Hello everyone, benevolent overlord #376465 here!

This wonderful little community of ours has grown a lot since it was started by AKittyCat and gloomchen back in June when Reddit chose to increase its decade-long process of going to hell at Mach 3.

That being said no one can predict the future. At the time kbin seemed like an amazing alternative to Lemmy. More features, better interface, improved functionality with Mastodon, etc etc. The reality now 8-9 months later is that kbin is falling drastically behind. I’m sure everyone has noticed the random 500 errors, the errors when upvoting and/or boosting, the occasional downtime, etc etc. Development seems to have stalled out. Ernest (kbin’s dev) has had personal issues (which I won’t rag on him for letting get in the way, real life comes before this dumb-ass Internet shit 10 times out of 10) but regardless, an absent dev (especially when there’s only one) does not make for a good software experience.

But…this is not just my community: It’s yours. So it’s time for everyone’s favourite activity: Sounding off in the comments!

As things stand we have two basic options:

A: Ride the wave, stay on kbin and deal with it cause life sucks while hoping Ernest comes back.
B: Jump ship and move to another instance with whatever turbulence it could cause.

For A, well nothing changes. Things might get better? Things might get worse? Who knows, roll a die.

For B, we’d be starting fresh with (theoretically) fewer problems, but depending where we go would mean we could lose some features (like if we went to Lemmy, no more microblog and Mastodon integration).

I have set up a SQ backup community a day ago, located on Lemmy.zip (https://lemmy.zip/c/squaredcircle) as it’s Federation is fairly wide open which should prevent issues (and from my own experience they don’t have much if any issues error-wise like we do here) tho I am not opposed to other instances should people suggest em and they look better (though I love how the .zip community already has 31 subscribers for no reason besides existing lmao).

I’ll make two comments below to keep the responses kinda-sorted, and this poll will remain up until approx. March 18th to give time for visibility.

Edit: Our current backup (and possible new home) which I linked above (and again, here) has been unlocked for posting given the heavy weekend we’re coming to here, and with kbin’s issues seemingly increasing today.

  • Neon_Carnivore@kbin.social
    3·
    8 months ago

    I think the decision falls heaviest on our fellow kbin.social users. Since moving will also likely require them to make new accounts elsewhere to ensure federation issues are resolved. From my own observation, the fedio magazine will be the most familiar option and therefore easiest to transition to.

    @TellumSiege I know commenting has been a pain for you but I’d really like you to weigh in on this. AKittyCat may have been our founder, and Geek may be the admin, but you’re the one that really got the ball rolling and I think it’s safe to say none of us would be here without you. Hell, when AKittyCat announced that you and I both were the new mods, I thought I was being pranked.

    • TellumSiege@kbin.social
      3·
      8 months ago

      I’m Natalie Imbruglia levels of torn on this. I haven’t had much time to research the alternative sites but I’d trust you guys to pick the best one.

      I’d love to know how @Montagge and @Travon333 feel. They’ve been just as big a part of this as anyone. If they didn’t show up to comment in the discussion threads then I probably would’ve hightailed it out of here long ago lol

      • Neon_Carnivore@kbin.social
        3·
        8 months ago

        I just now got the notification that you replied to my comment.

        I just want to let you, and all our other wrestlefriends, know that they are appreciated.

      • GeekFTW@kbin.socialOP
        3·
        8 months ago

        Montagge’s good for whatever, Travon hasn’t popped by yet so waiting on them too.

        Also…

        I’m Natalie Imbruglia levels of torn on this.

        I never want gold to be a thing here but I’d give you gold for that reference lmao.