1y ago

New kbin user guide (preparation for impending wave of reddit migrants in July)

This article is an x-post from m/quickstart

Quick note before starting: although this article is far from comprehensive, I wanted to get something done in time for the next wave of reddit migrants when the third party apps close down.
What you see below was written in anticipation for the same set of questions from new users being asked again and again.
If you want me to add anything in, or make any corrections, comment here and I will do my best to make amendments before I repost it on 1st July. Thanks!

All screenshots were taken using the kbin Web version on chrome for android, unless otherwise specified.

How to use this guide

This article is a work in progress, but what I am hoping to achieve is an easy to follow, quick to consume guide that presents you with the knowledge you need in a somewhat logical order.

To that end, I have divided it up into sections, or 'tiers'. The idea being that once you are confident at one tier, you can move up to the next. So let's start with...

1. Lurker Tier

Intro to subscriptions and magazines (kbin communities)

Other basic navigation

Voting and boosting content

What happens when you upvote something?
What happens when you boost something?
Warning: your votes and boosts are publicly visible to anyone who visits your profile.

Optional quality of life settings

Exploring the Fediverse

Useful information

2. Contributor Tier

Basic terminology

Don't worry if all these terms don't click with you right away. You might even be able to disregard a few of them. Either way, you can always come back and refer to this later.

A 'magazine' is a kbin community
Magazines contain 'threads' and a 'microblog'
The terms thread and microblog can cause some confusion, so we'll clear that up soon. But first...
A thread is a discussion based on either an 'article' (i.e. text post), a link, a photo, or a video (although video is not yet supported)
How to create an article
A 'comment' is a response to a thread
A 'microblog' is a collection of 'posts' that are based on the magazine itself as opposed to a single article, link, photo, or video
Confusingly, a post can still contain things like images, it's just that its replies will appear alongside all the other microblog posts
How to upload an image to display on a post
Responses to microblog posts are called 'replies'
The distinction between comments and replies is significant because they are split by type in your user profile by those names.
A 'favourite' is a thread you have upvoted using the arrow button
How to view your favourites

Threads vs microblog posts

	Thread	Post
Shown on front page	✅️YES	❌️NO
Added to favourites	✅️YES	❌️NO
Can be downvoted	✅️YES	❌️NO
Has a title	✅️YES	❌️NO
Can be pinned to top	✅️YES	❌️NO
Can be boosted	✅️YES	✅️YES
Shown on microblog	❌️NO	✅️YES
Can comment	✅️YES	❌️NO
Can reply	❌️NO	✅️YES

Staying engaged

3. Addict Tier

To make good use of the tips in this tier you must have the prerequisite knowledge from tiers 1 and 2.

Tips in this tier may also be quite quirky (e.g. only works on desktop) or require detailed explanations. Or they might be advanced niche tips for users looking to get the absolute most out of kbin.

Although you've reached the end, this article is still a work in progress. If you've any corrections, or feel something is missing, you can reach out to @Friend or post to m/quickstart. Thanks for reading!

41 comments

The how to subscribe to a magazine guide sadly won't work if you're the first to subscribe to it within kbin. Unfortunately, the guide to doing so might scare people away. You have to search @magazine.domain in the search (not the magazine search!).
Some of these things really highlight changes that need to be made. Like my above example. It's bad that there's two ways to subscribe to a magazine (one being completely unintuitive). It's bad that the whole thread vs post thing is so confusing. It's bad that we call something magazines while most of our content, which comes from Lemmy, calls them communities (and also has syntax for linking to them that doesn't work for us).
- Thanks for pointing out, I've updated the how-to. Hopefully that covers it.

@Friend. Do you have any tips for being able identify which instance a post is from? The “@.” part of an instance name is usually cut off, and often the post title will say “kbin.social” next to it even if it’s not a kbin post. The only way I know for sure to tell is to click on a post and scroll past all the comments.
Edit: for example, this post: https://kbin.social/m/youshouldknow@lemmy.world/t/100869/YSK-If-you-make-popcorn-in-a-pot-on-the
The post title clearly says kbin.social next to it. By he community label just says “youshouldknow.” It looks the same way from my home page: The only reason I know it’s actually on Lemmy.world is because I scrolled past all the comments, and also it’s in the url (which i am only looking at here because I copied and pasted the direct url for the post.)
Edit 2: I should probably also clarify that I am on mobile, so mouse-over’s are a no-go.
- It's sadly very annoying. What I usually do is I long press the magazine name if I'm in the front page. That will show the URL. I otherwise usually just use the URL of the page I'm on (it should have /m/foo@bar -- unless it's a local magazine, in which case it won't display the domain). But I know that isn't user friendly nor likely available on apps.
  It needs to be improved. And the UI should stop hiding it (eg, the front page will show "gaming" instead of "gaming@lemmy.ml"), because the domain is a critical part of the magazine name.
- this userscript can show it
  https://kbin.social/m/kbinStyles/t/27201/kbin-enhancement-script-QOL-updates-for-the-kbin-UI
  
  @sigma
  @Friend
  How does that work? Is is a safari mod?
- @CarlsIII try click on More at the original post and select Copy to Fediverse. That'll get you the originating url. This works for every type of post and comment.
  @Friend
  
  @cendawanita
  @Friend
  Again, this is all way more work than it would be if the post just showed the instance in the first place. I already know I can find out what instance if I do some scrolling and clicking. I would prefer to just have the “@beehaw.org” added to the community name in the post (and to not display “kbin.social” on posts that aren’t even from kbin. I still haven’t heard an explanation for that.)
- Please can you share a screenshot?
  Here's what I see what I select the burger menu while on the magazine.
  Maybe your screen size or text size is different to mine though.
  
  @Friend Hopefully this posts correctly. The post was on youshouldknow@Lemmy.world, but it only shows “youshouldknow”, and I have no idea why it says kbin.social next to the title. I’m hoping to be able to tell the name of the instance without having to click a bunch of places first.

A few points:
I feel like even this short guide is overcomplicating it for 90% of potential users. Just add a tl;dr at the start about checking out the relevant settings (top bar, notifications), subscribing to magazines, and navigating to the "subscribed" feed. Like, if I want a hot shower I don't need to know where the water comes from or how pressure is determined by the bermoulli formula, just say what do I press to get the water to come out hot.
Explain that collapsible comments are coming and there's a userscript for people who are into that.
I don't think that this separation of tiers is efficient for anyone. Like, if I want to know how to see the local feed is that lurker or addict.
I think it's overcomplicating threads and microblogs. Yeah, I didn't know there was a difference between replies and comments but it's never been relevant for me this past month. One is like reddit and is compatible with lemmy, the other is like twitter and lets you talk to mastodon users (and misskey, and calckey,...).
On that note, some people get overly confused with the concept of federation (in part because people usually overcomplicate it when explaining), and this problem is compounded on a platform that also interacts with instances from other platforms. You can just keep it simple and say "you have an account on a website which has its own content. There are others that look exactly the same with different users and content, but you have access to all of that too".
unless admins decide to defederate specifically from your website, like what beehaw did.
Ironic that I said to keep things short and then wrote a huge comment.
- Thanks for the long and thoughtful comment. This is really helpful. I will do my best to take on board your points over the next few days.

Impressive
Isn't there also something where a magazine mod/owner can add hashtags to be associated with their magazine, and then Microblog will fill with Mastodon posts hitting those hashtags?
- Yes that's right, it's the 'tags' menu in the 'magazine panel'.
  I was considering making a separate guide for mods and just linking it from here, because it's already pretty long.

TIL that the moderation logs are public. That was kind of surprise to look through.

can I ask here? but how do we see parents comment and/or shrink/expand comment tree in kbin? I can do it in lemmy, but lemmy is buggy as hell
also, is it possible to move create new post on the top? I don't want to scroll to the bottom of the page to post something

Good start. A quick summary of how to create a magazine, and how to access mod tools for that magazine is a good next step.
I'm aware that isn't most users, but the answers are pretty easy.
- Thanks! I was considering making a separate guide for mods and just linking it from here, because it's already pretty long.

Damn. Saved.
Thank you for this because I've been flailing a little bit. I've commented on some posts but I'm not always entirely sure where I am when it comes to the different instances.
(#lostredditorsinaction #whyiseverythinginGerman #itsOKIcanreadGerman #shitwasjustconfusing #confusingIEL)

I'm fairly new to kbin but will definitely give it a read
- Thanks! Let me know any feedback :)

My biggest issue with hopping over to the Fediverse was choosing an instance to sign up for. I did know that the point was decentralization so I picked one of the smaller ones, but not one so small that it’s probably run by one person who will shut it down in 3 months or by a person who will only have the instance up when they want to browse kbin. I used https://fedidb.org/software/kbin to check instance size. You might want to add choosing an instance to this guide as well.

Finally figured it out. It was a little confusing at first, especially since every app substitute has its own problems. Memmy app seems to be working the best for me, aside from a few bugs.
So far the experience has been better. “All” seems to have less negative threads, which is so refreshing. No more /r/Politics, /r/WhitePeopleTwitter or /r/Antiwork. I swear all those communities do is just post ragebait and spam depressing headlines.

Thanks for the guide, I'm still praying for an abilty to hide posts. Better yet, have them vanish when you upvote/boost them.

As an update from our previous convo. It looks like I am still receiving content from Feddit.de after blocking the domain
https://imgur.com/a/v9aZsJR

Is there an easy way to compile/aggregate selected subscriptions into a multireddit equivalent?
I saw a mention somewhere of adding magazines to 'racks' but no idea if that was a current/upcoming feature or just wishful thinking...
- No but it's a frequently requested functionality. I think it would be great :)

@Friend https://mas.to/@sjosjo/110589535586009725 This post mentioned that you can get rss feed from lemmy, you can also get rss feed from kbin in same way and not only magazine but users too. For Mastodon add .rss to end of user.

Isn't there already an app called kbin? It advertises itself at the bottom of kbin.social in mobile.

Very useful, thank you! I will share this with my friends :-)

41 comments