Thank you. That’s what I wanted to know.

Would implementing something like this prevent this problem?

https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/t/securing-fedora-with-fido2-utrust-full-disk-luks-gui-login-and-sudo-authentication/154136

So, there’s a inherent problem with blocking working both ways on a forum style site or platform like Lemmy.

When you block someone and the block goes through, if it works both ways, that means your comments or exchanges with that person disappear. The problem with that? They disappear for you and the person you blocked. Anyone else who comments can see the thread. But you both no longer can. So say someone comes along and responds to you on that thread. Or to the other person on that thread? Will their comment go through? Will you be able to see their comment? Will you be able to reply to their comment?

It becomes more complicated and further can affect users not related to or involve with the block depending on how it’s handled and for the most part that’s problematic.

I think we should be differentiating a “block function” (and neither the twain shall meet) from a “mute function” (a one way filter).

I feel like this might genuinely just be better than giving people a false understanding of what the filter they are using does.

This is what I do when I want to search Lemmy. I put Lemmy: “search for this” into the search box and see what comes up. It works better than Lemmy’s internal search function a lot of the time.

I have a couple of reasons. The first and foremost is that I use windows for two things. Gaming (I dual boot windows and Bazzite for that to cover the few games I haven’t gotten to work), and work. My work laptop has windows 10 because the IT department can’t get some of the legacy software we rely on to do our jobs to work in 11. The compatibility layer originally wasn’t there and now it only works some of the time and every time there’s an update it breaks something. As a result we will likely be paying to continue to receive important security updates after 10 sunsets in October.

Additionally, some windows computers lose certain functionality when you install Linux (touchscreen compatibility, pen input compatibility etc. Can I update my personal surface pro to Linux? Yes. Will I? Unlikely. It’s way more likely that I’ll jailbreak it to force free security updates for the duration. I’ve run into way too much stuff I’ve had to have to IT department just straight up turn off in both 11 and 10. 11 is much worse for this though and subsequent updates have a habit of turning that stuff back on because MS wants that data.

So much new telemetry. So many new ads. So much random tracking. Swapping browsers to Edge. Copilot. Etc.

My fedora rig has secure-boot/tpm enabled. But getting that to work isn’t something the average windows user is going to do. The average windows user doesn’t ever open the command line in windows. And that’s the thing I think people in the Linux community need to understand. I grew up with DOS. I spent 30+ years using the command line. I have used windows since 3.0. I have a general understanding of how to get what I want out of windows. I’m learning to do that with Linux but I have been on Linux for like a year and a half. The learning curve when you are already very familiar with something else and have muscle memory for something else is staggering. And I can fully understand why it might be exceptionally confusing and unintuitive for someone who’s never had to use a terminal ever.

The fact is, most computer devices are phones. They use apps. There is some overlap in that with windows, but the plug and play nature of how these people are used to doing things is just as important to this conversation as just about ever other point.

Windows even pops up “helpful” tips and tricks because they know that people aren’t windows savvy. I personally hate them but I’m not the average windows user.

I’d also like to point out that windows had the audacity to change the design language and somehow make a usable tablet environment worse in windows 11 in a bit to be more macOS-like and I personally really really hate that as well. I have my desktop and start menu set up in a way I like it and windows 11 completely ruins that and in my case makes things harder for me because I am fighting muscle memory. It’s egregious to have to pay for the privilege of changing my start menu or task bar. I shouldn’t have to go in and doctor what apps are allow during start up. I shouldn’t have to turn off OneDrive or office 365. I shouldn’t have to turn off telemetry or ads. This is a device I purchased and the OS is not supposed to spy on me.

Thank you for this post. I have been talking the ear off my one Linux friend since I installed Bazzite and I’m sure he’s got better things to do with his time than help me every time I text him with a problem or a question. A lot of online forums on the subject talk over my head so I need clarification even when I can find the solution to my problem.

How’s fractal? It comes up as a recommendation for Linux matrix a lot and I was wondering.

If that’s the only language you have to communicate, I’d say more power to you. If you can translate what you’re saying using online tools, that might better facilitate communication and conversation.

It’s searchable but information doesn’t stay pinned and available. It’s meant to be a chatroom style place for gaming and as that it’s fine but when you want to build a community for something like a video game or a product, what ends up happening is you end up making a channel for every single announcement etc. Say you have a channel for FAQ? You either lock it so only moderators and admins can use it or you end up with a constantly ballooning channel where everyone can contribute. There’s no in-between and because each post isn’t really collated the way it would be here or on a forum the information is hard to navigate without search which often only gives a truncated section that you can’t even navigate to. There’s no context more often than not when you use the search function and it’s a very poor substitute for a forum as a result.

I don’t think discord is a good substitute for a website and I don’t think it’s a good substitute for a forum but it’s being used as both fairly frequently.

I did ask. Why is it like pulling teeth to get answers? I don’t use WhatsApp. Never got on that bandwagon. Something being free and open source doesn’t mean it’s good. Something being trustworthy from your standpoint doesn’t explain why it’s trustworthy to a layman who doesn’t understand why you think FOSS = trustworthy or good. It’s FOSS and you’ve looked at the code and found it to live up to its claims of being secure?

I’m not sure where the hostility is coming from here but I’m more pointing out that I can use a search engine to find out about matrix to some extent, but people who use the platform and have a better understanding of its pros and cons have valuable information to pass on. But when you ask them about it they’re full of recommendations but those recommendations often don’t have much in the way of information about what’s good about the user experience or feature set or even the code. I’m trying to show that the particulars of why you like or prefer something matter.

So, I’m going to say that I don’t use telegram and only know it as being presented as a secure messenger platform. As a result, I am just asking follow-on questions to further discern what makes Element preferable. And this is no different because I feel like this is exactly the problem lemmy and other platforms like it have. There are people who love them, but when people ask about them, they don’t offer any really informative data to support why they like them.

What makes Element (matrix) a secure platform, and how does that differ from telegram or signal or whatever. Like. What is matrix good at? That’s what I’m asking. Why suggest it over something else?

What are its pros and cons? What does it offer that telegram or similar don’t offer? Is it good for group chat? Is it available on multiple platforms?

Tell me about Element. This is the first I’m hearing about it.

First and foremost I’d like to point out that this alarm has been sounded before. In the early 2010’s, in the late 2010’s, during the pandemic etc. Part of that is because megaforums like reddit (slack, github, and I guess digg) swallowed them up. Which is more convenient for the average user (younger internet users especially) who only have to go to one or two places with apps that allow them to use their phone to format in a readable/engageable manner for them.

I would posit that the internet forum isn’t dying exactly so much as it has morphed into things like the above mentioned megaforums. Those megaforums have their own trials and tribulations but they are popular for multiple reasons.

Ease of use - One tap to open an app you’re already signed into on a phone or tablet from anywhere.

Ease of discoverability - An algorithm that helps you to find things to engage with. An algorithm that promotes content that lots of other people engage with so that new users who don’t have preferences known yet can still find things they like.

Ease of navigation and search - I’m still using udm14.com to search for things on lemmy because if I don’t save them the search function on the site isn’t good and doesn’t always provide me with results at all. Reddit’s search is pretty bad but it’s still more usable than lemmy’s in a lot of ways.

Easy to sign up - I think this speaks for itself. Lemmy has a higher bar to clear for vetting an instance and even understanding the difference between instances than any other corpo platform, and while this has gotten easier over time, it will never be as simple as, go to this website and fill out the form to make an account.

I say all that to say that 1. we got here by ignoring the warnings for years and years. 2. We can compete but are unlikely to be the number one choice of the general internet masses for a lot of reasons. 3. Smaller forums will continue to die and get swallowed up by megaforum websites or platforms like reddit or lemmy because of the benefit of convenience on the user side and I believe we have probably reached the point of no return in that respect.

As to what we do about it? We cultivate ours to be better, add features and users in an organic way that would make our platform the preferred one. But we can’t really focus on growth alone and part of the reason for that has to do with the user subset who don’t want to become like reddit or digg etc. Additionally, I think we might be able to win over the artists and creators if we added something to prevent AI from scraping their works.

The main thing for users who are already here might just be better decorum. Lemmy users are often mean (myself included in that statement) to people who we view as stupid or ill-informed and we often treat them like trolls. We also assume a certain amount of known information about any given situation and act as if everyone should know, which is problematic.

One last thing I’d like to point out. People on the internet more and more engage with content they don’t have to read. I think that’s an important part of why forums are dying. Illiteracy is rising. It’s hard to have a conversation in written or typed forums when you don’t have that skillset. Discord allows people to engage via voice in ways lemmy just does not (this is not advocacy for discord because it’s not a forum and treating it as one is problematic on just about every level).

I read that Dan Dan Daaaaaan as the anime not the dramatic music at first and that was kind of hilarious. I probably need sleep.

And it wouldn’t be nearly as much of a problem if parents weren’t buying them for their children. Why do they need it to be a law?

If you use Sync you can’t do it through the app.

This is a lot of the problem that I see with social media as a whole. Doesn’t matter if it’s the fediverse or regular corporate social media platforms. The problem is users in echo chambers spouting a lot of things that don’t ever take into account the whole situation.

The “anyone who naysays anything I believe or say” crowd is alive and well on both sides of the political aisle and they use the same tactics.

-Anyone who has a logical problem with something I’m trying to do is a Nazi or a sealion.

-Anyone “who didn’t vote because they have a moral reason to abstain to show the political party that it’s not good enough to just not be the other guy anymore” is a Trump supporter or a vote for Trump.

• Anyone who brings up the fact that there are nearing 1 million homeless people in America in 2025 and only 1 in 10 homeless people actually have the opportunity to vote - is using whataboutism arguments.

What I’m saying is, it’s not just the transgender community seeing these problems and the problem is people on social media as a whole existing only in echo chambers.

The thing is, echo chambers are natural but they’re also divisive. The people that exist in them peer pressure each other and subvert every narrative, pitting people who are nominally on the same side against one another because they don’t happen to agree on one or two issues, or don’t agree on how to effect real change. And anyone who admits that there are problems that need to be fixed before we can move forward, or education that needs to happen in order for everybody to get on the same page and work towards a common goal gets alienated or excommunicated.

Believe it or not, this happens in every single community. And while I think it’s good that baseless reports were ignored in this instance, I don’t know that 1. This is happening everywhere, and 2. Every report isn’t baseless just because you happen to be on the side of the person who the reports are against.

The fact that baseless reports were not acknowledged or verified in the other instance is exactly the problem. Because the problem is people. So on the one hand, you have a homeless person being harassed for their politics because their real life experience negates the feeling some people in the platform have and those people reported her for it. And on the other hand you have a deranged individual actively weaponizing the report button in order to harass someone with intent and their reports are at best being phoned in by admins and mods who cannot keep up with the influx, and at worst are being viewed partially rather than impartially and allowed to victimize the user that was targeted, which was the intent.

The cognitive dissonance is happening on both sides of the aisle, and even though the way it manifests is absolutely different in some ways, the fact is, it is happening and it’s a detriment to any movement that organizes or attempts to organize.

So it doesn’t work like it does on Tumblr then. Thank you!

How does the boosting work? Because I was never a major Twitter user, and on Tumblr, the “retweet”. Option makes things a bit of a disjointed mess because (at least with new Tumblr and the app) it treats each share as a separate post and they aren’t linked properly together. So, say someone responds to a comment you made on the reshare ten reshare ago. You may or may not even be able to access it. You may not even be able to find it.