This was a mobile app that stalled out last year and was officially archived in February. The only reason given is “political differences” and I’m not really sure what that means.
I’m interested in building a cross platform app (Android and Linux Mobile, maybe iOS), and am deciding on tech stack. However, before I get too deep in the weeds, I’d like a bit more information about the reasons this app was discontinued since I’d really rather not run into the same problem.
If anyone has any input, please let me know. Thanks!
Several folks hold the opinion (here’s a recent one) that the Lemmy devs, acting as primary moderators for the lemmy.ml and lemmygrad.ml instances, have ignored moderation of pro-CCP, pro-communist discussion threads on those instances. This ends up being detrimental for Lemmy’s reputation overall, as:
- Those instances have some of the highest membership numbers, and as word-of-mouth spreads will mean a lot of newcomers to Lemmy will land into those large instances
- If the devs don’t moderate their instances a certain way, what are their motives that might bleed into the development direction that Lemmy itself will take? e.g. The devs’ opinion on how to implement a slur filter
My own personal opinion here is that as long as the devs aren’t building anything malicious or overly political into Lemmy, I don’t really care what their personal beliefs are. I work with devs all the time that have different ideological or political beliefs, that doesn’t change the quality of the code. Open-source software can be forked and modified if the Lemmy devs cross the line, and by design each instance can run their own version of the underlying software. How the Lemmy devs moderate their instances is only a reflection of their ability to act as effective moderators, which is why (again, by design) choosing your “home” instance is the most important aspect of engaging on Lemmy and the wider Fediverse.
I got banned for this view, somwwhere, yesterday. We live in wacky times
Agreed. The protocol (ActivityPub) and AFAIK the lemmy platform code itself is ‘neutral’ to such political issues. If a particular instance appears to have a distasteful agenda, we can each decide to move to another instance, or ignore it by filtering out those communities/users with which we don’t want to interact.
The devs’ opinion on how to implement a slur filter
They’ve since backed down on this entirely, apparently
I can only speculate with zero evidence, but it’s possible that the creator has strong feelings about communism, neo-nazis, or reddit, and others involved have other stances.
I don’t think the app or Lemmy itself was archived due to technical reasons though, it seemed to work decently enough.
Where does this communist/neo-nazi stuff come from? I had somebody go off on me posting on reddit this weekend just for suggesting users try moving to the fediverse and lemmy specifically.
This person asserted that by creating an account on any lemmy instance I was somehow supporting ‘tankies’ and neo-nazism (which is hilarious as looking up what ‘tankie’ means, it’s an old term for militant Stalinists… how is one both a neo-nazi and a Stalinist??).
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Lemmy instances are self-hosted, so no matter what the platform’s author(s) may or may not have had in authoring it, AFAIK the code is neutral;
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I see no evidence the owner of the lemmy.ca instance has any such political leanings (not that I’ve looked that hard, nor should I need to) – if they did, I’d simply delete this account and join another instance if it offended me;
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The ToS on lemmy.ca main page says specifically no racism, sexism, ableism, homophobia, transphobia, or xenophobia. Seems perfectly reasonable to me;
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Communities are their own little world; if one doesn’t like a certain topic or community, just don’t subscribe to it.
Finally, 5. If the lemmy devs themselves are problematic, fork the code. It’s the protocol that matters, and the fact it’s open source. Anyone can take up the reigns if need be.
This whole argument to me sounds like a car bumper manufacturer in the year 2023 refusing to make bumpers for Volkswagen Beetles because, once upon a time, they were designed by people affiliated with you-know-who.
you-know-who He who must not be named, lest he hear you and smite you.
OK, fair enough. Hitler. Hitler Hitler Hitler. I’ll await my smiting :p
Supposedly the lemmy.ml and lemmygrad instances and Lemmy software are made by people who think the Chinese Communist party is good. I haven’t verified it though.
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I don’t know the details but from what I heard the developer was bothered that Lemmy was either “too communist” or “not communist enough”. I can’t remember which one it was and no guarantee that it’s really true (it’s just hearsay and I might be mistaken).
Captain’s log, stardate 41153.7: We’ve left planet Lemmy 17. It was… too communist or… not communist enough. I… can’t remember which. The search continues for a… planet… whose communism… is just right.
Goldilocks, take us deeper into the Fediverse. It must… be out there somewhere.
I love this
I dunno my brain is weird. I read your comment and it just happened.
Lemmy dev(s?) are pro-CCP which has driven some people away from the platform and others to unaffiliated instances.
This explains a lot. I’m new to Lemmy and was taking a look on the Google Play store for any apps. Ended up downloading Lemmur and couldn’t find any communities or content. Now I know why! 😳
(Writing this from Jerboa for Lemmy, in case any lurkers out there are also looking for an app. It’s working pretty well overall.)
Yup, Jerboa works well, and I actually work on it to some capacity.
I was just looking around for projects that I could turn into a “desktop” app (I want it for a Linux phone and my Steam Deck), and it seemed promising and wondered about the notice on the GitHub page.
For now, I’m content helping out with Jerboa, at least until another high quality competitor comes along.
