Lemmy posts are starting to pop up on search results for Google (+ other search engines)

Submitted ⁨⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨otter@lemmy.ca⁩ to ⁨fediverse@lemmy.world⁩

To see the discussion, you can see

One of the top posts right now on !lemmybewholesome@lemmy.world
This thread: lemmy.ca/post/8488573
- To see it on your instance, use an app, frontend, or !instance_assistant@lemmy.ca browser extension)

Alternatively, here is the screenshot from the post.

I also wanted to share this tip for how you can find Lemmy posts:

Search using site:home_instance. So if I wanted to find recommended phones, I could go site:lemmy.ca recommended phones. Because every instance has its own collection of posts, you will be getting all content on Lemmy (that is available from your home instance).

Question to everyone, what does Lemmy need to make it easier for people to find content? What are the implications of the Fediverse on how people might find content in the future?

One thing is that people are more likely to get posts from the larger instances, likely because more people are linking to them and opening those links? Another thought was the common complaint about how our post links aren’t community specific. While I can search for posts using the method above, I can’t search within a specific community like I can with Reddit (ex. I can’t search site:lemmy.ca/c/Vancouver recommended restaurants

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Comments

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finthechat@kbin.social ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
We did it, Reddit

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- PuddingFeeling907@lemmy.ca ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Watch spez squirm every time lemmy improves
  
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  - Carighan@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    spez wants to remove Reddit from Google actively, so at least for this specifically I sincerely doubt he minds. Of course, the main reason he wants thatis only that he wants to inflate Reddit’s perceived investor value, so not sure what that even helps. But eh.
    
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  - spez@sh.itjust.works ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
    
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phoneymouse@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Reddit is talking about hiding Reddit from Google. I hope they do that because it will let Lemmy start to replace Reddit as the go to source for non-SEO , real-human answers.

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- Vub@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Except each instance has its own URL meaning ranking for ANYTHING is extremely hard since each domain’s rank will always be weak in the sea of others. Each is even being penalised by the algorithm if there are duplicate content mirrored between different URLs. It’s the weakness of the fediverse if we are to follow how search engines have worked in the last decades. Maybe it will lead to new search engines (I hope so) but right now it is not going to work well to replace for example Reddit … or rank well in general at all.
  
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  - Lionel@endlesstalk.org ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    I wonder if there’s a way around this that we can create, instead of doing nothing or hoping google adapts.
    
    Like a dummy instance that catalogues everything on all instances (but also links to the original posts) for the purpose of showing up on google search.
    
    Since this instance isn’t for posting but for search engine indexing, there may be some otherwise undesirable micro-optimizations that can help improve its chances of showing up.
    
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  - Ullallulloo@civilloquy.com ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Each post refers to the poster’s home domain as the canonical URL, regardless of which instance you’re viewing it on specifically to avoid duplication SEO concerns
    
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- emhl@feddit.de ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  If the Fediverse gets big enough search engines wil probably optimize for it e.g. prioritizing the instance of the community…
  
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- ezchili@iusearchlinux.fyi ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  “Good 4k tvs without bloat, site:lemm… oh.”
  
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- NickNak@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  One of the main reasons reddit mega turned to shit was due to far too many people joining and using it, granted this is due to mobile phones but is it really worth it to attract more and more people? These instances are run by average people not corps with money they can easily collapse under tuw burden of to many
  
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  - TORFdot0@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    The cool thing about the fediverse is that if grows to much where and the moderation turns to crap on some instances, you can always defederate from those problem instances and avoid the trouble makers entirely. Instance admins can always turn off sign ups when they feel like they have reached their limits for moderation as well. And users can always self host their own instances and only let the people they trust sign up. The fediverse is more resilient than traditional corporate run social media
    
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  - PersnickityPenguin@lemm.ee ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Reddit is not moderated by paid corporate employees. It’s all volunteer labor.
    
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Zippit@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I use duckduckgo and lately have been adding Lemmy at the beginning (like I did Reddit) and it really works. Search results come back if there is a discussion going on about the topic.

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- Chozo@kbin.social ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  I've not tinkered around with it too much yet, but how has your experience been with actually viewing the results? I would imagine that most results are statically likely to be for an instance other than the one you have an account on, requiring a few extra steps to load the post in your home instance if you wanted to vote/comment on it.
  
  This is one of those UX things that I think is still holding Lemmy back from more mainstream adoption, imo.
  
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  - breakfastmtn@lemmy.ca ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    You can make that a bit less painful with browser extensions. ‘Instance Assistant for Lemmy & kbin’, for example, will always show a button to open a page in your home server. Not sure if there’s anything exactly like it here yet but FediAct for Mastodon lets you like/boost/follow/comment on other servers directly, more or less eliminating the other-servers problem.
    
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  - Zippit@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    It’s hit and miss most of the time. I just tried Lemmy memes and it redirects to lemmy.ml and the memes community.
    
    Then I tried Lemmy how do I wash my kitten and there was an answer. Again for Lemmy ml. I think it depends on whether there is a post answering the question and if people commented on it.
    
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yukichigai@kbin.social ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Swag. The more we show up in search, the more people will be asking "what the heck is Lemmy?" Some of 'em will join.

Well then. Here. We. Go.

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- kratoz29@lemm.ee ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  I have been regularly sharing shit with friends that I see in Lemmy, and they always said to me why my links always have weird domains and shit… so I proceed to explain and we get to nowhere.
  
  Anyway this is people that weren’t even into Reddit, so that people are the harder to get, IMHO.
  
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  - otter@lemmy.ca ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    It really was silly of Lemmy to not have community specific links, it’s even more confusing that way. Now it’s just a bunch of
    
    {weird-domain}/post/{number}
    
    You never know what it is unless you have link previews
    
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  - qooqie@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    I’ve had success describing it as “imagine you owned the server your Facebook info was stored on but could still interact with all other Facebook servers”. It’s a little simplified, but it usually gets the point across.
    
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  - synae@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Sounds like a “them” problem, you keep doing what you’re doing. Maybe they’ll eventually get it, maybe not. Unless you give up sharing content with them entirely, of course, but that’s your choice.
    
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- SatansMaggotyCumFart@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Swag, brah.
  
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jacktherippah@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Reddit, we’re coming for you 😏

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- misterundercoat@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Clutching your upvotes tight
  
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  - PersnickityPenguin@lemm.ee ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Exit old reddit.com
    
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DingDongBell@lemm.ee ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Let’s fucking go

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chrishazfun@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
We did it, Lemmy

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Resol@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
The fediverse is no longer just a silly parallel universe now.

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cupcakezealot@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
oh man i saw “google” and “+” and got nostalgia for early days google+ blobcat, cry

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- LongerDonger@lemmynsfw.com ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  This is the first time I’ve ever seen positive sentiment for Google+ online.
  
  I come from early YouTube where it was forced upon us from above, so I’m genuinely curious as to what positives you see in it.
  
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- nick@campfyre.nickwebster.dev ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  I miss circles
  
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  - cupcakezealot@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    the photowalks were the best thing on social media… the original circles were great too. :(
    
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alucard@sopuli.xyz ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Good! I love it here and I think others will too :)

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Crylos@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
This is neat… I just tried “faceting lemmy” and my community came up on top.

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- otter@lemmy.ca ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Your community is neat! Subscribed :)
  
  Consider promoting it on !communitypromo@lemmy.ca, or other similar communities
  
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- cashews_best_nut@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  I read this wrong and thought it was an auto-correct from “face sitting”. :/
  
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MaliciousKebab@sh.itjust.works ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Would I be contributing if I was using a mobile app like eternity or voyager?

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- 4z01235@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Yes
  
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- TexMexBazooka@lemm.ee ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Activity and comment contribute
  
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sarmale@lemmy.zip ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I have a question, I have posted with my lemmy.zip acccount to a community hosted on feddit.ro, and when I search the title only lemmy.world appears, even tho i didnt post it there, any idea why?

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- neutron@thelemmy.club ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  It means many people are using lemmy.world instance to view your post instead of lemmy.zip or feddit.ro.
  
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- Corgana@startrek.website ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Every instance stores what are essentially copies of everything it’s users are subscribed to. So when you post “to” feddit.ro, you’re posting to the copy on lemmy.zip. Similarly, Lemmy.world has their own copy (that for whatever reason is ranking higher in search) because someone there is presumeably subscribed to the community.
  
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- otter@lemmy.ca ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Adding a bit more to the other comments
  
  The post should exist on all 3 instances (as well as any other instance federated with feddit.ro). However lemmy.world is bigger and so more people are likely linking to /from that instance, which mean Google is indexing it with higher priority.
  
  The other instances should probably show up over time?
  
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  - Teppic@kbin.social ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Hello from kbin... (federated here too)
    But this poses an interesting dilemma for Google, potentially to top 100 results could end up just being the same post observed on many Lemmy and kbin instances.
    
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- lemmyingly@lemm.ee ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  You can post with an archive?
  
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Habahnow@sh.itjust.works ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
That’s cool. I seem to have issues finding this post, or the top post of the day (sh.itjust.works/post/8365139) by searching: site:sh.itjust.works After watching the 2nd episode of 11th season of Futurama And I’m not getting the correct result. Am I doing it right, but there’s something else affecting the results (top of day for lemmy isn’t as popular as needed to show up on google, bing, nor DDG)? or am I making a mistake somewhere?

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- otter@lemmy.ca ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  It shouldn’t be the instance like the other comment is suggesting, although I don’t quite understand the specifics of how it works. I’m playing around with it myself right now
  
  If I search site:sh.itjust.works Hello and set it to 24 hours, I do see posts. So I don’t think timing is the issue
  
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- otter@lemmy.ca ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Looks like it’s appearing now! Just needed some time I guess
  
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- mrchampion@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  It’s on lemmy.ca, which is a different instance than sh.itjust.works, surprisingly. That’s probably your mistake.
  
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sarmale@lemmy.zip ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Did the same thing, now the linked thread is shown and not the discution

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lemmyingly@lemm.ee ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
One big issue that Lemmy has because it’s a distributed service is the dilution of results.

For example, there is only one Reddit domain (that people use to access the service) but there are hundreds/thousands of Lemmy domains and the dilution will continue to increase as Lemmy’s popularity increases. It’s either that or there will only be a couple of Lemmy instances that will dominate all of Lemmy.

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Daft_ish@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Honestly, I’d rather it not. Just accelerates the social media platform life cycle. Any other search engine. Google, no thanks.

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- otter@lemmy.ca ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  I don’t see how a site can choose which search engine it appears on
  
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  - cupcakezealot@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    technically most crawlers abide by robots.txt so if you really wanted you could forbid the google crawler but it would be silly too since it’s one of the most popular engines
    
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  - Daft_ish@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    I don’t know. How about the millions of sites that don’t appear in a Google search. Do what they did.
    
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