This is not an attempt to convert Lemmy users, nor is it a slight on Lemmy. I’m sure there are plenty of reasons why Lemmy works better for some, and I love the fact that we not only have multiple choices, but multiple choices that allow us to interact with each other regardless! It’s amazing. Lemmy is great, no shade.

With that said…

Why YSK: I see a lot of users posting frequent questions about Lemmy that are currently answered by kbin.

For example:

  • The ability to block a whole domain, or subscribe to one
  • The ability to subscribe to individual users
  • A built-in search tool to find communities all over fedi (kbin, Lemmy, Mastodon groups, etc.) with an indication of how active they are
  • Mitigation for the “tracking pixel” issue

I find that almost every day, I see Lemmy users asking about features and I think, “well, kbin does that.” I think it would be worthwhile for more users to check into both platforms and decide which might be best for them.

  • Kichae
    64•1 year ago

    Ehhh. kbin’s quite feature-incomplete in its own right, it’s just a different set of features that are incomplete. I don’t think there’s anything about kbin that’s actually superior to lemmy, just… different. Meanwhile, Betamax had inarguably better video, and inarguably worse capacity.

    • HipPriest
      1•1 year ago

      Which features are missing from Kbin that are on Lemmy?

      I lurked on both for about a week before going with Kbin so don’t really have experience of using Lemmy apps etc

      • Kichae
        33•1 year ago

        Off the top of my head:

        • API’s a big one. Mobile app development for kbin is deeply hampered because of that.

        • The ability to quickly filter your timeline by Local/Global, which is a big deal for regional or themed instances.

        • A (more) easily accessible subscribed community/magazine list (slower/smaller communities are kind of totally smothered in kbin).

        • PeerTube federation.

        Meanwhile, the domain block touted by the OP is buried and kind of a pain to get to, and the search claim is… overstated (kbin search still only reaches other sites that the given kbin instance is subscribed to).

        kbin has a nicer UI, IMO, and it’s fine. It’s perfectly fine. Lemmy is also perfectly fine. Neither is excellent, and that’s ok. Neither has reached version 1.0, either, and both are being developed by small teams (for some flexible definition of “team”).

        • Aki
          14•1 year ago

          I personally think Lemmy will have better UI as time goes on. It’s already coming slowly altogether as time goes on.

          • Kichae
            10•1 year ago

            Yeah, 0.18 came with subtle but really impact changes.

        • @[email protected]
          13•1 year ago

          Not having a quick step to go to your subscribed magazines.

          I know you can via settings but honestly on a mobile it’s a mission.

          No apps yet support kbin, no way to change post layouts.

          All of that said, what works for you works and the beauty of the fediverse is the choice to be able to choose the source and still see everything.

          • HipPriest
            8•1 year ago

            what works for you works and the beauty of the fediverse is the choice to be able to choose the source and still see everything.

            This is the main point for me really, everything else is just quibbling. Although collapsible comments on Kbin definitely need to happen!

      • I use NixOS btw
        1•1 year ago

        A mobile app (or even api), RSS feeds (AFAICT).