This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.

The original was posted on /r/lemmymigration by /u/TheArstaInventor on 2023-06-09 20:09:28+00:00.

Why Kbin & ActivityPub?

Hey everyone! As you may have seen in my recent post, I very recently became aware of some long-standing issues surrounding Lemmy, particularly its founders/developers/maintainers’ attitude towards human rights oppression and human rights in general. I personally wasn’t okay with this, which led me to reconsider my support for Lemmy and explore other alternative platforms that are open source and decentralized. That’s how I ended up with Kbin, and here’s how/why:

In my search for alternatives, I explored both new and familiar options. While some Reddit-like clients based on Nostr (a protocol that I’ve always been interested in, as I prefer it’s relay concept over activitypub’s instance) exist, such as Nvote or Zapddit, they either lack active development or fundamental features that define Reddit, such as subreddits (communities) and essential mod tools for moderators. Heck Zapddit requires you to connect your so called Lightning Wallet to simply be able to upvote/downvote posts. Unfortunately, these Nostr-based Reddit alternatives are more similar to Hacker News than Reddit, missing the vital “community” aspect.

Then, we have the well-known alternatives listed here on r/RedditAlternatives for some time now. Starting with Tildes, it is centralized, which brings us back to many of the same issues we face with Reddit (though I appreciate that it is open source). Additionally, Tildes is an invite-only platform, and has been like that for several years now, creating a significant barrier for users who are looking to migrate from Reddit. Other alternatives like FlingUp are closed source and centralized, exactly like Reddit, while decentralized options like discussions.app had the right idea but failed in execution. I was intrigued by P2P alternatives like Aether (which is sadly abandoned and was ephemeral), while Plebbit has an interesting concept but currently only has a demo with long loading times and a poorly copied Reddit UI. Simple things like usernames also seem to be crypto domains based on Ethereum, adding more confusion and complication for the average user.

This exploration led me to ActivityPub and Kbin. In my opinion, ActivityPub is currently the best protocol for a Reddit alternative right now, as it predates Nostr, AT protocol, and others. The protocol is mature and has an established community outside of big tech platforms like Reddit and Twitter. People often believe ActivityPub-based platforms are harder for average users due to server selection, but with the right guidance, more users will understand ActivityPub’s concept as it’s just as simple as email. Protocols like Nostr may be easy to implement, but the unnecessary crypto-involved mechanisms (like Zapddit had) make the overall user experience complicated or perhaps simply confusing.

With ActivityPub in mind, I chose Kbin not just because it avoids Lemmy’s known issues, but also because it has a fairly mature user interface for a younger project. Kbin allows users to both micro-blog individually and post threads to communities like Reddit, combining the best of Mastodon and Lemmy, and bringing both user bases together thanks to federation (ActivityPub), which is crucial for competing with a giant like Reddit. The platform is also more appealing to the average user than Lemmy which can often leave a tech-nerdyy impression to the average user, even though both are based on the same protocol. Therefore, Kbin has greater potential despite being newer.

Launching r/KbinMigration and Guide for New Users

As I move from Lemmy to Kbin, I wanted to take the same initiative I did with Lemmy and r/LemmyMigration, but this time with many more improvements to not only the sub r/KbinMigration itself but also a Guide for new users, as promised in my previous post. This guide answers many common questions users have regarding ActivityPub platforms, specifically Kbin. More updates will be coming to the guide, and if you have any unanswered questions, please let me know. I will make sure to read all of them and provide the necessary updates.

EDIT: Thanks to reddit being anti-competitive again, they have banned r/KbinMigration (for spam, when it has 2 pinned posts) and the ban has not been lifted as of now, please do share this to everyone and hopefully we can get it back if Reddit realizes more people are starting to notice it’s censorship.

Until then, the Guide will be accessible here.

Thank you for the support, all of you, it means a lot to me, keeps me motivated while making things like the guide.