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'What a great way to kill your community': Discord users are furious about its new age verification checks — and are now hunting for alternatives

⁨1669⁩ ⁨likes⁩

Submitted ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨return2ozma@lemmy.world⁩ to ⁨technology@lemmy.world⁩

https://www.techradar.com/computing/software/what-a-great-way-to-kill-your-community-discord-users-are-furious-about-its-new-age-verification-checks-and-are-now-hunting-for-alternatives

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Comments

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  • WhyJiffie@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    I’m truly surprised that lots of people don’t like it. I expected most will just silently obey the new orders of our overlords.

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    • Burninator05@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      How is it being recieved outside odmf the bubble we are in?

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      • WhyJiffie@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        that I don’t know, so far I have only seen that an unusual amount of tech news sites reported it which I wouldn’t consider to be inside of our bubble

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  • disconnectikacio@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Discord was always an overhyped crap.

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    • Kolanaki@pawb.social ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      It’s basically IRC, with 2 good features (voice, video) and a whole helluva lotta bullshit features that only exist to be monetized (Nitro, stickers, etc).

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      • zensanto@ttrpg.network ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        All of that extra bullshit actively detracts from discord and I hope Matrix never follows suit.

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    • zensanto@ttrpg.network ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      True, but it made it easy to chat with others without having to enter in an IP address.

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  • mechoman444@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    Definitely uninstalling discord. I hardly use it anyway.

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    • TerdFerguson@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      I use it daily, but I’ve now deleted my account and will move on.

      I dont put up with this shit.

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    • FatVegan@leminal.space ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      I always call people over steam. I haven’t used discord in a few month now and don’t miss it

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    • FritzApollo@lemmy.today ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      No one conversed with me there anyway haha. I found it to be such an unwelcoming place. And the data leaks and age verification crap as well - I hope there’s a decent alternative somewhere because I miss chatting with people.

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  • jaykrown@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    I am already learning about matrix protocol which is seeming like a good alternative. matrix.to/#/#all-topics:matrix.org

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    • fossilesque@mander.xyz ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      I have already spun up an instance for my friends. It was easier than I thought. You can bridge it into Discord an import the history of all channels of your servers.

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      • Zanathos@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        How can you do this? I just spun up an Element container but am still learning about Matrix as a whole.

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  • Iksbat@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    Thats why it is important to have an alternetive ready people can switch to. If there is a backlash (for any platform) and a decentralized alternative is there this is the biggest chance to become the “norm”. So thanks to all the people working on lemmy, peertube, mastodon, etc.

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  • AnimalsDream@slrpnk.net ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    I keep researching alternatives, and every time I circle back around toward Matrix, despite criticisms. Part of it is a question of what everyone is using. I pretty consistently see that groups who use or used to use irc are now using Matrix additionally or as a replacement.

    Part of me would like xmpp to be the best answer, but I’ve yet to see an implementation that handles public communities well, particularly for anything that functions at all like Discord. Matrix seems to be at least gaining voice/video chat support?

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    • luciferofastora@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Using a Matrix room for our family, it has some built-in video call service (I think it’s Jitsi?) that works great for regular family rounds. It has its hiccups too, but nothing we can’t deal with so far.

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    • CreativeCider@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Installed element x and created my account today. As I am not self hosting at the moment the learning curved was basically just learning the new ui and wording for rooms and spaces.

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      • AnimalsDream@slrpnk.net ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Yeah to be honest, as a regular user I find Matrix’s ux to ve at least somewhat less of a clusterfuck than Discord. Some things are still unintuitive, but that’s nothing rtfm shouldn’t be able to fix.

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    • LKPcharger@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      irc does looks cool BUT its hard to learn and you’ve gotta make your freinds download it

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  • bitjunkie@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    The practice of making a “free” thing so you can whore your MAU numbers out to private equity to keep the lights on should be wholesale abolished.

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  • ArmchairAce1944@discuss.online ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    I’m already making backups and deleting all the posts and DMs I made on discord. Yes I know they probably have everything backed up, but there is always a possibility that they lose that shit or don’t fully back up everything. I am not interesting in playing along with their bullshit.

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  • oopsgodisdeadmybad@lemmy.zip ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    I mean I’ve wanted to change anyway since the enshittification started. I think the first thing was a paid avatar/profile decoration store. Annoying enough, but if they’re decent cosmetics and not crazy prices I can understand. I still wish there was an internal, native seeing that would just remove all the visual teasing of paid options, but I can ignore it. (Mainly I hate trying to add an emoji to chat and just seeing pages of emoji from servers that I can’t use on the one I’m on- which is already super annoying, but they put the regular result ones behind all those so you have to either scroll past them or manually switch to the default emoji page- that’s just pure rage bait- default should be first, followed by the ones from that server that you can actually use)

    But my main problem was when Nitro showed up.

    Unfortunately, of the up and comers none are quite ready yet, and none have the full suite of functionality.

    This change actually doesn’t affect me at all, I don’t really engage with any communities. I have one that I use just to mess with admin options and see what kinda choices there are and how it works, one server with a few friends (like 5 regulars counting myself) and one for some of my siblings that we only really use to play Jackbox remotely.

    But I still resent the change and have wanted a good alternative ever since subscriptions started.

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  • Nickelalloy@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    So anyone who knows some good altenatives that are either FOSS or EU based?

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    • Zacryon@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Stoat (formerly Revolt), is a strong FOSS competitor with a Discord-like feeling stoat.chat github.com/stoatchat

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      • AnimalsDream@slrpnk.net ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        The last time I looked into Stoat (back when it was Revolt, they had basically no cryptographic capabilities enabled. Have they added any e2e features at all yet? Like, the overall impression I got from them it is that it’s being developed mainly by someone who seems pretty new to programming in general, and that makes me feel pretty cautious.

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      • tea@lemmy.today ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        I’m liking it, but there is a lot of work left to do there. I joined today and replicated the small server I run for video game nights with my friends. That part all worked, but the application layer seems to need the most attention. iOS is not there yet and Android needs notification integration. The desktop client has a memory leak. I hope it gets there, but it will be a tough sell to normie friends who can’t handle rough edges. The self hosted version is also behind on the release so it takes some effort to get working (looking to do this but I don’t know if I have the chops to make it work as is)

        The bones are there though and hope they get an influx of help given the writing on the wall about Discords imminent continued enshittification.

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    • Babalugats@feddit.uk ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      In no particular order, and not all are EU or FOSS But most are FOSS. I think only the first 6 are both EU and FOSS clients. I may not have marked all of the Self Hosted ones, but I think I did.

      • www.mumble.info

      • movim.eu

      • twake-chat.com

      • fusion.privmx.com/en

      • matrix.org/ecosystem/clients/matrix-commander/

      • fluxer.app (self hosted)

      • a.weird.one

      • zulip.com

      • sharkord.com (self hosted)

      • spacebar.chat

      • element.io/en

      • teamspeak.de

      • stoat.chat (self hosted)

      • jami.net

      • www.rocket.chat

      • mattermost.com

      • sylkserver.com

      • xmpp.org - roguesecurity.dev/blog/xmpp

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      • gwl@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        How many of these have 5-10 people voice chat?

        Cause I use Discord weekly for running and playing TTRPGs, over voice, occasionally doing screensharing when one or more of the players are having issues with their PC

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    • sunbeam60@feddit.uk ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Making you aware that the age requirement probably comes from the EU. Seeking another EU based solution might introduce the same requirement.

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      • lime@feddit.nu ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        it’s from the uk and texas.

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    • Matombo@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Element/Matrix and Stoat (formerly Revolt)

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      • Tiefkuehlkost@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        I missed a feature like voice rooms in discord server in elements it only had server groupcalls last time i looked. Did this change ?

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    • mrskipperoo@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      I heard sharkord allows for self-host. It’s super early in development, but it’s browser based for now, and I think if more people get on board and improve it, it’d be a pretty good alternative.

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    • Holytimes@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      This entire problem is because of the EU… So finding something EU based isn’t a valid solution.

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  • BaraCoded@literature.cafe ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    So far, I have stumbled upon Stoat, a project called Sharkord, the Matrix network and the XMPP network.

    Xmpp is both secure and snappy. Stoat doesn’t federate but the interface is really Discord-like.

    Some kind of XMPP based Stoat would be nice.

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  • DylanMc6@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    We need socialism

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    • QuandaleDingle@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Democratic Socialism

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      • DylanMc6@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        What about libertarian socialism and democratic communism (as in council communism, syndicalism, anarcho-communism, left-communism proper and De Leonism)?

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  • paulcdb@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    I wasn’t a huge discord use but I just removed all the channels before deleting the app on every device.

    Not going to make a huge difference but if everyone does it, maybe it will!

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  • Korkki@lemmy.ml ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    What features did they exactly disable for unverified accounts?

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    • Humanius@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      It is not disabled yet, but they will be resticting age gated channels by the end of the month yo amyone who hasn’t provided them with a copy of their ID

      Worth noting that Discord had a pretty bad data leak a few months back, where it turned out the ID verification company they hired was not deleting the IDs after they were checked

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    • tyler@programming.dev ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      You are treated as a child, literally, so no nsfw stuff. I think no advertisements as well.

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      • Wild_Mastic@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        No advertisements seems like a bonus to me

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  • weedee@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    s3nd.chat

    Made by the same team that did s3nd.pics (the imgur alternative. Under heavy Dev at the moment but has promise.

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    • lime@feddit.nu ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      copyright notice hasn’t been updated in three years and no link to source. no thanks.

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      • weedee@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Its in active dev. I’ve let them know about the copyright and that’s been updated. Open sourcing the project has been talked about, but sounds like they want to get it usable befor le discord pushes people to upload IDs first.

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  • acidowl@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    Teamspeak 6! Voice + Streaming. Selfhosting is also possible! You can also rent an instance from them for 4-5 bucks.

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    • OR3X@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      The Linux client sucks

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      • tea@lemmy.today ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        So discord users will feel right at home.

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      • acidowl@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        I think the new beta is alright, Streaming works under wayland now. For me it is fine enough to leave Discord alone

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    • EchoCranium@lemmy.zip ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      I just started looking at that this afternoon. May host my own on the game server I’m already running. Like that there are clients for Linux as well as Windows and Mac. My friend doing cross-play with his PS5 will probably have to link in using his phone though.

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  • Jobe@feddit.org ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    I hope this brings stoat.chat more attention. It’s promising, but not at the same level in terms of features.

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  • tostiman@sh.itjust.works ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    There really isn’t a good alternative to Discord, sadly. Yes, I’ve tried Matrix

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    • Rekorse@sh.itjust.works ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Ventrilo + signal

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      • tostiman@sh.itjust.works ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        This? You’re joking, right? Image

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      • earthwormjim@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        or Mumble + IRC

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    • Murdoc@sh.itjust.works ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Stoat?

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      • kcseb@pawb.social ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        Absolutely not.

        Stoat (formerly Revolt) is an utter shit-show of alt left and right extremists and the development is dead in the water. They’ve claimed to be working on feature parity with Discord for years now. Not to mention the developers jumping ship and the whole “Stoat” rebrand. Not to mention, their email verification server is just hosted on a homelab setup which has lead to a plethora of users being unable to receive their verification emails, resulting in them requiring a manual approval via emailing in… which guess what… those are also failing to come through!

        Don’t touch Revolt/Stoat. It’s no better.

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      • 7101334@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        I’ve heard (though not personally confirmed) that their servers are overwhelmed

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  • WindyRebel@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    For someone that used discord only for video chat and the chat sidebar for D&D since we have players in person and a couple in other states, what would you all recommend?

    Should we just switch to Zoom or something?

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    • CosmicTurtle0@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      My understanding is that if your community is not adult content and you aren’t on any adult servers, you won’t need to ID verify. But I suspect it’s only a matter of time before all accounts are required to verify.

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      • TheSeveralJourneysOfReemus@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        Discord has more breaches than my wallet how can i even trust these. Clearly, i won’t.

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  • homes@piefed.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Considering every discord user I’ve ever interacted with, this can only be seen as an ultimate good.

    Fuck, discord, and everyone who uses that. You all deserve to live a nightmare.

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    • Epzillon@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Atleast point the gun in the right direction, please. I’ve used Discord since it’s release, when I moved over from Skype. I’ve seen the enshittification all the way through and can safely say, as with every other SaaS software, if its run by a corporation it will eventually pile into a bag of shit. Thats not the users fault. Ive been looking for a promising alternative for a long time but there just isnt a good alternative. When it comes to features used by Discords users and communities most alternatives are lacking some key component that makes a switch hard. I just hope this speeds up the development of these features on alternative platforms.

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  • cloudskater@pawb.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    I’ve heard Matrix was involved in some crypto bullshit and military operations of some sort. I want an alternative but Matrix is just shady enough all around for me to stay the hell away.

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    • Evotech@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      It’s FOSS that should be enough

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      • cloudskater@pawb.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Sorry, I don’t knowingly support crypto bros or war profiteers if I can help it

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    • Goldholz@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Stoat

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      • cloudskater@pawb.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Tried that too. Its not federated and generally just didn’t like me lol

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  • disco_jimmy@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago
    [deleted]
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    • boneyards@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      I’m sure you won’t be upset when your information inevitably gets leaked after it supposedly gets deleted then.

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  • cy_narrator@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    I am going to bet noone in their team wants to do that, they are most likely pressured into it legally.

    I hope they find a way to fight this

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  • m3t00@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    require a laser scan of whole body. for security

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  • m3t00@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    that will do it. was thinking about over-moderation and reddit mentality moderation ideas/power trips.

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  • DylanMc6@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    Time to organize

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  • DylanMc6@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    Time to study and read socialist theory. Seriously! redsails.org

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  • bitjunkie@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    Is there a reason people don’t just go back to Vent/TS? Has it really been so long since those were the de facto options that people are in a quandary over what to do when Discord is clearly in the midst of rapid enshittification?

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  • Ada@chatgptjailbreak.tech ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    Say no to groomers

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  • Dekkia@this.doesnotcut.it ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    I guess the positive side of this is that at least some open source projects might move away from discord now.

    The negative is that a lot of them used discord not only for communication but also documentation, losing all of that knowledge in the process.

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