@ercanbrack Actually it could have arrived at Friendica from Diaspora (where I made the original post) with "fancy" stuff added. I have been testing "how" to best use the Fediverse services, and have lately been doing original sharing from Diaspora.

That original post is simultaneously posted to Twitter. It also gets picked up by Friendica and re-posted (as opposed to re-shared) as an original post by my Friendica user. Finally, that Friendica post gets re-shared on Pleroma.

I only have a few contacts on more than one of those services, but am aiming to clean it up further. The reason I've been using them all is due to (obviously testing, but also) them having slightly different people on the platforms, and (quite importantly), they run at "different speed". My pleroma flow is the fastest. I could easily miss good readable (often longer than a "Great lunch I just had!") posts on it as they simply move off the screen too fast.

That fast movement can be mitigated by adding people (such as yourself @FailForward ) either to "lists" or as a contact in Friendica too. Then I get the more readable/longer content in a separate stream.

Pleroma doesn't support "lists" in its default front-end, so only when I am using either the Mastodon front-end or Soapbox (a Pleroma "theme") can I even see the "lists" functionality.

However, I like the fact that Friendica "sits in the middle" of the Fediverse, and is compatible with pretty much all the other services. Perhaps I should contemplate doing my original posts in Friendica instead. Hmm...

The downside, for me, with Friendica is that posts are using BBCode (which I have to look up every time I use) compared to Diaspora which uses Markdown (which I know already, and which I find neater/faster).

@FailForward @ercanbrack From quick initial testing I'm learning that links from New York Times appear to have a placeholder for the image that becomes "invisible" when I re-post on Friendica. Articles shared from Economist comes out fine.

What was even weirder was that the posts looked alright regardless of where they originated, but when I posted the same link from "the other" network (as twin post, for testing) both twins lose their image. Must have something to do with naming, or meta tag confusion or something.

I have now turned off the "auto re-post" from Diaspora, if nothing else because the posts shared originally from Friendica (and not Diaspora) came out good on all platforms.

@hellquist

re friendica & markdown: I looked into it and apparently there is an addon for friendica enabling Markdown, so if you self-host, that would be an option. For public services it seems the only way to find out is to create an account.

@ercanbrack

@hellquist

I explored the HTML stripping and rendering issue and concluded that it's completely out of control of the original poster. There are at least 3 places where rendering changes can happen:

1. your home instance when you post can strip rich text formatting (it certainly does convert markdown or whatever you use to html which is the raw ActivityPub transport, c.f., https://github.com/tootsuite/mastodon/issues/11115)
2. when the status/post is federated, the receiving instance can strip any rich formatting
3. even when the formatting survives all that, the end-user client can choose to render or strip: Web ap vs. FediLab vs. Tusky.

In between these 3 there's plenty what can go wrong. For me, the lesson learned is that when communicating to others, go as plain as possible - make no assumptions on client rendering (e.g., no embedded links). When just noting for self to display on your timeline/wall, do whatever you like.

For comparison how just different Mastodon instances (not speaking of completely different platforms) display the same toot:
- https://qoto.org/@FailForward/105645352449165283
- https://mstdn.social/@calculsoberic?max_id=105646478895847045 <-- search for the same boosted toot in the timeline

BTW, a trick to discover how a toot would look at a different instance, look for boosts or responses from that instance and then browse the display at their timeline.

@ercanbrack

@ercanbrack Yes @FailForward , I am indeed leaning towards self-hosting a Friendica instance. The (public) one I'm on appears to timeout quite often when stressed. Also the one I'm on have a really tight limit for image uploads etc. Couldn't even upload my "regular" profile image which I use on all other services (for consistency and recognition) but had to use an extra lo-fi version of it.

Those things combined with a discussion I had earlier when comparing the platforms I was informed of other benefits of Friendica compared to both Pleroma and Diaspora, such as being able to upload images (on my own instance then) and being able to find that image for usage in other posts, or link it to other platforms etc. This, along with flexible search, filtering and grouping makes it appear quite promising to try and work out better.

As I am trying to "break free" from the "big tech" services I've been looking at how close, functionality wise, I can get to Facebook, Twitter etc.

To me, for my needs, I currently use Pleroma as "a new Twitter" (but I still use Twitter a bit) whereas Friendica and Diaspora both were suggested (on various web sites) as Facebook-like. I find that Diaspora is less flexible than Friendica, which is why I'm leaning towards having an instance of my own, truly living the federated life of ultimate federation (we all each have our own and with complete control over my content).

I also use Pleroma to find new people to follow at all, and I first add them over there. When I notice some are posting things with more readability I do the "slow-down" thing previously explained (lists and/or Friendica).

I also like that Friendica appears to live up to its name of being friendly and inclusive to the others (users and services). Pleroma (and Mastodon) doesn't feel like they are made to write longer things on, if nothing else as I find the stamp-sized input window to be off-putting for longer text. :)

@hellquist @FailForward It’s interesting that you mention BBCode and Markdown. Everything that I see in my Mastodon clients seems to be just basic text. What specifically are you doing to your text in your posts? ie Bold, Italics, etc?

@hellquist @FailForward Ha! It appears that had I waited a bit longer and read through the thread completely, I would have learned the answer as to why I may not be seeing the markup. I agree with @FailForward—for consistency across the Fediverse plain text (or as basic as possible) may be the key, due to the differences in the countless clients and front ends.

@ercanbrack

🙂 Try to use Mastodon web interface and click either on my profile, or click on the timestamp of this toot (top right corner - it's the toot age).

# What you will see

## Will probably surprise you

1. but **maybe** not _too much_
2. still can be an ~~interesting~~ experience

Either way, you'll see different stuff than you are used to.

| a | b | c | d | e |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| xxx | | **uuu** | | |
| | rr | | | |

and maybe even something else

<img src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c0/Raster_graphic_fish_40X46squares_hdtv-example.png/675px-Raster_graphic_fish_40X46squares_hdtv-example.png" width="100%"/>

Like it?

If you look at this via some app, most likely **half** is plain _text_ and the rest is scrambled.

@hellquist

@ercanbrack

Here's a comparison of what you experience and what I experience on Mastodon. Very different...

@hellquist

@ercanbrack

And here's what you see in FediLab (I uninstalled Tusky already)

@hellquist

@FailForward @hellquist Quite nice indeed! What is the difference?

@ercanbrack

I just realised it strips even the `img` tag. That sucks. So the only reliable way to include images is to upload them as attachments. But that is stupid, as often they would be from 3rd party websites... Well, I am misusing Mastodon here at qoto obviously...

@hellquist

@hellquist

While we are at this, maybe you can show me how were the different renderings of the boosted friendica post you sent yesterday about northern England. Here's how I experience it at QOTO. I also saw how it looks natively at Friendica (basically the same). Could you perhaps upload a screenshot how it looks like at usual Mastodon instances (or Pleroma)?

@ercanbrack

@FailForward @ercanbrack It looks really weird on Pleroma for sure.

@ercanbrack @FailForward

I'm having all kinds of issues trying to upload the screenshots on this Friendica instance, but this is what it looks like on the mastodon front-end of Pleroma (which is a mod of the "real" Mastodon front-end).

@ercanbrack @FailForward

And this is what it looks like if I use the Soapbox frontend for Pleroma. Quite different as well. Notice how the profile pic of the original poster takes the top spot, as opposed to the actual photo that was part of the article.

@hellquist

This version is quite acceptable.

@ercanbrack

@ercanbrack @FailForward It should be noted (again) that the original post came from Diaspora and was re-shared there, which in turn made it in to a "native" Friendica post (but, one can assume) already had been formatted then. I didn't re-share it on Pleroma, but as I follow myself everywhere I can (sounds weird but hey) that was my view of that very post in the 3 different front-ends I have for Pleroma.

@hellquist

Well, it's clear what is going on. The post is federated in its raw HTML form. The mess of the display which happens then is clearly screw-ups of the individual front-ends which themselves chose to either strip or not the HTML tags before sending it to the browser. Also, some clients/front-ends obviously "overdo" in that they add a thumbnail card, or additional profile picture, or the attached image. This makes sense when you expect that east status/post will be plaintext. If it's not, you either should not touch it, or completely strip it.

My conclusion from this is that I absolutely cannot rely on how my posts will be rendered to others. Sometimes also essential information is stripped, e.g., links included via `a` tag or images included via `img` tag - very bad.

To be on the safe side - if you want a post to be widely shared, it should stick to the original Mastodon plaintext format.

@ercanbrack

@hellquist

In other words, what we have here is a classic FOSS issue: backend architecture and protocols - great. Front-end: semi-fail. Like taking it to 85% of the job, where the remaining 15% are so obvious that it sends casual end-users crying, while techies like most of us just shrug, accept the damage and move on.

@ercanbrack

@ercanbrack @FailForward Yes, it does cause an issue though: I can't really recommend it to my "normal" (non-geek) friends as replacement of big tech services, unless they have a very specific and limited use case, which is rarely the case when they come from the services I would like them to move away from, whilst wishing for them to have a niggle-free experience.

Personally I'm thinking "right, I could of course start my own instance of Friendica, and get it all set-up right. I could probably even create a front-end for Pleroma that avoids a few of the things we've mentioned here" but then that would only apply to me and my social presence, not the one of my friends.

So then I start thinking "should I perhaps set my instance up for just a few friends?" before I realise that I a) have no wish to be an admin for others and their services and b) if my stuff goes down for whatever reason, that is fine. I'm not so sure I would be happy if I was a user in such a set-up though. So no. I don't want to host services for others. Back to square 1. :)

@hellquist @FailForward Yep. Sadly...

@hellquist

I start to think about Fediverse not as platforms (Mastodon, Friendica, etc.), but rather in terms of instances. Many instances are heavily customised. Me joining qoto.org gives me a completely different experience than you joining friendica, or mastodon.online, or whatever else. In effect, my experience with rich text formatting, etc. at qoto.org is somewhat similar to what you'd get on friendica plain. But with those fast timelines... I imagine other platforms (like Pleroma, or glitch-soc) are modified towards other mixture and weighing of the same ingredients in a slightly different outcome.

So maybe the solution for your friends is this:
- let them join an instance which you recommend (if you have any power over that) to make sure than among your group you will share good experience and tech features.
- of course outside that single platform it's not going to be great, but those are those other people.
- so there will be some frustration, but most of it will be kept outside your circle of friends/family.

Something like that...

@ercanbrack

@ercanbrack @FailForward yes. I will need to think about the "how" a bit more. Probably experiment and test some more. Not that I actually mind experimenting, I do that for things that are ranging from "very useful" to "not-at-all useful". Sometimes the journey itself is part of the goal eh? :)

@hellquist @FailForward Agreed! I’ve researched a lot, and I think the Fediverse is the future. I just have to figure out how best to use it, so that I can recommend it to friends in a way that will offer the best experience possible. 🙂

@FailForward @hellquist Agreed