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Feddit UK update: we're not going anywhere (feddit.uk)

submitted 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) by Emperor@feddit.uk to c/feddituk@feddit.uk

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Hi all, sorry for a lack of updates but there's been a lot going on behind the scenes and events moved rather rapidly.

I recently posted that we were going to have to move to another instance because our only Admin was missing and problems looked to be piling up.

Fortunately, Tom dropped me a line the other day and he has updated the instance and made GreatAlbatross and myself Admins.

So the immediate crisis has been averted and we've fallen back to the original plan which was get more Admins in place and work to ensure there's no single point of failure, so any one of us could get hit by a bus (bagsy not me) and the instance will carry on.

Soooo bear with us while we thrash out the details of what else needs doing to ensure the continuity of the instance and while I figure out what all the new buttons do (hopefully not by mashing them all at once just to see what happens).

In the meantime there are likely problems that need fixing. I know, for example, that some are still having email verification problems and have been waiting a while, so I'll figure out how to resolve this and work through the pinned post here. If you have this problem then post there and we'll get it sorted.

If there are any other issues you want to flag up for attention then you can do so here or contact one of the new admins.

And, finally, thanks to everyone for their enthusiasm for this instance in the other thread and elsewhere, if the folks on here hadn't formed a great community that they felt was worth the time and effort to save we wouldn't be here now with the future looking more secure. Tom built the house but you all made it a home. So carry on...

edit 1: I'll keep tagging things on as I think of them. Firstly, we'll be keeping the Matrix space - it'll be our fallback if the server goes down and provides people with an encrypted (and private if needed) channel of communication. If you add your Matrix ID to your profile it adds a secure DMs button to your.profile, so Matrix and Lemmy are integrated to a degree.

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[-] Prking@lemmy.world 32 points 2 years ago

This is the best news.

I’m relieved Tom is okay.

Thank you, great albatross and everyone else who has put so much effort into Feddit UK

[-] GreatAlbatross@feddit.uk 24 points 2 years ago

This is going to be an interesting few days while we get to grips with everything, especially behind the scenes.
(Seeing site wide mod-queue is like staring into the void, I must say)

As we know there were a lot of issues stacking up, I'm going to do my best to do a power day tomorrow. Any janitorial/administrative work that's been sitting, just blow up my inbox. Or Emperor's.

Hopefully next week we'll start to get procedures for "I'm locked out" or "This isn't against the rules, but I think it should be" type things.

[-] Emperor@feddit.uk 9 points 2 years ago

(Seeing site wide mod-queue is like staring into the void, I must say)

I may have swore, although it's worth noting that not all of it is on this instance (although I suppose it kinda is because of federation), so may take some sifting.

Hopefully next week we’ll start to get procedures for “I’m locked out” or “This isn’t against the rules, but I think it should be” type things.

Yes, we are open to ideas or issues but we may also be spending some time reading the manual. If there's anything urgent then don't be shy about it, we knew it was going to be an overwhelming few weeks we'll sorted things out.

[-] criminalunicorn@feddit.uk 18 points 2 years ago

Email issues are likely related to the lack of SPF and DMARC for the domain. It's a pretty common practice to mark domains without as spam.

The NCSC had a nice tool to check and also give you feedback on how to fix the issues.

https://emailsecuritycheck.service.ncsc.gov.uk/results?domain=fddit.uk

[-] GreatAlbatross@feddit.uk 5 points 2 years ago

This is high on the to-do list, though I believe SPF is already in place. (There might be a typo in your URL!)

[-] criminalunicorn@feddit.uk 4 points 2 years ago

Yes you are correct I did not notice that. Great to see that it's in hand though.

[-] UKFilmNerd@feddit.uk 17 points 2 years ago

I'm happy to hear that Tom is okay and I welcome our new admin overlords. 😁

I was worried that the new instance and transfer would possibly confuse people and we would lose them in the move but now that has been averted.

As the tacky merchandise would say: I'm on Feddit UK. We kept calm And carried on!

😆

[-] fakeman_pretendname@feddit.uk 12 points 2 years ago

That's great news! Thank you so much for your work on this (and thanks to Tom and GreatAlbatross too).

[-] Hossenfeffer@feddit.uk 11 points 2 years ago

Good news! Glad to hear Tom's ok.

[-] tkc@feddit.uk 9 points 2 years ago

Good news guys. Well done for all of your hard work.

[-] cashews_best_nut@lemmy.world 9 points 2 years ago

"bagsy not me" - fucking hell it's probs 30+yrs since I heard that.

[-] PhobosAnomaly@feddit.uk 3 points 2 years ago

"Jinx 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8"

"you fell oooooooover!"

"You dropped your virgin card look"

...and other such outrageously witty schoolyard humour.

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[-] Predator@feddit.uk 8 points 2 years ago

Could you make this instance have its own baked in old reddit layout with the old.feddit domain like lemmy world and others have, instead of relying on 3rd party domains like opnxng etc?

[-] Emperor@feddit.uk 9 points 2 years ago

Yes, we've discussed design ideas including this and it should be relatively straightforward to implement. Hopefully, there'll be a few to choose from and we are open to suggestions about others. Keep an eye out for an announcement about it once we get everything ironed out.

[-] mannycalavera@feddit.uk 7 points 2 years ago

Praise be!

Thanks for the updates and the hard work. You're doing an amazing job!

[-] Blaze@discuss.tchncs.de 7 points 2 years ago

Great news!

[-] i_am_not_a_robot@feddit.uk 7 points 2 years ago

Note to self: always subscribe to the "instance news" community so chaos like this doesn't pass by unnoticed.

[-] wildeaboutoskar@feddit.uk 6 points 2 years ago

Yay great news!

[-] christophski@feddit.uk 6 points 2 years ago

Great news! Was starting to wonder if I'd need to transfer everything to a new instance, glad I don't have to!

[-] PhylMoel@feddit.uk 6 points 2 years ago

Great news. Thanks to all involved for your efforts.

[-] ns1@feddit.uk 6 points 2 years ago

Great news, thanks for the update

[-] Oneeightnine@feddit.uk 6 points 2 years ago

Great news all around. Although, I do feel a tiny bit sad we'll never get to see what Quackhouse could have been.

[-] Emperor@feddit.uk 8 points 2 years ago

Ah yes, a real Sliding Doors moment but, hopefully, we should be able to use a lot of the ideas and enthusiasm to improve this place. Which reminds me, we need a duck community now.

[-] Flax_vert@feddit.uk 6 points 2 years ago

The ideas won't work. Feddit UK is an awful name and we won't really be able to expand this place easily with such a name, and if we do, reddit will get annoyed with us because we are basically stealing their name. I am really disappointed that you'd kill all of our plans for Quackhouse overnight without much consultation :/

[-] Rogue@feddit.uk 6 points 2 years ago

You seem to be a absorbing a lot of down votes but you are completely correct - feddit.uk is an uninspiring identity. What does it mean? Federated Reddit UK?

If so that's blatantly imposing on Reddit's IP/ trademark.
The average user really doesn't care about federation so it seems pointless to include it as part of a brand.
feddit.uk seems to imply some relationship with feddit.de and similar domains. Not only is that open to confusion, but it could be a bit of a minefield if (when) one of them falls into controversy.

[-] Flax_vert@feddit.uk 2 points 2 years ago

Yep. I made a full post on here proposing the name change. Please check it out if you have the time. But you've basically nailed it, plus added the relationship for feddit.de

[-] noodle@feddit.uk 6 points 2 years ago

I'm sorry but Quackhouse is a terrible name.

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[-] smeg@feddit.uk 5 points 2 years ago

Compared to Reddit we're a tiny blip, there's no way they'll ever care about our name and even if they do I doubt it constitutes trademark infringement

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[-] Prking@lemmy.world 2 points 2 years ago

It was always the case that the plans were a last resort and there was no way to migrate everything across.

Anyone can set up an instance so Quackhouse can still go ahead, that’s the benefit of federation.

[-] GreatAlbatross@feddit.uk 3 points 2 years ago

Emperor and I have had chats about both directions in the background following the unexpected feddit.uk reveal.
There are pros and cons to both.
For now, we're planning to get feddit.uk running happily, then have a think/public discussion on what happens next.
People seem very enthusiastic about the new domain, but it would entail effectively shuttering an already running community, so it has to be weighed up.

[-] Flax_vert@feddit.uk 4 points 2 years ago

I believe we should take a simple course of action and work in phases.

1: Get Quackhouse running 2: Create alternative communities there 3: Turn off sign ups on Feddit.UK 4: Shut down the communities on Feddit.UK

Then leave Feddit.uk as is so people can still use their accounts. Feddit.uk is held back by the domain. There's two outcomes of it which are inevitable, barring tom disappearing again and money running out:

Lemmy hype kind of dies off, so people are already settled on their Lemmy instances and don't join, as feddit.uk is set up right now to only really appeal to lemmy people. Feddit.UK dies out slowly.
People keep joining Feddit.UK, it gets large enough that Reddit's lawyers notice it and shut it down because we absolutely are infringing on their brand and have no defence for this.

The new domain, Quackhouse.uk, had two main appeals:

That you could tell people who don't understand the fediverse about it without having to explain, so you can "advertise" it as it's own thing, making the fediverse more mainstream-friendly

It's not named after an existing social media site and is copyright friendly.

I strongly believe that a migration to a new domain in some way is ABSOLUTELY necessary. People talk about forcing it, but if we don't force gently, this community will fragment more. The alternative I suggested allowed a renamed site to survive and thrive excellently while people could keep their accounts until the reddit lawyers get angry. Our appeal is "A UK based instance", we are better standing as one UK based instance than two with identical communities. The latter option of having two identical communities is heavily impractical and the sapling for Quackhouse would likely be choked out by the bramble bush that is Feddit.UK

[-] ToasterOverlord@feddit.uk 7 points 2 years ago

I disagree. The country-specific Lemmy instances tend to share the Feddit branding which I think is a big plus. I think there's a strong argument the name doesn't infringe Reddit's brand (it's not like Apple can just make all i-Whatever products go away).

And feddit.de is the 5th biggest instance, and would surely run into problems first. They seem to be doing fine.

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[-] noodle@feddit.uk 6 points 2 years ago

Great stuff. Good on you all for keeping this place alive.

[-] clara@feddit.uk 5 points 2 years ago

we are saved \o/

[-] alchemy88@lemmy.team 5 points 2 years ago

Great you guys managed to sort things out. Glad you'll still be around :)

[-] Deebster@programming.dev 4 points 2 years ago

Congrats, I'm glad all those communities don't have to move!

I was needing a new instance the other day but rejected feddit.uk due to only having a single admin/point of failure. After seeing a few decent-sized instances vanish, I think only personal servers should have just one admin.

[-] Emperor@feddit.uk 4 points 2 years ago

Yes, I think we may have missed out on a lot of members who did their homework before picking an instance, because a single Admin means it could just vanish over night. Our aim is to ensure that we are rock solid on all fronts and can keep rolling as long as people want it to.

The good thing about federation is you can still be an active member here, so I look forward to seeing you out and about.

[-] ilovecheese@feddit.uk 4 points 2 years ago

Nice one! It's good to not have to move instance again!

Much appreciation to all those involved in keeping our instance afloat!

(Bagsy not me either!)

[-] Mane25@feddit.uk 3 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

Hmm, I have mixed feelings about this, honestly, I'm not going to grumble too much because I'm not the one putting in the work - but it felt like a bit of a let-down that all this happened in the first place, and it felt like a fresh start was needed to move on.

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[-] Mex@feddit.uk 3 points 2 years ago

This post has been up for a month time to consider unpinning it?

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this post was submitted on 19 Oct 2023

213 points (100.0% liked)

Feddit UK

1573 readers

1 users here now

Community for the Feddit UK instance.
A place to log issues, and for the admins to communicate with everyone.

founded 2 years ago

MODERATORS

tom@feddit.uk

GreatAlbatross@feddit.uk