this post was submitted on 10 Jun 2023
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Difference between kbin and lemmy (feddit.de)
submitted 1 year ago by YoTcA@feddit.de to c/fediverse@lemmy.ml
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Lately I often read about kbin.social being similar to lemmy but more accessible. So I created an account there to check it out. My experience so far is a little mixed. From kbin I can access all Lemmy posts, although I find the interface less intuitive to join new communities. So from the kbin side it feels like an other Lemmy instance.

But when searching for kbin from this Lemmy Account, I do not find much. I feel like I am missing some basic concept, that makes it pretty clear. Why this is such a one way experience.

So now I am wondering: How does this work, what are the difference, what do both sites have in common?

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[–] ernest@kbin.social 36 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (4 children)

I am striving to make the foundations very similar to Lemmy's, to facilitate potential migration in either direction. The main differences are that /kbin will ultimately be a modular gateway to the entire fediverse. I will tell you more about it a bit later.

You can search for groups and users in the following way (this will also be improved):
https://kbin.social/search?q=%40ernest%40szmer.info
https://kbin.social/search?q=%40wolnyinternet%40szmer.info

You can also disable federation in the options (sidebar) and only see local posts.

[–] Kory@lemmy.ml 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I really like what you are building there, but at the moment I often cannot find the communities I'm subscribed to on Lemmy so I tend to jump between those two.

[–] ernest@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Can you send me the names of the communities in a private message? I'll see what can be done.

[–] DarraignTheSane@lemmy.ml 7 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

On Lemmy, if a community on another server doesn't appear when you search for it, you can use the syntax "!communityname@server.name". Your login Lemmy server will then go out and index it and it will appear in the search a few moments later.

Is there a way to do that on kbin? I've tried every syntax for a Lemmy community that I know of and nothing seems to work.

!communityname@server.name
/c/communityname@server.name
server.name/c/communityname
@communityname@server.name
etc.

[–] ernest@kbin.social 4 points 1 year ago

I will be working on it soon to standardize it across platforms. I will also describe it in the project's wiki. I'll let you know.
https://codeberg.org/Kbin/kbin-core/issues/4

[–] 0xtero@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Does @communityname@server.name work?
That's how I tend to find things on most fedi places (masto, pixelfeed etc) and so far it's worked fine here as well.

[–] lps@masto.1146.nohost.me 2 points 1 year ago

@0xtero @YoTcA @Kory @ernest @DarraignTheSane I am connecting from mastodon and was wondering the same, I haven't had much luck

[–] Kory@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Sure thing and thank you. Will do it later though, have to run! :)

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[–] YoTcA@feddit.de 4 points 1 year ago

Thanks for the answer and all the work you put into kbin. Really like the design so far. Only have to get used to the structure a little more.

Something else I am wondering: when I registered at kbin I think I never could choose an instance. So is it only possible to use kbin with a registration at kbin.social or is a plan to allow other instances of it?

[–] missingno@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago

I'm intrigued by the idea of being able to talk to other Fediverse apps, but searching for my Pleroma account at @missingno to test this out turns up nothing. Is there some way to force discovery?

[–] strepto@kbin.social 2 points 1 year ago

Very excited to see how this all turns out. This is my favorite fedi site so far.

[–] ProctorZeuss@kbin.social 20 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

From what I've found thus far:

  • Community is smaller currently due to being newer but connects to the Lemmy, Mastodon, etc communities so it doesn't feel small.
  • Definitely needs a mobile app for collapsing comments, notifications, etc but installing on mobile through the browser works quite well.
  • Would like the ability to delete new magazines to change the URL for instance which I currently can't figure out how to do.
  • Calling communities magazines is a little confusing but nothing serious.
  • The ability to sign up without an email like Lemmy would be a huge bonus.
  • The privacy policy and UI is much nicer than on Lemmy.
  • Signing up is open compared to Lemmy which requires an explanation and review.

Most of these things will likely and hopefully come with time as the platform is developed. Other than that I feel this will most likely be my safe haven from the bs Reddit (fuck spez) has pulled.

[–] cujo@sh.itjust.works 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Signing up is open compared to Lemmy which requires an explanation and review.

Only on certain instances. Lemmy.ml and beehaw.org, for example, require you to answer some questions (I've heard people say beehaw requires you to write an essay, lol) which I think is primarily to avoid being overrun by bot accounts. Not all instances do, though. sh.itjust.works has open registration, for one.

[–] Torty@beehaw.org 16 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Fwiw my application to BeeHaw I submitted last night was like 4 sentences and approved in < 10 minutes.

I don't think they're looking for anyone's life story of personal philosophy on life and the universe ya know?

[–] cujo@sh.itjust.works 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I have not applied to beehaw, myself. I dislike the lack of a down vote personally. I think it's a useful utility to have as long as people don't abuse it... Which people always will, but I don't think that merits taking it away. That's the great thing about decentralized services, though!

[–] Derproid@beehaw.org 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Downvotes are used to show disagreement without an explanation which just stifles discussion, and for off-topic comments reporting them works as an alternative.

I do prefer user moderated conversations through downvotes but with the way they are used I don't really trust us users enough for that.

[–] cujo@sh.itjust.works 7 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I just don't necessarily think the feature should be removed just because it isn't always used as intended. I know there are folks who use it as a "disagree" button, and that's... fine, I guess lol. I think Lemmy does a decent enough job of preventing abuse of the downvote button by removing the concept of karma. There are no imaginary internet points to be gained or lost. As a bonus, you can always turn vote values off entirely for yourself, as opposed to disabling downvotes on an instance. That way you can upvote/downvote organically, without your perception being skewed by existing votes.

I wouldn't necessarily refuse to use a service based solely on whether it has a downvote feature or not, but I think downvote serves a different purpose than reporting. If I were on a platform that didn't support downvotes, I do think I would feel obliged to be a lot more liberal with my upvotes, lol. Which... maybe that's not a bad thing. 🤔

But again, through the power of federation we can both interact on a platform that can satisfy both our beliefs, and that's a pretty awesome thing.

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[–] acedelgado@kbin.social 17 points 1 year ago

Kbin is newer, so it has less traffic on its magazines than communities on Lemmy do, at least at the moment. Just like in Lemmy or other fediverse instances, to see kbin magazines someone has had to search for them on your Lemmy instance before they'll show up on your instance. So more people searching for Lemmy communities in your insurance rather than kbin's magazines means less will show up on your feed. That's what they have in common.

Kbin itself is a different software backend to access the fediverse. It supports viewing/subscibing/posting to Lemmy communities in other fediverse instances, but also has microblogging support (basically like random Twitter posts) that supports mastodon (fediverse Twitter). It also has a lot of customization options if you go into your kbin settings. Plus I read kbin doesn't rely on Javascript like Lemmy does, so that's a nice security bonus.

Kbin is much newer but I like the direction it's going. They do need to simplify link aggregation to make it a bit easier to view communities, but it's a work in progress that has a lot of potential.

[–] damn@lemmy.fmhy.ml 16 points 1 year ago (1 children)

kbin looks good but I can't get over the fact that its backend is written in PHP. In the long run, lemmy's Rust backend will probably be way more resource efficient and thus better for hosters. We'll have to see though, since tech stacks aren't the most important thing. But for me a Rust backend is a huge plus.

[–] henry@kbin.social 8 points 1 year ago (2 children)

there is a bit of learning curve.

I found a couple of things :

  • if you go to your preferences, you can get a more famililar reddit look and feel, by adding the top bar, and a few other tweaks.
  • i think that ultimately it wont (shouldn't) matter what 'window' you look through into the fediverse - correct me if i'm wrong. I like kbin a lot, but i', looking at beehaw. i was asked not to join lemmy.ml because of server load issues.
  • i'm not sure how mastodon fits. i guess that's a federated app - but is seems entirely seperate.
[–] cnnrduncan@beehaw.org 7 points 1 year ago

Mastodon is kinda similar to Lemmy but replaces Twitter rather than Reddit. They both use they same underlying technology though which is why kbin can talk to both!

[–] dragnucs@social.touha.me 5 points 1 year ago

@henry @YoTcA the way each application handles federation is a bit different. Sure, you have the same content, buy it would be presented differently. Depending on the application goal, the presentation is more tailored to a particular way of interaction and content.

[–] ANuStart@kbin.social 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I'll admit I can't wrap my head around how many of this works.

I like kbin and the default content it provides for the most part... But I want to branch out a bit.

I know there's a formula 1 community I want to join on lemmy, do I need to sign up for Lemmy now? And do I need to sign up for multiple "instances" whatever those are?

I'm pretty tech savvy but the fediverse makes me feel stupid, i have to assume this could be a barrier to entry for some

[–] Devgard@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago

there should be a way to join Lemmy communities with a Kbin account, but try this

in the Kbin search bar:

  1. type @REPLACEthisWITHf1COMMUNITY@lemmy.server.here
  2. replace the fields and see if you can subscribe
[–] milan@discuss.tchncs.de 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

But when searching for kbin from this Lemmy Account, I do not find much. I feel like I am missing some basic concept, that makes it pretty clear. Why this is such a one way experience.

Not sure if i understand correctly, but instances can only show you what they are aware of. This does not really depend on the underlaying software (unless it is specialized, like PeerTube maybe).

[–] mrmanager@lemmy.today 14 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

Is there a reason why instances couldn't just index and show all the communities from other federated instances?

Right now you have to do this to add a community from another instance:

  • Visit it, look in communities, copy the link to the community
  • Go back to the instance you were, paste link into search box and hit enter, then click the link, open sidebar, and click subscribe.

I don't see why instances couldn't just have an index over communities on all federated instances, so it's a one click action to subscribe to any community in the entire Lemmy fediverse.

If this was implemented it would lower the bar for new users enormously, and encourage a lot more cross instance subscriptions.

[–] acedelgado@kbin.social 11 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Word is Lemmy and kbin are working to make the process more automated, so if you click a link to a community/magazine your instance want aware of it'll start aggregation without having to manually do the search. Downside of going with a free, open source, decentralized solution is there aren't a bunch of devs dedicated to updating the platforms for a living, so features will roll out slower.

[–] FaceDeer@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 year ago

Like features just flew out the door for us at Reddit. :)

[–] Draconic_NEO@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago

Yeah, Hopefully they'll be able to something soon. That is ultimately the big downside to decentralized open source solutions but it sure outweighs the drawbacks of the closed source centralized ones as will become painfully apparent on June 12

[–] jeena@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

How would one instance know that I set up a new instance without a central service?

[–] mrmanager@lemmy.today 2 points 1 year ago

When you subscribe to a community from another instance, it learns your instance exists and starts sending it messages and receives responses.

[–] ch1cken@kbin.social 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Couple things i like about kbin over lemmy:

  • Has a good privacy policy, and works without javascript.
  • It integrates federated services like mastodon really nicely, so not only lemmy posts but mastodon, peertube and other services using activitypub will show and any comments sent to them will also show up on the other end
  • I personally think its more intuitive to find new communities, back on lemmy when i was on a less popular instance (tchncs), there was only a couple native communities and they were german, to add more i had to manually find and add them. Whereas on refreshing kbin, i can see a list of random threads/people/posts displayed on the right, alongside other posts on the homepage, which can promote less popular stuff i hadn't heard of before. Theres also the microblog, and magazines.
  • I find the design a lot nicer overall as well
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