MJ RayWhat replaces Facebook groups? Niche hashtags don't transmit reliably (do they?) so are bonfire circles the best option? #askfedi
Neil E. Hodges@mjr Some folks have been working on Fedi groups for years, but I've yet to see anything other than stuff like a.gup.pe come out of it.
Mike | Raymond Tec@mjr I don't know if you're in control of your server or not, but the best way to propagate hashtags I've found is by using the relay.fedi.buzz.
You basically add the hashtags you (or your users) are most interested in. You do this in Preferences->Administration->Relays. Fedi.Buzz allows the same for whole instances (if you think the instance you're trying to read from isn't being pulled).
Austin Huang ❤️@mike @mjr They don't have to be admin; as normal users they can follow @tag-introduction for #introduction or @instance-mstdn.party for my instance's local timeline.
Trantion@mjr Someone on the #OhGodWhatNow podcast recently said that local groups are the one thing Facebook still does well, and I'd agree there are a couple of groups I follow on Facebook that are decent.
Sure, Facebook only tells you about time-critical posts after the deadline has passed and makes it almost impossible to find a post you've seen before again, but a lot of the people who make these groups good just will not use any other website or platform, unless maybe something even worse
@trantion yes, but Facebook groups are now deteriorating quickly under the weight of algorithmic fash promotion, AI slop and the ever-increasing numbers of fakes and bots. I think Meta has killed the last USP of facebook and it's just taking a while for the headless chicken to stop running around.
Things have moved on since my last post. There aren't many bonfire servers and it seems a bit heavy to install my own public one quickly and cheaply. So I'm experimenting with #Friendica groups.