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Ask HN: Alternatives to Reddit

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Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to Reddit

#331

Post by tasuki »

unpopularopp wrote: post #91
1024core wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Public: these would be democratically run forums. The users would actually be able to vote for moderators, and perhaps even rules around them. This would be ideal for things like r/[country] or r/[city]. This is my biggest gripe about Reddit. Unlike hobbies or interests, I can't change my country of birth or (easily change) the city. So when you get banned from a geographical sub, you have no alternative. Some of t…

>A typical example is /r/india which is totally under the control of radical anti-Modi mods Most geographical subs are extremely liberal leaning. I'm from Hungary and in /r/hungary pretty much 99% of the posts are anti-Orban. Same with /r/europe pushing the general federalist EU agenda [0]. Or just /r/politics for the US, good luck going against the MSNBC meta. 0, which ends up funny when the topic is food and sudden…

> I'm from Hungary and in /r/hungary pretty much 99% of the posts are anti-Orban.

I'm not from Hungary but I have low opinion of Orban. All the Hungarians I've talked to had nothing but bad things to say about him. Is he well liked or at least tolerated in Hungary?

Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to Reddit

#332

Post by rondini »

JSavageOne wrote: post #299

I have not found any serious alternatives. The main problem is the chicken and egg problem where no one cares unless other people are using it. I created my own alternative as a side project ( https://zsync.xyz ) with some differences (eg. tags instead of subreddits), but there are no users - and why should there be? I used to use Reddit pretty heavily, but I stopped when I realized outside a few small use cases it w…

Reddit has a much bigger problem with allowing hateful and dangerous content than being too "PC".

Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to Reddit

#333

Post by Emoticon4032 »

awill wrote: post #223
sharperguy wrote: post #44

I see reddit less as a website and more as a collection of communities. Each community has its own set of reasons for hosting itself on reddit vs other locations. Therefore I would predict that in the absence of reddit, not every community would move to the same place. I also noticed that in recent years many subreddits have increasingly been taken over by memes and other low quality posts and so users looking for mo…

But the magic of reddit is that I can browse all my communities in one place. Playstation, Audi, Cooking, Tennis. It's super convenient to have a single account for all of this. Before I used reddit, I had an account at an Audi forum, a different account at a tennis forum etc.. Reddit is so much better. I'd rather some 'bluesky'-like competitor vs every community going their own way.

Maybe the model going forward is to go back to the use of RSS feeds from each of the discrete sites that you frequent? Not sure if RSS is a thing these days though.

Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to Reddit

#334

Post by Masema »

zigman1 wrote: post #69
Glench wrote: post #14

God what a mess. If anyone else is interested I made a browser extension you can use to batch delete your Reddit posts and comments: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/bulk-delete-reddit... Let me know how it works for you if you try it! Still fixing bugs.

I really hope not a lot of people does that. Looking for knowledge or guides i don’t want to be stuck with the worst part of the internet as what blogs have become. There’s a reason all of us are using site:reddit.com.

Unfortunately, the alternative is to let Reddit continue to profit off content contributed by users who Reddit has now decided to spurn.

A lot of people are using Reddit's data request form to get a copy of their own content before deleting it.

Maybe somebody could set up a site where users can send in their personal backups, and they can be combined into a sort of 'shadow Reddit'.

Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to Reddit

#335

Post by friend_and_foe »

Comprehensive? The internet would be my first choice.

The fact is, all community organization online being on one site is an awful idea as we see with this and other things that have happened in the past. Communities should host their own forums.

Searchability... The truth is that Google isn't a search engine, it's a content aggregator now. It doesn't even index the internet! And it blocks valid results, for reasons ranging from "its a pirate site" to "we don't want you knowing these things". This site:reddit.com thing is a workaround, because sites like reddit have taken over enthusiast run information depos on the internet. Looking at it now, it's a bad idea to have all that information in one place, no?

Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to Reddit

#336

Post by nerdponx »

deafpolygon wrote: post #327
nerdponx wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally I don't see a significant portion of the Reddit user base leaving over this. Basically every major and minor city in the USA has its own subreddit. How many of those users are really going to leave and switch back to Facebook groups?

> Basically every major and minor city in the USA has its own subreddit And how many are actually run by the city government?

None, but what does that matter? These are community-created microforums, which probably wouldn't exist at all if it weren't for Reddit.

Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to Reddit

#337

Post by kybernetikos »

stinkytaco wrote: post #329
kybernetikos wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

after you and another commenter suggested it, I checked it out. It does look pretty interesting. Unfortunately I can't find any way to import my OPML so I'm a bit stuck. The discovery of feeds contrasts rather poorly with my podcast player. And forcing me to manually copy a whole bunch of hard to find urls one at a time is not a fun onboarding experience.

If you click the gear in the bottom right (at least of my screen) the menu that pops up will have an option called "Import or upload sites". That has an OPML upload option. It's a cluttered user experience, though fairly configurable once you've started to find your way around. It's definitely a kitchen sink style tool, however. EDIT: It's bottom left, sorry. I browse the web in a mirror.

I think the gear was greyed out until I added my first site, but it's working now. Thanks for the suggestion, and I'll give it a try!

Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to Reddit

#338

Post by JSavageOne »

rondini wrote: post #332
JSavageOne wrote: post #299

I have not found any serious alternatives. The main problem is the chicken and egg problem where no one cares unless other people are using it. I created my own alternative as a side project ( https://zsync.xyz ) with some differences (eg. tags instead of subreddits), but there are no users - and why should there be? I used to use Reddit pretty heavily, but I stopped when I realized outside a few small use cases it w…

Reddit has a much bigger problem with allowing hateful and dangerous content than being too "PC".

Do you have any examples?

For example during COVID, Reddit was extremely toxic and hostile to any questioning of COVID lockdown policies. You couldn't even talk about travel in travel forums without being shamed as some kind of murderer and downvote censored to oblivion, let alone questioning the justification of lockdowns, border restrictions, and vaccine mandates.

Reddit has had an extreme woke left bias for a long time such as in its main subs like /r/politics. Of course this extremity on one side breeds counter extremes on the other like /r/TheDonald. The hivemind nature of the site ultimately makes everyone more divided and worse off.

I wrote a bit about the toxicity of Reddit here https://jsavage.xyz/2022/03/13/the-downfall-of-reddit-why-re...

Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to Reddit

#339

Post by true_blue »

abhijat wrote: post #271
heyoni wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

/r/rust just initiated a soft fork of Lemmy so it should be getting some traction and development.

Do you perhaps know why they aren't contributing to the upstream?

I believe it's related to the stalinism controversy.

Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to Reddit

#340

Post by stinkytaco »

kybernetikos wrote: post #337
stinkytaco wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you click the gear in the bottom right (at least of my screen) the menu that pops up will have an option called "Import or upload sites". That has an OPML upload option. It's a cluttered user experience, though fairly configurable once you've started to find your way around. It's definitely a kitchen sink style tool, however. EDIT: It's bottom left, sorry. I browse the web in a mirror.

I think the gear was greyed out until I added my first site, but it's working now. Thanks for the suggestion, and I'll give it a try!

If you decide you like it, let us know your username. I'm always looking for interesting people to follow.
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