Comment on would it be simpler for people if we said "proxy" instead of "instance"?
marsokod@lemmy.world 9 months ago
Instance are far from being simple proxies. While instances can act as proxies for other instances, the aim is to have each instances to have their own communities and be somewhat self sufficient. If you remove the federation, Lemmy (and other fediverse software) still work, it’s just that it is more difficult in that case to reach a critical mass of users.
Die4Ever@programming.dev 9 months ago
yea I understand, but I think the term “instance” confuses new users
I would only use terms like “proxy” or “hub” if the instance actually had federation enabled, otherwise I would probably just call it a “server” or “host”
originalucifer@moist.catsweat.com 9 months ago
no offense, but 'proxy' and 'hub' are also technophobe-ambiguous. servers, however... is somewhat mainstream. all my ignorant staff understand the server concept.
marsokod@lemmy.world 9 months ago
I agree with you on proxy.
For hub I am not sure, that sounds a bit more mainstream to me, with the caveat that English is not my mother tongue. That gives a nice image that an instance is basically an access hub to a whole universe of data.