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 :-) )

  • tj
    19•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

      • @Coelacanth
        2•1 year ago

        I tend to agree, though it should be noted that the public access to vote information is part of the current backend and Kbins frontend just makes it available for everyone to see. WefWef for example also shows your point totals (“karma”) on Lemmy and I’m sure many other 3rd party apps will too.

        Someone raised this issue on the Lemmy GitHub today but it’s unclear what stance the Devs will take.

    • @Redonkulation
      2•1 year ago

      As a reddit refugee I appreciate the quick FAQ. I have been re-reading the lemmy welcome post as I browse around and find new stuff. Mastodon is a whole other can of worms for me.