• Re: Mastodon (and the fediverse)

    From SpallsHurgenson (NG)@3:633/10 to All on Fri Jun 5 16:47:00 2026

    "Kerr-Mudd, John" <admin@127.0.0.1> posted:



    What's wanted is a platform with a threaded heirarchal message
    system^w^w^w^w an exact clone of Usenet that's fast and has lots of intelligent traffic, that attracts well behaved folk, yet keeps out the
    troll idiots.
    One can dream.


    If I can add to that: text only too. No emoji, no images. Keep it about
    the message, not the fluff.

    (I'm on the fence with stuff like text-effects like bold and italics. We
    can discuss hyperlinking. ;-)

    Or is that too old-school?


    (More importantly though: the ideal system would have to be decentralized. Usenet wouldn't survived as long as it did if it were dependent on a single provider.)

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Lawrence D?Oliveiro@3:633/10 to All on Fri Jun 5 23:57:33 2026
    On Fri, 05 Jun 2026 16:47:00 GMT, SpallsHurgenson(NG) wrote:

    If I can add to that: text only too. No emoji, no images. Keep it
    about the message, not the fluff.

    No ASCII art? Only that?s been part of Usenet since practically the
    beginning ...

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From The True Melissa@3:633/10 to All on Sat Jun 6 07:07:56 2026
    Verily, in article <10vvnpd$1gkrk$1@dont-email.me>, did ldo@nz.invalid
    deliver unto us this message:

    On Fri, 05 Jun 2026 16:47:00 GMT, SpallsHurgenson(NG) wrote:

    If I can add to that: text only too. No emoji, no images. Keep it
    about the message, not the fluff.

    No ASCII art? Only that?s been part of Usenet since practically the
    beginning ...

    ASCII art can go anywhere ASCII can go. That should be fine.

    --
    The True Melissa - Canal Winchester - Ohio
    United States of America - North America - Earth
    Solar System - Milky Way - Local Group
    Virgo Cluster - Laniakea Supercluster - Cosmos

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Jonathan Lamothe@3:633/10 to All on Sat Jun 6 14:56:46 2026
    SpallsHurgenson(NG) <user14325@newsgrouper.org.invalid> writes:

    "Kerr-Mudd, John" <admin@127.0.0.1> posted:



    What's wanted is a platform with a threaded heirarchal message
    system^w^w^w^w an exact clone of Usenet that's fast and has lots of
    intelligent traffic, that attracts well behaved folk, yet keeps out the
    troll idiots.
    One can dream.


    If I can add to that: text only too. No emoji, no images. Keep it about
    the message, not the fluff.

    (I'm on the fence with stuff like text-effects like bold and italics. We
    can discuss hyperlinking. ;-)

    Or is that too old-school?


    (More importantly though: the ideal system would have to be decentralized. Usenet wouldn't survived as long as it did if it were dependent on a single provider.)

    I would push back slightly on the no emoji thing, not because I feel any particular way about emoji themselves, but if you want this system to be
    able to serve non English-speaking users, Unicode support would be the
    best (though admittedly imperfect) tool we've currently got for that
    purpose.

    --
    Regards,
    Jonathan Lamothe
    https://jlamothe.net - PGP: 9CF2CE03EBF08E8C8B66C3660198463E3CF3FFD1
    I ? Unicode

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Jonathan Lamothe@3:633/10 to All on Sat Jun 6 14:59:05 2026
    The True Melissa <thetruemelissa@gmail.com> writes:

    Verily, in article <10vvnpd$1gkrk$1@dont-email.me>, did ldo@nz.invalid deliver unto us this message:

    On Fri, 05 Jun 2026 16:47:00 GMT, SpallsHurgenson(NG) wrote:

    If I can add to that: text only too. No emoji, no images. Keep it
    about the message, not the fluff.

    No ASCII art? Only that?s been part of Usenet since practically the
    beginning ...

    ASCII art can go anywhere ASCII can go. That should be fine.

    Unless it's being wiewed with a *shudders* variable width font.

    --
    Regards,
    Jonathan Lamothe
    https://jlamothe.net - PGP: 9CF2CE03EBF08E8C8B66C3660198463E3CF3FFD1
    I ? Unicode

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Lawrence D?Oliveiro@3:633/10 to All on Sat Jun 6 21:16:40 2026
    On Sat, 6 Jun 2026 07:07:56 -0400, The True Melissa wrote:

    Verily, in article <10vvnpd$1gkrk$1@dont-email.me>, did
    ldo@nz.invalid deliver unto us this message:

    On Fri, 05 Jun 2026 16:47:00 GMT, SpallsHurgenson(NG) wrote:

    If I can add to that: text only too. No emoji, no images. Keep it
    about the message, not the fluff.

    No ASCII art? Only that?s been part of Usenet since practically the
    beginning ...

    ASCII art can go anywhere ASCII can go. That should be fine.

    Then you have to ask, why not simply allow Unicode?

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Nuno Silva@3:633/10 to All on Sun Jun 7 00:11:37 2026
    On 2026-06-06, Jonathan Lamothe wrote:

    SpallsHurgenson(NG) <user14325@newsgrouper.org.invalid> writes:

    "Kerr-Mudd, John" <admin@127.0.0.1> posted:



    What's wanted is a platform with a threaded heirarchal message
    system^w^w^w^w an exact clone of Usenet that's fast and has lots of
    intelligent traffic, that attracts well behaved folk, yet keeps out the
    troll idiots.
    One can dream.


    If I can add to that: text only too. No emoji, no images. Keep it about
    the message, not the fluff.

    (I'm on the fence with stuff like text-effects like bold and italics. We
    can discuss hyperlinking. ;-)

    Or is that too old-school?


    (More importantly though: the ideal system would have to be decentralized. >> Usenet wouldn't survived as long as it did if it were dependent on a single >> provider.)

    I would push back slightly on the no emoji thing, not because I feel any particular way about emoji themselves, but if you want this system to be
    able to serve non English-speaking users, Unicode support would be the
    best (though admittedly imperfect) tool we've currently got for that
    purpose.

    Emojis are still an accessibility problem. Having them handled
    via UCS *should* be good from a point of view of ensuring some
    consistency and well-defined meaning, that could be exploited to either
    show these as text or provide descriptions somehow. But the usual
    approach of cramming a bunch of stuff in a single glyph *is* a huge
    downgrade compared to ASCII smileys and the like.

    ... but don't forget this: there are glyphs in wide use that aren't
    really consistent or adequate, there's widespread usage of a "no 18"
    sign with the meaning and name of "no one under eighteen" (0x1F51E) -
    which was even submitted to UCS with the bogus "no 18" rendering some
    fonts use.

    I've been told this is because the source fonts did not have room for
    more [1], which both points to possible issues regarding what is shown
    v. the meaning even with UCS, and to the problem of readability and accessibility itself.

    [1] <https://mastodon.social/@CharlotteBuff/112806149720738139> - which
    is in a thread about another issue with sign coverage in UCS, for some
    reason there are (or at least that was the case when the posts were
    made?) a bunch of prohibition signs... but not C3a.

    But I digress: the point I wanted to make is that emojis in general end
    up being a downgrade IMHO, but that I'd hope at least UCS or, in
    image-based add-ons to systems like Mastodon, proper metadata, would
    make it possible to provide better readability, and possibly fully ASCII replacements.

    At least for stuff close enough to ASCII, like the UCS equivalent of
    Microsoft Dumb Quotes? and some mathematical signs, it's even possible
    to add //TRANSLIT to the iconv(1) encoding specification to get
    e.g. ASCII or latin1 versions. But of course this isn't any good for
    emojis. I merely mean something similar should be, in theory, possible.

    I have some Gnus settings to convert some of the glyphs of the kind
    //TRANSLIT can handle to something more capable of being displayed in a
    latin1 terminal, I should check if that could be useful for emojis.

    --
    Nuno Silva

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Nuno Silva@3:633/10 to All on Sun Jun 7 00:23:59 2026
    On 2026-06-06, Lawrence D?Oliveiro wrote:

    On Sat, 6 Jun 2026 07:07:56 -0400, The True Melissa wrote:

    Verily, in article <10vvnpd$1gkrk$1@dont-email.me>, did
    ldo@nz.invalid deliver unto us this message:

    On Fri, 05 Jun 2026 16:47:00 GMT, SpallsHurgenson(NG) wrote:

    If I can add to that: text only too. No emoji, no images. Keep it
    about the message, not the fluff.

    No ASCII art? Only that?s been part of Usenet since practically the
    beginning ...

    ASCII art can go anywhere ASCII can go. That should be fine.

    Then you have to ask, why not simply allow Unicode?

    Not allowing unicode *at all* would be a mistake, given that gives a
    good solution to handle so many languages, even if considering just the
    ones revolving around the latin alphabet! One could perhaps talk about
    limiting emoji usage, and then there's overuse of glyphs other than
    emojis, like not using apostrophes (which are ASCII-compatible) and
    instead using ASCII-incompatible glyphs that likely don't even have the
    same meaning :-P

    --
    Nuno Silva

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Charlie Gibbs@3:633/10 to All on Sun Jun 7 00:17:14 2026
    On 2026-06-06, Nuno Silva <nunojsilva@invalid.invalid> wrote:

    Emojis are still an accessibility problem. Having them handled
    via UCS *should* be good from a point of view of ensuring some
    consistency and well-defined meaning, that could be exploited to either
    show these as text or provide descriptions somehow. But the usual
    approach of cramming a bunch of stuff in a single glyph *is* a huge
    downgrade compared to ASCII smileys and the like.

    This whole thing is becoming a tempest in a teapot. People were
    communicating with text for centuries before emojis were invented.

    I know, I know, Pandora's box has been opened and a bunch of
    emojis have come flying out. But remember that the last thing
    in the box was hope.

    --
    /~\ Charlie Gibbs | Growth for the sake of
    \ / <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> | growth is the ideology
    X I'm really at ac.dekanfrus | of the cancer cell.
    / \ if you read it the right way. | -- Edward Abbey

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Lawrence D?Oliveiro@3:633/10 to All on Sun Jun 7 02:33:03 2026
    On Sun, 07 Jun 2026 00:17:14 GMT, Charlie Gibbs wrote:

    People were communicating with text for centuries before emojis were invented.

    What were these <https://www.reddit.com/r/linguistics/comments/kn60r/infographic_26_prehistoric_cave_symbols_used/>,
    do you think?

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Daniel Cerqueira@3:633/10 to All on Sun Jun 7 07:05:53 2026
    Nuno Silva <nunojsilva@invalid.invalid> writes:

    [...]

    I have some Gnus settings to convert some of the glyphs of the kind //TRANSLIT can handle to something more capable of being displayed in a latin1 terminal, I should check if that could be useful for emojis.
    I am interested in this functionality, if it works with emojis. Please
    Nuno, do email me if this works with emojis, or do write an article
    about it (it can be in the pt.* hierarchy).
    The best thing I have so far, is using GNU Emacs' M-x describe-char for
    knowing what an emoji means. Which takes a lot of effort: setting the
    point on the emoji, running that command, changing buffer, scrolling the
    buffer down to read the description of the emoji, kill the current
    buffer and get back to the previous buffer, and continue reading... Too
    much.
    --
    The pioneers of a warless world are the youth that
    refuse military service. ~ Albert Einstein


    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Lawrence D?Oliveiro@3:633/10 to All on Sun Jun 7 08:04:57 2026
    On Sun, 07 Jun 2026 07:05:53 +0100, Daniel Cerqueira wrote:

    The best thing I have so far, is using GNU Emacs' M-x describe-char
    for knowing what an emoji means.

    This command <https://manpages.debian.org/unicode(1)> will accept an
    argument in various formats, including copying and pasting a literal
    character.

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Jonathan Lamothe@3:633/10 to All on Sun Jun 7 09:25:19 2026
    Lawrence D?Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> writes:

    On Sun, 07 Jun 2026 00:17:14 GMT, Charlie Gibbs wrote:

    People were communicating with text for centuries before emojis were
    invented.

    What were these <https://www.reddit.com/r/linguistics/comments/kn60r/infographic_26_prehistoric_cave_symbols_used/>,
    do you think?

    I don't know. Reddit doesn't like my VPN, apparently.

    --
    Regards,
    Jonathan Lamothe
    https://jlamothe.net - PGP: 9CF2CE03EBF08E8C8B66C3660198463E3CF3FFD1

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Jonathan Lamothe@3:633/10 to All on Sun Jun 7 09:28:52 2026
    Nuno Silva <nunojsilva@invalid.invalid> writes:

    On 2026-06-06, Lawrence D?Oliveiro wrote:

    On Sat, 6 Jun 2026 07:07:56 -0400, The True Melissa wrote:

    Verily, in article <10vvnpd$1gkrk$1@dont-email.me>, did
    ldo@nz.invalid deliver unto us this message:

    On Fri, 05 Jun 2026 16:47:00 GMT, SpallsHurgenson(NG) wrote:

    If I can add to that: text only too. No emoji, no images. Keep it
    about the message, not the fluff.

    No ASCII art? Only that?s been part of Usenet since practically the
    beginning ...

    ASCII art can go anywhere ASCII can go. That should be fine.

    Then you have to ask, why not simply allow Unicode?

    Not allowing unicode *at all* would be a mistake, given that gives a
    good solution to handle so many languages, even if considering just the
    ones revolving around the latin alphabet! One could perhaps talk about limiting emoji usage, and then there's overuse of glyphs other than
    emojis, like not using apostrophes (which are ASCII-compatible) and
    instead using ASCII-incompatible glyphs that likely don't even have the
    same meaning :-P

    I`ve seen people mess up apostrophes with plain old ASCII too. ;)

    --
    Regards,
    Jonathan Lamothe
    https://jlamothe.net - PGP: 9CF2CE03EBF08E8C8B66C3660198463E3CF3FFD1
    I ? Unicode

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Nuno Silva@3:633/10 to All on Sun Jun 7 16:15:40 2026
    On 2026-06-07, Jonathan Lamothe wrote:

    Nuno Silva <nunojsilva@invalid.invalid> writes:

    On 2026-06-06, Lawrence D?Oliveiro wrote:

    On Sat, 6 Jun 2026 07:07:56 -0400, The True Melissa wrote:

    Verily, in article <10vvnpd$1gkrk$1@dont-email.me>, did
    ldo@nz.invalid deliver unto us this message:

    On Fri, 05 Jun 2026 16:47:00 GMT, SpallsHurgenson(NG) wrote:

    If I can add to that: text only too. No emoji, no images. Keep it
    about the message, not the fluff.

    No ASCII art? Only that?s been part of Usenet since practically the
    beginning ...

    ASCII art can go anywhere ASCII can go. That should be fine.

    Then you have to ask, why not simply allow Unicode?

    Not allowing unicode *at all* would be a mistake, given that gives a
    good solution to handle so many languages, even if considering just the
    ones revolving around the latin alphabet! One could perhaps talk about
    limiting emoji usage, and then there's overuse of glyphs other than
    emojis, like not using apostrophes (which are ASCII-compatible) and
    instead using ASCII-incompatible glyphs that likely don't even have the
    same meaning :-P

    I`ve seen people mess up apostrophes with plain old ASCII too. ;)

    ISWYDT :-)

    --
    Nuno Silva

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From The True Melissa@3:633/10 to All on Sun Jun 7 12:24:04 2026
    Verily, in article <1102l8v$287og$1@dont-email.me>, did ldo@nz.invalid
    deliver unto us this message:

    On Sun, 07 Jun 2026 00:17:14 GMT, Charlie Gibbs wrote:

    People were communicating with text for centuries before emojis were invented.

    What were these <https://www.reddit.com/r/linguistics/comments/kn60r/infographic_26_prehistoric_cave_symbols_used/>,
    do you think?

    Prehistory is one of my interests. These were likely tribal markings.

    The "worldwide" is a bit misleading. Each sign is found only in some
    areas. It's not as if the same 26 signs were in use all over the world,
    but local areas did develop codes.

    This probably isn't "writing" in quite the sense we think of it, because
    the sign probably didn't represent a word. Instead, it mostly likely represented the tribe directly, as a separate symbol.

    The very oldest cave markings are handprints, either positive or
    negative, on the wall. The intended message was probably "Ogg was here."


    --
    The True Melissa - Canal Winchester - Ohio
    United States of America - North America - Earth
    Solar System - Milky Way - Local Group
    Virgo Cluster - Laniakea Supercluster - Cosmos

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Dennis Boone@3:633/10 to All on Sun Jun 7 16:42:40 2026
    I`ve seen people mess up apostrophes with plain old ASCII too. ;)

    ITYM "I`ve seen people mess up apostrophe's with plain old ASCII too.".

    De

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Root Badger@3:633/10 to All on Sun Jun 7 18:43:54 2026
    On 2026-06-05, Kerr-Mudd, John <admin@127.0.0.1> wrote:
    On Fri, 5 Jun 2026 09:03:53 -0000 (UTC)
    gmc@metro.cx (Koen Martens) wrote:

    Nuno Silva <nunojsilva@invalid.invalid> wrote:
    That besides the point that even when displaying the full thread,
    Mastodon's official UIs still don't display it as a thread, with
    nesting. As an example http://threadtree.xyz does this but leaves out
    attachments. I guess this one goes into the "wants to imitate twitter"
    bucket?

    I think so, but it just makes for poor interaction imho.

    Brutaldon, first I hear about that one. Something to check out!

    Might even enable browsing mastodon on low-bandwidth and/or high-latency >> > connections. Most of the troubles I've had with it have been because of
    the instance itself, not because of brutaldon.

    Ah, it's a web front-end for regular mastodon I see now. That still
    doesn't take away my major beef with mastodon: it's a bloated piece
    of ruby software that guzzles resources like it's no-one's business.

    Not that friendica is particularly light though. Which is why I'm
    intending to give snac and gotosocial a try. They are being advertised
    as light-weight, so if their user experience is anywhere near decent it
    might be interesting to switch over.

    []

    What's wanted is a platform with a threaded heirarchal message
    system^w^w^w^w an exact clone of Usenet that's fast and has lots of intelligent traffic, that attracts well behaved folk, yet keeps out the
    troll idiots.
    One can dream.
    , --
    Bah, and indeed Humbug.

    I have been working on RootBadger www.rootbadger.com. it is a
    usenetstyle discussion board.

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Lawrence D?Oliveiro@3:633/10 to All on Sun Jun 7 23:11:37 2026
    On Sun, 07 Jun 2026 16:42:40 +0000, Dennis Boone wrote:

    I`ve seen people mess up apostrophes with plain old ASCII too. ;)

    ITYM "I`ve seen people mess up apostrophe's with plain old ASCII too.".

    <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry%27s_law>

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Nuno Silva@3:633/10 to All on Mon Jun 8 00:58:51 2026
    On 2026-06-08, Lawrence D?Oliveiro wrote:

    On Sun, 07 Jun 2026 16:42:40 +0000, Dennis Boone wrote:

    I`ve seen people mess up apostrophes with plain old ASCII too. ;)

    ITYM "I`ve seen people mess up apostrophe's with plain old ASCII too.".

    <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry%27s_law>

    ITYM <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry%60s_law>

    --
    Nuno Silva

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Charlie Gibbs@3:633/10 to All on Mon Jun 8 00:21:24 2026
    On 2026-06-07, Nuno Silva <nunojsilva@invalid.invalid> wrote:

    On 2026-06-08, Lawrence D?Oliveiro wrote:

    On Sun, 07 Jun 2026 16:42:40 +0000, Dennis Boone wrote:

    I`ve seen people mess up apostrophes with plain old ASCII too. ;)

    ITYM "I`ve seen people mess up apostrophe's with plain old ASCII too.".

    <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry%27s_law>

    ITYM <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry%60s_law>

    No, no - backticks are out of style. It should be

    <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry$(s_law)>

    --
    /~\ Charlie Gibbs | No artificial
    \ / <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> | intelligence was
    X I'm really at ac.dekanfrus | used in the creation
    / \ if you read it the right way. | of this post.

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.15
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)