I used to browse Reddit 90+% of the time from my phone through the RiF app, so after June 30th, here is what I did and what I recommend as a starter pack for others in the same situation:

  • Create account on lemmy.world, so the browser part is covered
  • Search for the information on which app provides the closest to the RiF (Apollo, etc.) experience
  • Instal Liftoff and be happy - it is just like RiF :-) (for Apollo and others, it could be different - find your own favorite!)
  • Dial back dramatically on using Reddit at all. I only load 4 subs in my phone’s browser, because I did not find the Lemmy / Fediverse alternatives yet
  • Constantly look for the communities to replace the subreddits you are still visiting
  • OPTIONAL - once or twice a week, look at /r/pics and /r/videos and laugh at the creativity of the still ongoing protest :-)

So that is where I am right now, posting this via the web browser on the lemmy.world site, by pressing “create a post”. Seems easy enough for now, but I find it a bit confusing that other people can post from Mastodon and other Lemmy instances… Do they see the same communities I do? Do I see all Lemmy communities if I use lemmy.world…? So many questions, but it’s exciting to explore this brand new structure.

Even after reading the Fediverse and ActivityPub articles on Wikipedia my head is spinning, and I don’t really understand how everything fits / works together, but here I am! An ex(-ish) Redditor after the APIcalypse, looking for cool new communities, and excited about the future that the Fediverse can bring!

(I’m willing to learn! Someone please link me a FAQ where I can find the answers to my questions :-) )

  • BetaRebooter@feddit.ukEnglish
    0·
    1 year ago

    Newbie here and apologies if these are FAQs but just want one line answers

    What’s an instance?

    What’s a community?

    What are federations?

    Whats the difference between all these?

    What’s mastodon?

    What’s Kbin?

    What’s ActivityPub?

    Just jargon I’m trying to get my head around, I’m still confused on signing up to different communities?! I guess and yeah… a bit lost I suppose. If there are FAQs to all this please direct me to them, thanks!

    • tj@fedia.io
      0·
      1 year ago

      What’s an instance?

      An instance is a server running the Lemmy software (or some other federation software such as Mastodon, Kbin, Pixelfed, and others). Instances can talk together (similarly to how you can send email from gmail.com to outlook.com), so you can sign up on one instance and subscribe and comment to communities on other instances

      What’s a community?

      A community is to Lemmy what a subreddit is to Reddit. on

      What are federations?

      Federation is the machanism allowing different instances (servers) to talk together. Federation is automatic, so two instances becomes federated, when you as a user on one instance subscribe to a community on a different instance

      Whats the difference between all these?

      Many instances are general but have somewhat different values and rules for what you can post or not. “lemmy.world” is a good choice for a general instance. There are also topic specific instances, such as “mander.xyz” that is science focused.

      What’s mastodon?

      Mastodon is like twitter but is part of the federated universe (the “fediverse”).

      What’s Kbin?

      Kbin - like Lemmy - is like Reddit. The impelemntation is different and focuses on different fetures. Some (myself included) like Kbin more than Lemmy - others the other way around.

      What’s ActivityPub?

      ActivityPub is the common technical protocol that allows all of the software in the Fediverse to talk together. Both Mastodon, Kbin and Lemmy (and others) are build “on top” of the ActivityPub protocol.

      Hope this helps

    • 3xa8yte@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
      0·
      1 year ago

      I’ll give it a try, though I’m new here too:

      What’s an instance? -> A server on which you can register your account

      What’s a community? -> same as a subreddit

      What are federations? -> Information exchange between servers

      What’s mastodon? -> Twitter alternative. As lemmy is to reddit

      What’s Kbin? -> Similar to lemmy, but kbin can interact better with Mastodon

      What’s ActivityPub? -> the protocol used within the fediverse

      • BetaRebooter@feddit.ukEnglish
        0·
        1 year ago

        Thanks, so you can register with multiple servers (instances) right? Like I have a lemmy.world account and a Feddit.uk one, I am generally logged into the fedddit.uk. when would I need to switch over to using Lemmy.world? Do i need too?

        Also can you only find certain communities depending on which account your signed into

        • rooster_butt@programming.devEnglish
          0·
          1 year ago

          when would I need to switch over to using Lemmy.world?

          I can think of 2 reasons:

          • feddit.uk is down.
          • you want to create a community on Lemmy.world you have to do it with an account on that instance.

          Also can you only find certain communities depending on which account your signed into.

          so if an instance is defederated with another like beehaw to lemmy.world (though they say this is temporary), then you won’t get any updates out of those communities. You can always search the community from another instance in the search tool. If someone else on your instance already did this the community should be accessible via c/[email protected]. That URL will not work unless someone has already searched it and it’s indexed. For large instances this will likely not be an issue, but it may be annoying for people on smaller instances.

        • Sparking@lemm.eeEnglish
          0·
          1 year ago

          You can register with multiple instances, but you don’t need too, because you can view, post, comment and vote on any instance that your home instance is federated with.

          So you only need one account.