That's cool, but OP is specifically asking about finding things on Google.

Asymmetry can be hot. Observe:

From a developer role, Lemmy is going to need to figure out a way to scale up development.

No they don't. The platform is open source, so the more users they have, the more of those users will become contributors.

Agreed! Then it could be really like email! You create an account on an "account server", we'll call it, and then you can use that account to log into "community servers". Instances wouldn't need to federate content with each other, since users could just go to other instances with their account.

That would just make them go downhill further.

I was thinking about the multiple accounts thing. Maybe the concept of an "instance" needs to be separate from the concept of an account? Like, it doesn't matter what service you choose for your email account; you can email anyone from Gmail, and anyone can send email to you. The only real difference is that your email address end in "@gmail.com" instead of "@comcast.net".

On Lemmy, though, the place you make your account matters a whole lot. It determines what content you're allowed to see, and who you're allowed to interact with. If the instance you're on gets federated, you need to migrate to a different account on a different instance. That never happens with email!

A lot of users have been managing this by creating their own instance, with the sole purpose of hosting their account and nothing else. Maybe that's what we need: a set of "instances" that only host accounts, and a set of "instances" that only host communities. You could then use that account to subscribe to communities from any instance. That way, Beehaw could block content from instances they don't like, without cutting off all of the users who happened to choose the wrong place to sign up.

Actually, under that system, there wouldn't be a need for instances to federate content with each other at all. Users could just subscribe to communities with their account, and then the users would be the ones in charge of what they see, instead of their instance choosing for them.

I got that vibe when I saw that they intentionally keep their rules vague, to make them harder to evade. That just sounded to me like a recipe for power tripping.

He already publicly admitted that Reddit isn't profitable. I'm sure that inspired tons of confidence in investors.

I'd rather people not delete their content at all, tbh. Imagine all of the Google searches that would be borked by it.

I tried kbin, but I left it behind when I realized I couldn't tell the difference between federated and non federated posts.

Yeah, the last thing we need is for Lemmy to be only about Reddit

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