In reaction to Can you follow a PixelFed with a Lemmy account? I thought it might be interesting to brainstorm how Lemmy could integrate and federate with the broader Fediverse in cool ways 😎
With some random thoughts I’ll kick off the brainstorm…
With Microblogging apps
What are the interactions with apps such as Pleroma and Mastodon?
Search and view Lemmy community profiles
- Profile shows logo and full description of the community
- Profile can be followed like any other account
Follow a Lemmy community
- The Follower count of the community increases by 1
- Maybe the Follower count can be clicked on to show where followers are coming from
- Lemmy posts appear in your personal timeline
- Lemmy comments are part of the toot thread
- A toot you add also appears in the Lemmy UI
- A Lemmy comment you Like/Favourite counts as an upvote
- Boosts attract others to the Lemmy post to interact with
Post a toot URL in a Lemmy post
- If there is no link or image in the toot, the instance logo is shown
- If there is no instance logo, then the app logo is shown (e.g. Pleroma)
- If there is a link preview, then the link’s OpenGraph image is shown
- If there is an image, then this image is shown as the Lemmy preview image
How does the Lemmy post interact with the toot? Two options:
- A new toot thread is created under the Lemmy microblogging profile
- The original toot URL is inlined as a reference
- Note: Quoting the toot text is discouraged in Mastodon to avoid abuse as @Liwott points out. Should probably not quote, and just show the additional Lemmy post’s title + markdown body.
- A new branch is added to the existing thread and Lemmy post is a sub-toot of that
- Upvotes are Likes/Favourites on the toot
How do cross-posts work for these options?
- For option 1 a new toot is created under the Profile that matches the cross-posted community
- For option 2 there may be a notification sub-toot “cross-posted to [community]” under which a new branch of toots relate to subsequent Lemmy comments
Mentioning a Lemmy community profile in a toot
How do we handle that? Probably we don’t want any random fedi account to be able to create Lemmy posts.
One option might be to add a separate timeline to communities to support this: “Mentioned across the Fediverse” or something, where you can find all mentions, drill-down in the toot thread and maybe respond from Lemmy. Responding may be a moderator-only feature, as they talk on behalf of the community.
With Image Media apps
Federating with apps such as PixelFed.
Do you wanna give a shot at this? Then burn loose below 🚀
With Video Streaming apps
Federating with apps such as PeerTube and Owncast.
Do you wanna give a shot at this? Then burn loose below 🚀
With Podcasting apps
Federating with apps such as CastaPod.
Do you wanna give a shot at this? Then burn loose below 🚀
With Event Planning apps
Federating with apps such as Mobilizon.
Do you wanna give a shot at this? Then burn loose below 🚀
With Your App of Choice
Go. go. go! 🚀 🚀 🚀
Cross posts aren’t meant to be a single post with shared comments and votes, but new posts that stand on their own to interested communities, each having their own comments, votes, etc. This is the reddit cross-posting model, and posts in lemmy must belong to a single community.
I also think it does make the most sense: different communities will have different reactions to news / content, and don’t necessarily want that mingled with other communities.
I am not a Reddit user, so if it works the same there it might make sense. My confusion stems from this:
So these crossposts have nothing to do with this federation brainstorm. Maybe clarifying the UI label may help: “URL has been crossposted to […]”. Maybe even avoid crosspost altogether with “URL is also posted to these communities […]”.
I believe (correct me if wrong) that if I cross-post myself, my post text is dupllicated to the other community. After that comments are added separately and not synched, which is fine to me.