crisis is real. Future generations won’t have short usernames and will have to use increasingly longer usernames to have a unique one, or have a Redditesque default [word1][word2][4numbers].

        We might as well just go all out and just have everyone use a UUID with minimal chances of username collision.

        • Hamartiogonic@sopuli.xyz
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          If you really need to have the same name in many services, it’s going to be really hard or even impossible. Having a nice and short name in one service is possible, because the name of the service adds some extra length to the whole thing. Just think of Lemmy names for example [shortName]@[InstanceName].[something]. The whole thing is actually pretty long, so making that unique is very easy.

    • 𝔇𝔦𝔬@lemmy.world
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      Old comment by this time, but their usernames are tied to their Instagram account, correct? So there wasn’t much, “securing their name” From that angle.

      I couldn’t personally say as it’s not available in Europe.

  • decadentrebel@lemmy.world
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    I’m one of the many who deactivated not too long after it launched. My dashboard was just being filled with so many users (mostly celebrities and influencers) who I don’t recall ever following or even being on my sphere of interest. It doesn’t help that their posts are inorganic attempts to spur engagement.

    • HughJanus@lemmy.ml
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      Anyone signing up for a new Meta account isn’t going to be suddenly surprised at how invasive it is. The people who signed up for Threads obviously don’t give a shit about privacy, as much as I’d like to think otherwise.

      • 𝕸𝖔𝖘𝖘@infosec.pub
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        I’ve had this conversation many times, and they always say something like “I have nothing to hide, so I don’t care”, to which I respond with “I have to hide, either, but nothing I want to share. Since you have nothing to hide and you don’t care, what’s your bank account number, tax ID number, credentials, etc. etc. I won’t use it for anything bad, promise.”

        They still don’t get it…

        • QueenAlucia@lemmy.world
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          I’ve had some success by asking them to unlock their phone and give it to me so I can read their messages and look at their photos. As they refuse, I tell them “but you just said you’ve got nothing to hide and you don’t care?”

          • Boz (he/him)@lemmy.one
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            And you could add that you probably wouldn’t learn as much about them by looking at their phone for a few minutes than Threads transmits to Meta every second of every day.

          • 𝕸𝖔𝖘𝖘@infosec.pub
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            I did that once to a friend of mine, but because he knows me and known I’m trustworthy, he did it hahaha I had to resort to verbalizing the invasive actions I would take when I got the phone so that my point would sink in

      • CoderKat@lemm.ee
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        Especially since there’s over 2 BILLION Instagram users. Why would anyone who uses Instagram have any concerns with Threads?

    • Matt@lemmy.world
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      This is absolutely not a concern for 99% of people. As much as we (rightfully) scream about it on Lemmy and Mastodon, most people don’t care.

      Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, and others are already collecting this information already, it’s so strange to see people acting like this is a new phenomenon.

    • Matt@lemmy.world
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      Threads never released in the EU in the first place, so this absolutely is not the reason for lowered engagement.

      In an indirect way it could be though - not having the entirety of the EU on Threads is a huge non-starter for many people, as many of their favourite influencers, celebrities, companies, etc will be from the EU who were never able to get on it.

      • Iron Lynx@lemmy.world
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        It’s pretty hard to start working in the EU if you look at the absolute pile of data that Threads demanded. The GDPR paperwork to make sure they can get away with that AND still comply to GDPR would be more than the whole internet.

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    They gave up all their personal data to see a crappy algo-driven social media site. Meta still considers this a win.

    • master5o1@lemmy.nz
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      What new personal information did meta get from Instagram users enabling threads?

      • saegiru@lemmy.world
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        The real answer is nothing, assuming they already had an Instagram account. People are all up in arms, but the majority of ‘signups’ were just people clicking the activation button as opposed to creating a new account.

        That said, I currently will praise anything that takes more users away from Twitter. Lesser of two evils and all that.

        • jdsquared@lemmy.world
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          Zuck is not a lesser evil. He’s the same evil. And Jeffrey bezos this week is having a laugh because nobody’s paying attention to him at the moment.

        • Meltbox@lemmy.world
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          As LTT said. Threads is the result of the Zuck flicking his tongue out and tasting blood.

          But I mean we (society, not me, miss me with that) are still clearly subscribing to a social media site run by the lizard people and calling it an improvement.

          Which says a lot.

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              And, unless your Playstation is broken, less fun.

              …wait, scratch, that, even if your Playstation is broken, he’s less fun.

        • can@sh.itjust.works
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          Pretty sure all new users are required to have an Instagram? I know for sure the two are linked. No deleting Threads without deleting your Insta.

    • SJ_Zero@lemmy.fbxl.net
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      I feel like what you’re talking about is complaining about someone taking a dump on another, much larger pile of crap.

      If you were already on Instagram that ship has sailed.

  • Dr. Moose@lemmy.world
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    They launched it without addressing the obvious issues like spam and low-quality content. The easy migration from Instagram basically turned threads into… Instragram. Literally the same low quality posts and low quality engagement of Instagram transfered over. Seriously, have you ever read comments on Instagram? It’s the bottom of the barrel in the every sense of the expression. That’s Threads now.

    Also, poetically threads on Threads are even harder to follow and navigate than Twitter.

    • Nijuu@lemmy.world
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      Isnt instagram primarily used for… pictures and images? I seen comments the times i have used it - the comments are generally very low quality and low brow.

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        I think both of your points are correct but a lot of celebrity types write straight up essays attached to some of their pictures - it’s like where they get out everything they can’t fit into 280 characters.

      • GiuseppeAndTheYeti@midwest.social
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        Not a bad thing if true. I’d prefer a slow and steady growth. Let the more dedicated people among us build a stable foundation, then people will switch organically. I almost feel bad for being here in some sense because I have a very general understanding of how Lemmy even works.

        I know that it’s open-source and decentralized, but I struggled/struggle to understand what instances are, what communities are which, what server I joined, how communities are moderated and where to find rules…etc. I really want to gain traction in regional team subs with game day threads for Lemmy, but I have no idea how to code a bot to post them automatically with auto updating game info and stats.

        • Boz (he/him)@lemmy.one
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          If it makes you feel better, I probably understand Lemmy less well than you, so if you’re a misfit, so am I, lol. I see my role here as “someone to put words in the databases other people build.”

      • kanzalibrary@lemmy.world
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        Because Lemmy top topic before are only talking about Reddit, and people love talk about it since api contro. Now since Reddit hype are down, people start to think how to make Lemmy topic different and somewhat great than on Reddit I think… So, it takes time to see the average Lemmy users activity…

    • CurlyMoustache@lemmy.world
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      If they all came from Instagram, or is used to how Instagram is, I’m not suprised this happens. People use Insta for likes only, not comments/discussions. Sadly.

  • Knightfall@lemmy.ca
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    Yeah, the novelty of it will fizzle out. Some will call it their new home. Others will go back to Twitter or other. Some will check back in periodically.

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    I played around with it and it’s basically useless without a follower only feed. And the posts tend to just basically disappear forever after a feed refresh.

    But if they follow through on ActivityPub integration I’ll be stoked to follow all the normies that couldn’t get by on mastodon that are using threads. More content = more better.

    • Gestrid@lemmy.ca
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      I won’t be happy if they integrate federation. Ever heard the phrase “embrace, extend, extinguish”? It’s a tactic used by large companies to squash growing competition.

      Google used it, for example, to squash a growing open-source chat messenger protocol called XMPP. (Think of XMPP like ActivityPub.) Google allowed its Google Talk application to integrate with people using XMPP. (They embraced XMPP.)

      Then, they added their own proprietary features that wouldn’t work with normal XMPP users. (They extended, or built on top of, XMPP.)

      Then, they cut support for XMPP integration, leaving it effectively dead in the water. XMPP users suddenly had a list of Google Talk users in their friend list who would never appear online again, whereas Google Talk users maybe had one or two people in their friend list who looked like they’d moved on from Google Talk. (They extinguished XMPP.)

      Now imagine that happening with Threads. You, a Mastodon user, follow a bunch of people who just happen to be on Threads. There are some things Threads users can do that you can’t, but you don’t really mind. It works well enough. Then, one day, Threads stops working with Mastodon. Suddenly, over half of the people you followed are no longer available to you. The only way you can follow them again… is to join Threads.

      • cybersandwich@lemmy.world
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        “ever heard of embrace extend extinguish???”

        Lololol yes. And the ploum article people parrot about xmpp too.

        There is a lot of groupthink in the fediverse and not enough critical thinking.

        Threads integrating will highlight the serious value in activitypub. I personally don’t know why they would integrate unless they want to just completely dismember Twitter and blue sky or get in front of govt regulations.

        • arc@lemm.ee
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          The danger here is that Threads will suddenly be > 99% of the activity and user base in one fell swoop. You might find that Mastodon doesn’t scale as well as you think. It might also be that Threads deliberately or half assedly doesn’t federate properly, so that being a non-Threads user means posts aren’t visible inside of Threads or suffer from down ranking or other issues.

          I’d add that historically federation hasn’t gone well when a big fish enters a small pond. XMPP was cited above as an example of that. At the time you had proprietary services like AOL / AIM, ICQ, Instant Messenger. XMPP was going to liberate us from proprietary and even Google got on board for a bit before dumping it.

          The problem with big companies is they want all the cake to themselves and abhor having to yield control or cooperate with others. Meta might make nice noises about ActivityPub while they’re the underdog to Twitter but you could see them rapidly change their tune if Twitter went under.

          • Ben Hur Horse Race@lemm.ee
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            I’m surprised I don’t hear as much of “I wan’t literally nothing to do with Meta in any way shape or form” sentiment (which happens to be my feelings on the matter).

            Federation is the most interesting thing thats happened on the internet since http became the standard in my opinion, and I’ve been kicking around since Telnet, BBCs, IRC, Etc.

            Meta doesn’t want to play nice, they want to see if they can own everything, in my opinion. “Oh, people are doing this cool thing that we can’t yet monitize and make our shareholders richer? See if we can somehow assimilate it, at a loss at first, as ususal of course.”

            I’m not sure about embrace, extend, extinguish, but it does sound like it’d be the way here. Either way, why the living fuck can we not have anything interconnected that a megacorp can’t decide they’ll take over? Why can’t we keep that from happening, even when small independent individuals are running the server?

            • StoicLime@lemm.ee
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              The entire point of ActivityPub is that it’s open and EEE-proof. If the users leave it for something proprietary but better, then it isn’t EEE, it’s just a better product.

              Simply being open source is not an achievement in itself. The platform has to be user friendly, stable and future-proof. Most FOSS and federated alternatives create a platform and then endlessly harp on federation like that’s the end. No, that’s the beginning. The point is to make a product better than Big Tech WHILE maintaining federation and Foss status. THAT is what makes a platform EEE proof.

              • boonhet@lemm.ee
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                If the users leave it for something proprietary but better, then it isn’t EEE, it’s just a better product.

                That’s literally the second E, extend.

                Nothing is EEE-proof. If Meta puts even just 10 billion dollars into developing and marketing their fediverse EEE project, it’s going to be better for the average user (I.e: billions of people already using Meta’s services) than what a couple of FOSS devs made for free in their spare time.

                • Barbarian@sh.itjust.works
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                  1 year ago

                  That’s not what extend means in this context. In this context, extend means to add non-standard features to the protocol which only your implementation understands.

                • StoicLime@lemm.ee
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                  1 year ago

                  If they embrace ActivityPub and then start adding their own proprietary features that are enough for users to switch over, and Mastodon doesn’t, then it’s not an “evil agenda”, it’s Meta adding an essential feature that the users want and Mastodon isn’t able to add and ultimately Meta making a better product.

                  If Mastodon or Lemmy are truly superior and the future, then the product should be the best in the market, not DUE to federation but DESPITE it.

                  That’s one thing that everyone here forgets because right now federation is hard to get into, and the only people here are those who put the effort in because they believe in federation. That is the reason for their tolerance in an inferior product. But if that’s the case, then it will never be mainstream as long as the product is inferior.

      • noodle@feddit.uk
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        ActivityPub is open source. This means, by definition, Meta are allowed to use it. They could easily do the extinguish part by just never using the protocol. If another platform existing is such a threat to the Fediverse then we’re doomed to failure in the first place.

        While Google removing XMPP no doubt helped sink nails into the coffin, WhatsApp played a bigger role in the death of XMPP than Google removing it from Talk. It was increasingly irrelevant for a now growing number of people.

        • Gestrid@lemmy.ca
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          The point of “embrace, extend, extinguish” is primarily to get rid of any potential future competition. So, for example, it would not work if Facebook tried to do it with Twitter since the latter already reached critical mass and can stand on its own without outside help, barring bad leadership. It typically only works if the party that’s being “embraced” is smaller than the company that’s “embracing”.

          To your point of ActivityPub being open source: that’s true, so Meta is, legally speaking, free to use it. However, barring any restrictions in the license, they’re also free to add any proprietary features to Threads that don’t work on Mastodon. It’s similar to Google Chrome: Google has their open-source Chromium web browser, but they also have a version called Chrome that has features that are not open-source.

        • Gestrid@lemmy.ca
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          The thing with Wine is that, from what I understand, it was made to help Windows software run on Linux. From the beginning, its primary intention was to help Linux users. Facebook’s primary intention is to get more money. If they believe extinguishing Mastodon will further that goal, they’ll do it. Unfortunately, I don’t believe Mastodon is big enough to make Thread users think they’ll be missing any significant amount of content if Facebook removed ActivityPub support.

  • krigo666@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    “Last week, the text-based social media platform reported a record 100 million sign-ups in just five days.”

    LOL The biggest bullshit of the year… Meta just created shadow accounts of all Instagram users, without their knowledge or consent…

    • Shadesto@lemmy.world
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      100 million isn’t that much when it comes to Meta. There’s over 2 billion “active” Instagram users that all were prompted to download the app. That means only 0.005% of Instagram accounts fell for it.

      I have no doubt that at least that many people tried it out. When I went to the Android App store, Meta was paying for a front and center promotion of Threads.

        • fcuks@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          while you’re correct based on instagram’s numbers, the other commenter would be correct if it was a British billion which is a million millions. just a fun fact 🦄

          • crate_of_mice@feddit.nu
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            That’s true, although the long scale billion hasn’t been a thing even in Britain for decades.

            If it’s fun facts you like, try this: English is the clear odd one out, most other languages use milliard for 10^9 and billion for 10^12.

            • fcuks@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              milliard - love it ty for that. Reminds me of: French: L’ananas Italian: L’ananas Icelandic: Ananas Portuguese: O ananás Swedish: Ananas German: Die Ananas

              English: Pineapple
              
        • jarfil@lemmy.world
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          Well, technically… they said “users”, not “people”. Maybe there are 2E12-1E8 bots… 🙃

    • Master@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Is there a way to check if a user account exists for my instagram account without logging in?

      • unexposedhazard@discuss.tchncs.de
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        people reported already having followers before ever using the platform, meaning all people automatically had an account created for them. that (and many other things) is also very legally problematic in the EU which is why the service isnt available here.

        • NinjaAssassinKitty@lemmy.world
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          It’s not hard to understand what was happening.

          • I follow Person A and Person A follows me on Instagram
          • Person A signs up for Threads before me
          • I sign up for Threads after
          • Because we already follow each other on Instagram, Threads automatically made Person A follow me

          The issue with the EU is you can’t mingle and mix user data from two separate services.

        • TerryCustard@feddit.uk
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          Sole benefit of Brexit identified. We get to hand over our data to meta before you guys. It’s all been worth it.

        • kmkz_ninja@lemmy.world
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          “An account was already created for them” because it’s the same Meta account. You can just follow people when you start your account without them necessarily activating threads.

    • chem_bpy@lemmy.world
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      Not to mention all the spam bots they fail to actually ban after multiple people report.

      • I Cast Fist@programming.dev
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        Bots generate user engagement! Granted, it’s bad engagement, but it also generates jobs for the moderator AI teams

  • arc@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    Doesn’t seem surprising. It’s the new shiny thing and then interest wanes a bit. Probably same holds true of Lemmy IMO. That said Threads is now a viable replacement for Twitter and advertisers might decide one platform is a toxic cesspit and the other isn’t (and has some big crossover influencers) and spend accordingly. Even if it only hurts Twitter by a few % of revenue, that still more losses for Musk’s ego purchase and it should be seen as a good thing.

    Threads is allegedly going to support ActivityPub so theoretically itself and Mastodon, and Lemmy could all have some kind of federated access to each other. But Threads is an enormous whale in a pond of minows so how that would work is anyone’s guess.

    • lamlamlam@lemmy.world
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      Social networks that end up being successful have a long initial growth phase. Interest waning after a couple of days is a terrible sign. Threads is already dead.

      • arc@lemm.ee
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        Way too early to proclaim that. You might as well proclaim Lemmy the same - after all, the controversy over Reddit will fade in time and so too will interest in moving away from it.

        • esty@lemmy.ca
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          you forgot the other variable of spez/elon causing another controversy that reignites the interest tho

        • lamlamlam@lemmy.world
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          Lemmy is a completely different thing. It is a grassroots movement of geeks motivated by an ideal. It has some chance of having enough people “fueling the fire” while it grows slowly and, also importantly, it does not need to grow like crazy to survive. This contrasts with threads, which is an attempt by a big tech company to capture mainstream audience. The mainstream has the attention span of 5 seconds, forms an opinion and never goes back. Either it is immediately fun or it is a flop. Threads had the best possible shot, riding on the enormous unpopularity of Musk and being able to piggy back on the huge user base of Instagram. They took the shot, it didn’t work. The only way they can get a second shot is if another extraordinary event happens. I will admit that given the current tech leadership (and specifically Musk) this is not impossible, but otherwise I’m pretty confident in declaring Threads’ stillbirth.