Lemmy probably feels like Reddit when it first started, all warm cuddly and friendly to newcomers eager to discuss and collaborate around central topics.

I was on Reddit since almost the beginning and I would not say it's similar, but I also don't think that culture exists on the internet anymore, closest thing might be tildes?

What I really miss is the intelligent conversion and actual debate in the comments. People don't really lay out arguments anymore, complete with sources and logical conclusions. Back in the early days of Reddit you'd be downvoted and told off if you made a claim without evidence. Anecdotal evidence, speculation, and bias were called out. There were still jokes and light comment sections, but comments aiming to make a point were essays where you could actually learn something. Might sound exhausting to some, but it feels like the internet has turned into just upvoting whatever confirms your bias, whether there's evidence of it or not. I'm sure you can find some excellent examples in the old r/bestof posts.

The content was a lot different too, the community was just a lot more scientific. Studies were posted over articles, and clickbait articles (before they were even clickbait) were called out as not having substantial content or evidence. Even studies were heavily scrutinized by identifying the bias in the methodology.

There were a lot less communties (subreddits) too, which I think lead to healthier discussion overall and less of an echo chamber effect. It was still always criticized as being a "hive mind", but it felt less like one to me back then anyways.

I guess overall it feels like the main difference is everything nowadays is meant to radicalize you, or get a reaction out of you. Back in the day if something political or scientific was being shared it was shared with the intention of changing minds, not confirming bias.

Anyways, that's my old person rant. I'm probably looking at it all through rose tinted nostalgia glasses, but there's definitely been a shift in how we communicate on the internet for better or for worse.

Downvoted.

Not a laid out argument, complete with sources and logical conclusions. This is anecdotal, speculative, and biased information.

Serious note : Love your perspective about the old reddit I’m always curious to know what made internet what it was. I wonder if that’ll happen again.
- Source or gtfo!
My favorite was old days of Reddit you’d be skewered for posting a .jpg instead of a .png of the image had text.
- JPG should be killed off. We don't need a lossy image format anymore were not on dialup.
- Asking what's the difference got a response about three paragraphs long.
  
  I wrote some of them.
I also remember constant reminders to vote on the quality of the post, not if you agree or not.
- Haha yeah, I don't know if that disclaimer is still there, but that totally went out the window in the mid 2010s
Kinda pain in the ass to add links and formatting on a phone which most of us use. Early days of reddit was all Desktops.
- Yeah good point, that's probably part of it! Reddit was probably used more during active time than passive time (while shitting). Gave you time to properly research a topic and structure arguments.
/r/askhistorians was the last bastion of this approach. I loved that sub and really hope they migrate to a lemmy soon.
yea that reminds me when facebookk first came out and it was only for college, my friends would post stuff like that
I appreciate this take, and I strive to make intelligent conversation here on Lemmy.
People don’t really lay out arguments anymore, complete with sources and logical conclusions

I only joined reddit like a year or so ago and have recently ditched it. I was never a fan of someone just spamming links to studies and condescending to me while doing so. I think people use links to sources as a way to control conversations. Or at least, that's all I ever saw it used as.

I don't know, I'm a pretty left leaning person. The vitriolic, almost violent responses to some of my comments is shocking. I knew Lemmygrad was a thing here, along with tankies, honestly it's off putting to say the least. OP talks about Reddit being an echo chamber. I got news for you. This place is just as bad for lefty type discourse being regurgitated. My experience is that it has been anything but friendly.

Also just as hostile to women as reddit, sadly.
- Found the woman
I honestly wouldn't give those people the dignity of calling them leftists. They're too concerned about cosplaying as activists and dunking on people to actually give a shit about advancing the rights of real people or trying to protect anything good.
I see comments like this, complaining about tankies, more often than i see "tankies".

On the occasion politics comes up, and i say anything socialist, I'm jumped on by people who seem either angry or smugly dismissive of the notion of people organising.
- Dude is a Canadian landlord. But I guess since the right wing has literal nazis now, anything left of that is 'pretty left leaning'
- I just said I knew they were present, I didn't say I specifically had a problem with them. I personally think that we're don't have enough unions. Any time corporations are against something, that usually means it's good for employees and the environment. (I have no particular opinion on people's political notions). It's sad that people here on both ends of the political spectrum can't voice their opinion without being jumped on. Honestly it's worse than Reddit.
GOP/Russian/Qanon propaganda everywhere
lol i put up a post on here and people analyzing it from a "socialist perspective" the thing is i thin kits limited to certain cats [what u call communities] lemmy is like america 1790s, all kinds of people comign in here, some of the rejects from other countries, some criminals, and some opportunity seekers
just as bad for lefty type discourse being regurgitated

You allergic to being correct or something?

I find Lemmy to be an echo chamber more than Reddit was. Depends on the community but Lemmy can be pretty caustic if you don't agree with something.

That being said, is fine there is different opinions. Creates discussion.

Honestly, the fact that Lemmy displays upvote and downvote counts (like reddit, at least with RES, used to) makes it a lot friendlier. If you say something unpopular, better to see +10/-4 than just -6 - if you're saying something unpopular but true, at least you're seeing some positive reaction.
- This alone makes it worlds less toxic and less circlejerky. People won't automatically groupthink themselves into disregarding you if they realize that your comment was divisive instead of wrong.
  
  +15/-45 gets that across better than -30
- And when you know it's going to be unpopular, that +1 feels better than the -12 feels bad. You got through to someone!
- This must depend on which app you're using.
  
  Sync just shows the total, I'd prefer if it didn't show at all.

I'd say less so. There wasn't much by way of disinformation campaigns and bots back when Reddit first started so the posts and comments felt more genuine and organic. Even with Kbin/Lemmy being much smaller, there's still a ton of weird shit that gets posted here or comments that feel really suspicious. It would be nice for that kind of environment to make its way back, but it seems those days are over.

Yeah 100% When I joined I saw so much weird pro China and Russia comments, veiled but there. And no one would disagree! To me it felt like trying to influence newcomers and it was more insidious the way it was presented. Nothing like the dumb trolls I was used to seeing on reddit.
- Yeah it's such a weird vibe here, and honestly, if it doesn't change, I think it's going to be what dooms the platform. This version of it, at least.
  
  It's this super far left melting pot of western progressive talking points that are also somehow pro Russia and China.
  
  Not saying that these are necessarily mutually exclusive views, but to most Western audiences, you're holding views that are (again within a Western frame of reference) simultaneously far right and far left...which is most likely to be polarizing enough to just annoy or piss off most casual users.
- This is especially bad due to certain instances. It wasn’t so bad on Reddit where they usually limited themselves to a few subreddits, but it’s really off putting to see the nonstop propaganda they spew. So glad LW defederated with that instance.
- I had someone go off on me recently because I talked about how I never see the term "tankie" anywhere but on Lemmy.
  
  I blocked them because they just became so fucking unhinged it wasn't worth responding to anymore.
And the ddos' n child porn aren't too nice either

hey I'm doing my best to be rude, scabulous, irascible and misanthropic out here.

There are antibiotic creams for scabulousness these days, how advanced is your case? 🧟‍♀️
We appreciate your work.

It's already like that here, friend.

Lemmy might be friendlier on the surface but has a much stronger hivemind-y aspect to it where you agree with it or else.

It’s already like that here, friend.

Lemmy didn't take off until well into May 2023, despite being online and open source for over 4 years. The quantity of posts, communities, comments was very small for 4 years online.

Then everyone flocked out of hate and anger of an API money matter with Reddit.Then crowds got hate-filled and angry when Threads was launched by Meta/Instagram/Facebook on July 5. And crowds became hate-filled and angry over Elon Musk rename of Twitter to X on July 23.

Outside big growth in memes and shitposts, there haven't been big numbers of people flocking here out of organic goodness on organized topics. It has largely been a HiveMind of hate as a motivation to come here since May.

Some good seeds have been planted since May, but the atmosphere of hate motivates change is pretty much Mob Mentality / reactionary.
- Your timeline of events is intriguing to see and makes sense to me, even if I had a different experience. Thanks for that.
Definitely, you can also see that on certain communities, there are very strong opinions which don't allow for discussion.
Say anything that goes against the grain and you will be shunned immediately.

Also - not that that is always a bad thing but Lemmy is extremely left leaning and you just can't discuss certain topics here at all.

(Guns are always bad / Cars should all be banned and traded for bicycles / traveling by plane is bad and you should feel horrible for destroying the environment..)

What I enjoyed about early reddit was the tech/nerd focused community that did not try to push their political opinion into every thread.
Basically the worst part of reddit is already here, just that the echo chambers are smaller for now.

Honestly, I'm not sure how I feel about it.
- As someone who was on Reddit when it was young I am going to disagree with you here. Young Reddit was absolutely full of political ideology. It was a Ron Paul, legalize weed, atheist, soft anti feminist, cypher punk, USA style libertarian pool of ideology.
  
  All places have an ideology. We are all constantly swimming in ideology. It’s just when an ideology matches you (either you being molded by the ideology or you joining a place with a matching ideology) you don’t notice it. A fish only has to think about the medium it is in after it is pulled out of the water.
- How is Dorothy going to make it to Oz if you're hoarding all the damn strawmen?
Indeed. Watch me attract downvotes. *ahem*

Linux sucks, and Windows 11 is a great OS.
I do like to debate. I try not to use the downvote button if someone has caught my interest enough to engage.
- I, too like to debate, and I do invite people to disagree with me if they can discuss in good faith. Easier to do in some communities than others.

Honestly the lack of content helps people mellow out.

I like the fact that I'm not doom scrolling and being fed rage bait by algorithms. I also like the fact that I'm reasonably sure most people here are actual people and not bots or paid actors.

my experience so far is people are as, if not more toxic then reddit. honestly I feel like half the people here were sick of people blocking them on reddit and decided to attack people with their stupidity here instead.

If you're reading this, please go back to reddit, they need you so much more over there.

This is my experience as well, lemmy.world has been quite toxic IME.
- Report those being toxic. We are quick to react.
You have no idea what you’re talking about, if you think people here are bad you must be the most fragile little snowflake who ever lived.

Go curl up and jerk off in your safe space.

/s for those who weren’t sure.
- Now my safe space is filled with cum
Ur toxic

:-P

The vast majority of people on Lemmy right now are directly from Reddit and they act exactly like the bog standard Redditors they are. Stop deluding yourself.

Who are you interacting with that has been so lame? I'm having a way better time in these comnunities than on reddit.
- Anything even vaguely political is a shitshow since people are just as toxic as on reddit, but there is way less moderation
- You know, I've felt there's a sizable difference now in the kinds of discussion you tend to see depending on your home instance. Lemmy.world really feels like Reddit in both good and bad ways. Lemmy.ca is cool with local news and a smattering of other communities. But I what I really love beehaw.org. There are few places like it, and I hope if people join there, they don't bring their Reddit tendencies with them. Slow down a bit, think of each other and enjoy real, thoughtful discussion.

You can use the wayback machine to see how Reddit was at any point in the past. I was there from even before subreddits were a thing, and yeah it was pretty great. The fediverse does have a bit of that feel.

In 10 years we'll look back on this early Lemmy period with the same nostalgia, and wonder how Lemmy ever got so shitty.
- Nah - it’s pretty shit already. I wasn’t on Reddit at the absolute beginning but I did clock in 12+ years. This is more like the end of Reddit - only split into several servers.
- In the Fediverse, it’s much less disruptive to migrate to a different platform if one starts to get shitty—so hopefully reddit-like situations can be avoided before they recur.

wait, warm? cuddly? can you show me this magical fairy-tale corner of lemmy?

Warm and cuddly until you say something negative bout China or Russia, then they come hauling ass..
- I could never understand how you could be attached to china's government that intensely. their government has fully betrayed communism, so extensibly that tech giants with no public control, (control the public instead) are fully formed.
  
  Edit: i forgot my original intent but I do want a discussion and not just a roast of led astray MLs.
- Or say something in support of conservative American policies. Or say something in support of organized religion.
- Putin is a militant pensioner from St. Petesbugrg garages. Fuck Putin.
  
  Well, technically it is not negative about Russia. And I think I've yet not seen trolls from Olgino(or whereever they currently are)
- im a woman of taste, i like butt they can haul all they want, see if i care
Warm and cuddly right here my friend. Lemmy give you a hug!
- now thats an attitude i can respect virtual hugs can work
- Lemmy just point out that this comment is underrated.
[email protected]

I feel Lemmy is like reddit without the normies making this infact more reddit than reddit

I miss the 'normies', I interact with enough tech people in my daily life
- I block almost every tech community and tech is still 50% of my feed here
This is exactly how Reddit started too. It was the digg migration that brought in all the normies.

Lol no Lemmy is just as bad as Reddit

I left reddit for lemmy and have yet to have the same experience here that I did on reddit.
Not in my experience.

Where are these warm and cuddly people? If you express viewpoints that are not central dogma to the left of center folk, you're just as ostracized here as you would be on Reddit.

I'm left of center and I get yelled at by a communist at least once per thread I engage with, on average.

I'm at a point where I'm just blocking them as they pop up.
Yeah, it's much worse here.
I'd argue that it is actually more so the case here if anything.
Not to leave out mods deleting posts altogether here.

This is just how it seems to go, before reddit there was Digg, after Digg went down, everyone went to reddit, now that reddit is going down, people are migrating to alternatives, with Lenmy being the most prominent one right now. I think Lemmy's ability to have multiple instances will help cement its popularity though

I'm not sure, i made a comment on the controversy over linus tech tips, basically there may have been miscommunication and we should wait and see before demonising anyone. But people took what i said the wrong way and downvoted me to eternity. It was quite depressing. I didn't say anyone was wrong or anyone was right. Just stated i'd been in a position before where people misunderstood my intentions so i understand how easily it can happen.

The lemmyverse, is rife with sock puppets. It's very easy to make a bunch of accounts for down voting. And brigading is easy here too, let's not forget we have a general population, we don't have specialized pockets really. So if something's generally unpopular, but is technically correct, it will get downvoted regardless because the general people outweigh the individuals.

Overtime we might have communities that require community reputation to post in, or vote in, like we saw on Reddit.

I just want to say waiting for more data is always the right thing to do, especially with any new internet drama, so I respect your position
Happend to me too. I've asked on a Post about modern slavery in London why they don't just go to the Police because I was really just curious. I was sure there was a reason why this was not an option but I couldn't think of any. And then I just got insulted and downvoted. After a few hours and a post asking why I get downvoted later, the tide turned and it got balanced out. But people can be real POS over here too. The Account insulting me was deleted after i reported him. Im not sure if He was just a Troll or an genuine ass.
- I really can not stand the mentality behind insulting people who are asking questions.
  
  I've even stated that I'm asking a question in good faith and being genuine and somehow people turn that shit into "you were insulting me by asking"
You was just Stallmaned. It is not lemmy-specific.

I was user 2600 or so on Reddit, and yes indeed it does. I just love this size. When I compare the content here and on Reddit, for me it's a world away now. The vast majority of things on here are relevant and interesting to me compared to reddit where it's all just low effort garbage and reposts.

The memes about site outages also reminds me of 2010s Reddit!
- I feel like I'm the only person on lemmy who hasn't experienced an outtage issue.
  
  Did I just pick the best instance or something??

The concept you're describing is called Eternal September and happens to all web services that get popular enough.

Real web service popularity has never been tried

My Brother in Christ any online community will have toxicity as long as it has people

And Lemmy isn't an echo chamber? Try posting any conservative opinions around here and see how many downvotes you get.

I don’t know if that’s fair. Contemporary “conservatism” is pretty indefensible.
To be fair, the GOP has shifted so far Right, that conservative opinions nowadays are less "We need to be more fiscally responsible and try solutions outside of throwing money at problems." and more "So lemme tell you which minorities don't deserve rights and the specific reasons why they don't... the short version is it's all of them.. except my asian wife and my black friend... for now.."
That’s because all the dum-dums are still over there on Reddit. This place has brain cells and it’s awesome.
- It's nice because you can talk to people, be heard, and be able to listen back. Of course I don't agree with everybody all the time, but in some communities it's cool to learn something you didn't know before.
Yup, based on the replies you got they're proving your comment Lemmy absolutely sucks when it comes to political circlejerk.
Uh yeah, people around here don't tend to accept bigotry. Anybody who espouses racism/homophobia can get out. Which happens to be most conservatives. It's not about being a conservative. It's about being a piece of human shit.
- Even as I'm on the more left end, I'd say not all conservatives or right-leaning people are racist homophobic bigots, though. If anything, I'd say a sizable portion have a right-leaning non-discriminatory worldview, mainly economic.
  
  Admittedly, as much as I'm preferring the fediverse, it is definitely an echo chamber, Lemmy included.
Here's conservative opinion for you: we should go back in how schools work because the less beaurocracy teachers deal with - the better they teach students. Also revert wage inequaloty where director eats-up half of entire budget. Go back to how it was in USSR.

Oh, you thought there is only one conservative opinion?

Honestly, it's begun to feel more hostile and shady. Pretty sure the Russian trolls are here, but hexchan ain't helping either. I'm waiting for a client side instance block feature. We really need it.

I mean I or anyone coudl write one up easily with userscripts, but I assume you're wanting server side block, because thats just UI stuff, you may not see it but the server is still sending you their junk, which is what you want to stop. something simple like: cat_name{'nousers':list, 'keywords':[list of block keywords], 'blockalgs': [list of knownblockfilters] } and you send this to the server to fetch only the stuff you want
- I'd like to block all users and posts from hexchan, exploding heads, and lemmygrad. I don't care if it sends the data as long as it blocks it from my UI.
  
  What's that written in? Python? I need to learn Python.

"cuddly and friendly" aren't the words I'd use, but I suppose it is better than the way you can get dog piled on reddit over the most stupid stuff. Also less people tend to accept bigotry here most of the time which is nice.

Lemmy feels way more neckbeardy... because it is.

Still trying to settle into communities for games I hyperfixate on - they aren't very active currently, but perhaps if I put in my own activity it'll bring some of those communities to life, no?

One of the earliest comments on reddit when they enabled commenting was complaining about the addition of commenting-

https://old.reddit.com/r/reddit.com/comments/17913/reddit_now_supports_comments/c51/

It's weird to think of reddit without comments

Lemmy hits different, especially when hexbear is around.

Hexbear users have been some of the most toxic I've come across
- What's a hexbear?
- Hexbear is complicated, ive heard extreme good and bad from hexbear. I had a too extreme take that i really didnt like after i calmed down. Now i dont know.
- They are actually pretty nice with each other, IMO. They do make fun of liberals a lot, but one should take into account that only very recently did Hexbear start to federate with anyone (so they aren't as used to having all of them in their posts, I imagine), and with a community so politically different from the wave of Lemmy newcomers (the old communities I think would have met each other better), I think it's only understandable that there would be some not so nice interactions.

Dude fuck reddit. They ban/suspendel accounts for seriously petty shit and then give no recourse and you can't make new accounts. It's absolutely bs. Yes I am bitter but I am glad to have lemmy because it does feel like reddit but I don't feel so gauged by edge lord mods..... Well yet any ways.. got into an argument with a mod they reported me for harassment and I got banned.. I have tried to make new accounts and the get suspended. I tried VPN and then making the accounts and it worked for a bit, but then they suspended me again cause I commented on the sub I got in a fight with the mod on... Such bs

I got a warning for making a report on an automod comment and basically said the moderators are being oppressive and unjustly closing down comments. Five days later, I haven't touched reddit at all because I switched to lemmy and got a notification that I was banned from reddit because of the same report that I had received a warning on. I guess warnings on reddit are meaningless because you will still get banned or suspended even though it is the first "offense," which isn't hard to do when you tell mods they are jerks. I immediately used shreddit on my account and promptly deleted it with feedback that reddit banned me for a first offense that was a warning at first. Literal cancer of a site and glad to be rid of it. My life is better, and lemmy helps with communicating with the small communities I like.
- I shared a link to my google drive with free and available to everyone PDF's of tabletop roleplaying game supplements and got banned for piracy lmao
- Dude screw reddit.. I should have quit July 1st when they took away my boost for reddit 3party app.. but I couldn't stand FB discussion which is deluded with terrorist claiming to be Christians and Republicans... I can't stand the boners they get for any cop video... So I tried going back to reddit.. then the ban came.. I searched around and some how found lemmy.. and I am glad I did. I like it here better. I like that it's new too

It definitely feels that way to me. And it also felt like Reddit went to shit so slowly, I didn't even notice, like the mythical frog in a pot of water on a stove. It took me 13 years to break free. I hope Lemmy stays small to be honest. I'm old enough to remember the Eternal September on Usenet.

Sounds glorious.

Even if lemmy goes mainstream. I am sure there will be several instances that only federate with each other and not be federated with the rest of the lemmyverse, keeping the vibe lemmy has now and the early reddit vibe. Just have to find these instances and join them.

Yep, Lemmy feels a lot like reddit used to. A couple dozen larger subs, niche stuff in its infancy (but growing), general nerd interests, slows down to a crawl at night until users wake up in the morning.

I love it.

I don't know. I've already been seeing a lot of reactionary vitriol like you find on reddit.

Yeah it's more or less the same as current Reddit, just a smaller community. Bots and bad actors unfortunately exist in a way they simply didn't 10-15 years ago.

No...not really. It's just as polarized here as the rest of the internet.

I've encountered more trolls, assholes, and general dickheads here on lemmy than I ever have anywhere else on the Internet, and I've been around for a long time now so that's really saying something.

Idk what's more frustrating: the idiots and assholes themselves or the fact I see threads like this every day talking about how awesome lemmy and everyone around here is (are?).

Screw you pal! 🤣

I ain't your friend, buddy
- I'm not your buddy, guy

The internet overall is a much more mature place, and basic literacy of using online spaces has grown immensely. I don’t think there is a good way to build new platforms that avoid including everyone these days. No more intrinsic filters due to necessary domain knowledge or access to the internet.

Asynchronous spaces will always be like this moving forward. It seems.

In my opinion, synchronous spaces will continue to grow in popularity due to many factors.

Lemmy can still be useful, federated online spaces are still worth sorting out and building.

I think you are pretty much right. Personally, I think Lemmy still has a lot of room to improve, even if unlike 1993 the internet has matured a lot. So long as the initiative to improve Lemmy is there, I'll stick around.

The comment section was so good in the early days. No memes at all. Just real conversation about the topic.

Aw yes, back in the good ole days 3 months ago, back when decent folk could make a livin' on lemmy without nary a care
- This is a topic about reddit early days as was my comment

Nope, Reddit was very different back then. Lemmy feels no different than Reddit does now.

There are a lot more delicious beans here.

My brother, this is exactly what Reddit felt like in the beginning.

Not. At. All.

So far I share your opinion. So far..

can confirm, this place is as much a shit hole now as reddit is.

God I hate redditors.

You wanna elaborate what problems you're having?

A little bit easier than using the wayback machine:

https://www.reddit.com/r/reddit.com/

Here's some cuddles for you.

Upd: and more

Nope. Reddit in the early days was a place for free speech. I had a 15 year old account till I left. After about 2016 Reddit went full-Orwellian. And Lemmy.world has carried that tyranny forwards very faithfully. Just try and speak out against the narratives and you'll be silenced quickly. That's not what early Reddit was like AT ALL.

When people say "free speech" I tend to hear "call of duty lobby". In the early days of reddit, my experience is that it was mostly just tech people talking about PC builds and sharing Top Gear clips (how I discovered Top Gear). And of course, it was very easy to find abuse groups, fatpeoplehate, watchpeopledie, 4chan, etc.

I don't recall this mystical free speech bastion, because I don't think I see the concept the same as you. Sure, in the early days of the internet it was easier to be an anonymous abuser, but I have always avoided those communities.. and the reason they disappear is.. they're not popular places. They just collect butt heads until the butt heads think, " Yeah, everyone thinks like me! I'm a free thinker!" (In the limited scope of the butt head group)

But I mean, the majority keeps eradicating those spaces. At some point if your population continues to be sprayed with bugspray, maybe consider if you are a bug.