First of all, it’s really fine to stay on LW for now, no need to rush anything. But if at some point you have some time for this, then read the following.
So, to pick your instance, you can have a look at https://lemmy.fediverse.observer/list, filter by “1m” to see what are the most popular ones. As you can see, with a 27433 monthly users, Lemmy.world is by far the most popular, which is why you might experience some issues from time to time.
You should have a look at the next instances on the list.
Short story: lemm.ee, sh.itjust.works, lemmy.one, sopuli.xyz and reddthat.com are solid choices.
You are looking at instances with quite a lot of people (the more people help with filling your “All” feed), just not the most populous one (lemmy.world), the original one (lemmy.ml), and instances that are too specific, either due to country or specific focus.
Long story:
spoiler
lemmy.ml is the original insance, also quite crowded, not really the best choice
lemm.ee can be nice, you can have a look at it and see how fast it is for you. The admin communicates a lot and is very helpful.
sh.itjust.works had some rough time in the last few days. You might also not like the name, that’s okay.
beehaw.org does not federate with the big instances, so if you go there, you will be in their own space. It can a valid choice, but please have a look at their guidelines first, they tend to moderate a lot. Can work for you, or not.
I think there is a huge misconception many people have that a larger instance is more likely to stay around, but due to the nonlinear costs involved in hosting fediverse instances this is not true.
Basically there is a sweet-spot around a few thousand (~2500) members where costs are low enough for a single admin paying things out of their own pocket long term is possible, but also enough members willing to occasionally donate or contribute otherwise to cover costs.
To be honest, I know it’s a controversial view, but I would almost like to see Ruud and the LW admins block registrations for a while, along with a communication “Have a look at those other instances, they are well managed, you can access all of Lemmy just as well from there”
I’m not looking forward to 5 years from now, where instances like this are the mastodon.social of federated reddit-likes. As much as they should block registrations, I don’t think they will. …but I have a hat on stand by, just in case I need to eat it.
I think they’re stuck in a vicious circle, their server costs scale with size but new users are way more likely to donate. Users that have already donated feel like they’ve done their bit for a while, and that’s if they’re still around and engaged in a few weeks. Very few people want to donate monthly, subscription style.
My personal controversial view is people should put more faith in well-run self-hosted instances. It’s a much more sustainable way to run a Fediverse server and self-hosted doesn’t have to mean amateur hour. Just because an instance is cloud hosted doesn’t mean it’s well configured or secure either.
I have way more resources at my disposal than the vast majority of cloud hosted instances, for a tiny fraction of the cost. lemm.ee for example is very well run but has to put up with a 100kb image size limit because of cost-driven space constrains.
Self hosting is also closer to the spirit of what decentralization is supposed to mean - your server ultimately belongs to your host.
LASIM author here, ironically on my own alt: Just an FYI that support for Lemmy 0.18.3 is not yet out, but keep an eye out for it soon (I have it working on a branch but I need to test it more before release).
This is the first breaking API change since it’s creation, so here are the limitations:
Old version (0.1.2) will only support API 0.18.1 and 0.18.2
New version (0.2.0) will only support 0.18.3 (and above until there are more breaking API changes)
Profiles downloaded with 0.1.2 (and below) will automatically be converted to work with 0.2.0.
So that all means:
You can use the old LASIM to migrate between 0.18.2 Lemmy instances
You can use the new LASIM to migrate between 0.18.3 Lemmy instances
You can use the old LASIM to download from an 0.18.2 instance then use the new LASIM to upload to a 0.18.3 instance
You cannot use the new LASIN to download from a 0.18.3 instance and then the old LASIM to upload to a 0.18.2 instance (unless you are comfortable doing some manual work editing the JSON file so “old LASIM” understands it).
This will be true of every release with breaking API changes.
Thanks for all your hard work on this. I’ve used lasim to transfer my subscriptions to my other accounts on other instances when the lemmy.world downtimes happened last week. I love the portability of the tool.
Fwiw, sh.itjust.works is a horrible name, but a great instance lol.
What’s funny though, I’m getting beehaw posts in my all feed since yesterday. No idea if they’ve refederated with us, or if it’s an artifact of connect (my app of choice), or what,
Quoting myself from a previous post:
First of all, it’s really fine to stay on LW for now, no need to rush anything. But if at some point you have some time for this, then read the following.
So, to pick your instance, you can have a look at https://lemmy.fediverse.observer/list, filter by “1m” to see what are the most popular ones. As you can see, with a 27433 monthly users, Lemmy.world is by far the most popular, which is why you might experience some issues from time to time.
You should have a look at the next instances on the list. Short story: lemm.ee, sh.itjust.works, lemmy.one, sopuli.xyz and reddthat.com are solid choices.
You are looking at instances with quite a lot of people (the more people help with filling your “All” feed), just not the most populous one (lemmy.world), the original one (lemmy.ml), and instances that are too specific, either due to country or specific focus.
Long story:
spoiler
.
To migrate your settings (including subscriptions and blocked instances), you can use that script: https://github.com/CMahaff/lasim
I think there is a huge misconception many people have that a larger instance is more likely to stay around, but due to the nonlinear costs involved in hosting fediverse instances this is not true.
Basically there is a sweet-spot around a few thousand (~2500) members where costs are low enough for a single admin paying things out of their own pocket long term is possible, but also enough members willing to occasionally donate or contribute otherwise to cover costs.
To be honest, I know it’s a controversial view, but I would almost like to see Ruud and the LW admins block registrations for a while, along with a communication “Have a look at those other instances, they are well managed, you can access all of Lemmy just as well from there”
I’m not looking forward to 5 years from now, where instances like this are the mastodon.social of federated reddit-likes. As much as they should block registrations, I don’t think they will. …but I have a hat on stand by, just in case I need to eat it.
I think they’re stuck in a vicious circle, their server costs scale with size but new users are way more likely to donate. Users that have already donated feel like they’ve done their bit for a while, and that’s if they’re still around and engaged in a few weeks. Very few people want to donate monthly, subscription style.
My personal controversial view is people should put more faith in well-run self-hosted instances. It’s a much more sustainable way to run a Fediverse server and self-hosted doesn’t have to mean amateur hour. Just because an instance is cloud hosted doesn’t mean it’s well configured or secure either.
I have way more resources at my disposal than the vast majority of cloud hosted instances, for a tiny fraction of the cost. lemm.ee for example is very well run but has to put up with a 100kb image size limit because of cost-driven space constrains.
Self hosting is also closer to the spirit of what decentralization is supposed to mean - your server ultimately belongs to your host.
Interesting, I wasn’t really thinking about this, I guess most of admins nowadays just prefer the convenience (including scalability) of a VPS.
I mean, with 27k monthly active users, they are more prevalent that Mastodon.social. The following instances are so much smaller it’s almost comical.
@remindme@mstdn.social 5y
LASIM author here, ironically on my own alt: Just an FYI that support for Lemmy 0.18.3 is not yet out, but keep an eye out for it soon (I have it working on a branch but I need to test it more before release).
This is the first breaking API change since it’s creation, so here are the limitations:
So that all means:
This will be true of every release with breaking API changes.
EDIT: PR is out. Once it builds, I’ll publish a new release! https://github.com/CMahaff/lasim/pull/21
EDIT 2: Release is published! https://github.com/CMahaff/lasim/releases/tag/v0.2.0
Thank you for the heads up! You might want to add that to the ReadMe on your Github
Removed “and above” from page and instead added a note to always get the latest version if your version isn’t listed as supported explicitly.
Great, thank you!
Thanks for all your hard work on this. I’ve used lasim to transfer my subscriptions to my other accounts on other instances when the lemmy.world downtimes happened last week. I love the portability of the tool.
Thanks for your kind words, I’m glad it has helped you!
geddit.social is a another good server, I have alt there. It’s run by @stux@geddit.social who has his own hosting company and also hosts mstdn.social.
Fwiw, sh.itjust.works is a horrible name, but a great instance lol.
What’s funny though, I’m getting beehaw posts in my all feed since yesterday. No idea if they’ve refederated with us, or if it’s an artifact of connect (my app of choice), or what,
Interesting. You are still on the list of their blocked instances, so I’m not sure: https://beehaw.org/instances
Must be some kind of weirdness with the app then. Thanks for looking at that!
You’re welcome, have a good one!