These past days many people seem to have migrated to the fediverse and some are complaining about the limitations of Mastodon for example, since most are using that (it is the most popular). Mastodon is great, is sleek, well developed, and I'd say looks the best and is the most reliable perhaps. But some people want better features and I ended up replying to them individually. I am making this post to explain why I moved from Mastodon to Friendica and why I chose Friendica despite trying a lot of other alternatives.
The great things about Friendica:
It is very easy to use; the default Frio theme it comes with looks very intuitive. For our instance we have created custom themes social.trom.tf so that it looks even better in my view.
Connects with pretty much everything. Mastodon, Pleroma, H
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These past days many people seem to have migrated to the fediverse and some are complaining about the limitations of Mastodon for example, since most are using that (it is the most popular). Mastodon is great, is sleek, well developed, and I'd say looks the best and is the most reliable perhaps. But some people want better features and I ended up replying to them individually. I am making this post to explain why I moved from Mastodon to Friendica and why I chose Friendica despite trying a lot of other alternatives.
The great things about Friendica:
It is very easy to use; the default Frio theme it comes with looks very intuitive. For our instance we have created custom themes social.trom.tf so that it looks even better in my view.
Connects with pretty much everything. Mastodon, Pleroma, Hubzilla, Lemmy, Peertube....
Can follow RSS sources as "normal contacts". That's amazing since you can follow websites directly.
You can create huge posts, format the text (basic formatting), add inline media, and even use markdown.
You can setup any contact (even RSS sources) to auto repost their posts. For example we also have a Peertube account and I setup that so when we post a new video on Peertube, it also goes to our Friendica page. As native post or re-share, up to you. So awesome!
Has a calendar and you can schedule and organize events.
Has very well defined "news feeds": chronologically, based on activity, or based on your participation.
Auto contact discovery or random profile discovery.
Can integrate with Twitter so you can post to your twitter from friendica, or interact/connect/follow anyone on twitter.
You can setup your profile in different ways, such as a page, personal profile, or even forum.
You can have multiple profiles under 1 account.
Send private messages in a mail-like interface.
Follow search results or tags.
Ignore/block contacts.
Filter/block the posts based on language or other rules.
2FA authentication.
You can use it as your email client and receive/send emails too (did not test this tho).
Works with Mastodon's API so any Mastodon app/client should work with Friendica too.
It is developed by some very very nice people!
The not-so-perfect:
Their default theme needs some improvements in my view. People may look at that and think that this is not a very modern social network. Mastodon nails it!
Their website needs to be a lot more attractive. People going there have no clue about how awesome Frendica is.
Should handle video platform embedding better.
Maybe should add reactions to posts.
Should better handle images - how they are displayed and such.
Should have an "app"....I do not use phones really, so this does not affect me, but nowadays this can be important.
Maybe that's all. Anyone feel free to let me know if I've missed anything and I can edit the post.
You can use it as your email client and receive/send emails too (did not test this tho).
Wait, what? Do you mean any user on a Friendica instance can do that? If yes, how? Or is it an option that the admin has to activate?
Connects with pretty much everything. Mastodon, Pleroma, Hubzilla, Lemmy, Peertube....
I think this "talk to everyone" approach of Friendica is one of its main strength, especially wrt other fedi platforms. There are two main precisions that I can bring about this
devs actually cooperate to implement other's protocols and objects. This is why it works so well with Lemmy and also why it works at all with Diaspora
the broad set of features plays a role. For example, Mastodon has a character limit and does not have downvotes, which make sense in their pure microblogging perspective but which limits the experience of interacting with Peertube
Works with Mastodon's API so any
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Very nice list !
You can use it as your email client and receive/send emails too (did not test this tho).
Wait, what? Do you mean any user on a Friendica instance can do that? If yes, how? Or is it an option that the admin has to activate?
Connects with pretty much everything. Mastodon, Pleroma, Hubzilla, Lemmy, Peertube....
I think this "talk to everyone" approach of Friendica is one of its main strength, especially wrt other fedi platforms. There are two main precisions that I can bring about this
devs actually cooperate to implement other's protocols and objects. This is why it works so well with Lemmy and also why it works at all with Diaspora
the broad set of features plays a role. For example, Mastodon has a character limit and does not have downvotes, which make sense in their pure microblogging perspective but which limits the experience of interacting with Peertube
Works with Mastodon's API so any Mastodon app/client should with with Friendica too.
Yes, but, as you say it yourself later on, it lacks a dedicated app, something that does not just squeeze the content of your friendica timeline into a microblogging frontend. Really hope that @Fedilab Apps implements a more Friendlica-oriented frontend at some point, so as to get closer to their announced goal of being the multifunctional fediverse window :)
I really want to look into this as well, what an awesome feature. I set it up in options but fumbling around to get it to work at the moment, I assume it's accessible under the mail icon ... hmmm
Sorry if this double posts, my last one disappeared. Totally agree, Friendica is amazing except for a few things, the email client aspect looks amazing, but I haven't been able to figure it out just yet. It would be really great if there was a UI sprint or something for Friendica, it would make a huge difference in attracting new users IMHO
Rokosun
in reply to Tio • • •*Filter/block the posts based on language
*any Mastodon app/client should work with Friendica
*It is developed by
Tio likes this.
Liwott
in reply to Tio • • •Very nice list !
Wait, what? Do you mean any user on a Friendica instance can do that? If yes, how? Or is it an option that the admin has to activate?
I think this "talk to everyone" approach of Friendica is one of its main strength, especially wrt other fedi platforms. There are two main precisions that I can bring about this
... show moreVery nice list !
Wait, what? Do you mean any user on a Friendica instance can do that? If yes, how? Or is it an option that the admin has to activate?
I think this "talk to everyone" approach of Friendica is one of its main strength, especially wrt other fedi platforms. There are two main precisions that I can bring about this
Yes, but, as you say it yourself later on, it lacks a dedicated app, something that does not just squeeze the content of your friendica timeline into a microblogging frontend. Really hope that @Fedilab Apps implements a more Friendlica-oriented frontend at some point, so as to get closer to their announced goal of being the multifunctional fediverse window :)
Tio likes this.
Tio
in reply to Liwott • •Yes if the admin enables it. We have it enabled but I never tested it honestly.
LPS
in reply to Tio • •LPS
in reply to Tio • •Totally agree, Friendica is amazing except for a few things, the email client aspect looks amazing, but I haven't been able to figure it out just yet.
It would be really great if there was a UI sprint or something for Friendica, it would make a huge difference in attracting new users IMHO
Tio likes this.