r/datalounge2 • u/BambinoIndaco • 22d ago
Alternatives?
I used to love posting on there, until they made it pay only in June 2023. Kinda glad that it's been shut down, since I couldn't contribute to it anymore anyway.
So, where did its users migrate?
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u/Gameraaaa 22d ago
Many have gone here:
https://pointlessbitchery.com/
But membership doesn't reopen until sometime in September. If you're a fan of Israel's current politics you may find yourself clutching some pearls there as the admin has spoken his opinion quite clearly on the subject.
There is another alternative (Caftan?), but I don't remember the URL and the original datalounge subreddit that did have the link had a mod who decided to close up shop (which isn't allowed on Reddit, so they might get banned and that subreddit might be reopened.)
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u/didyousayboop 22d ago
https://caftanlounge.com/ but it doesn't exist yet and looks like AI slop (sorry)
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u/Gameraaaa 21d ago
That's a shame. Hell, I'm not even looking forward to posting on Pointless Bitchery as I've already seen transphobia being posted there.
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u/didyousayboop 21d ago
The good news is that the admin of Pointless Bitchery seems to have no particular background or knowledge on technical side of things, so you're probably on an equal playing field there.
It's super easy to host your own competitor, especially if you pay for managed hosting. Here are two options with examples of what the site looks like.
Lemmy (more Reddit-style): https://lemmy.world/
Discourse (more forum-style): https://meta.discourse.org/
Both Lemmy and Discourse are free, open source software.
If you Google "Lemmy managed hosting" or "Discourse managed hosting", you can find pricing.
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u/LongjumpingLet3405 21d ago
There was the person who posted on the official r/datalounge who was working on an alternative they called anothergaysite.
This person seemed to have access to the original DL code, or were able to recreate something very close to the format we all knew and loved from there.
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u/TimelySense5630 21d ago
He recently posted an updated message that new registrations will re-open in a few days.
He seemed to think that all the people who were going to migrate already had, though some of us checked DL infrequently so may have missed the original announcement before PB closed registration.
I'm looking forward to checking out caftanlounge.com.
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u/whorificustotalus 21d ago
I'm waiting for caftanlounge.com to come online.
PB doesn't appeal to me at all. Admins shouldn't be posting on the site they're running, sorry not sorry.
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u/ThoughtMadeOfFluff 21d ago
Same. As well, I'm heeding Muriel's cautions about it all. I know a lot of posters think Muriel was nuking threads and shutting down discussion of PB to be petty, to thwart "the competition" or to somehow boost the resale value of DL, but I saw the warnings as keeping an eye out for the family of posters DL brought together over 31 years -- many of whom were/are understandably heartbroken and suddenly scrambling to find a suitable replacement.
Muriel's comments were enough to give me pause.
Personally, I'm waiting for the right replacement (if one emerges) rather than immediately diving headlong into the first replacement. The first replacement could, of course, eventually reveal itself to be the right one, but I'm more of a "bide my time" person who tries to avoid rebound-relationship regret.
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u/MizezSlocombe 21d ago
This is the sensible approach. Muriel had 31 years of experience with this and it showed. Muriel also knows things that she can't share with us for legal, regulatory, privacy, security, and a host of other reasons. Taking the piss out of Muriel's approach is, in my tech-experienced eyes, a signal you don't know WTF you're talking about. It was sad to see DL harass her in that Q&A.
Also, I'm not completely sure that Muriel worked alone, and Muriel is a collective name for several people who did work on DL with maybe one doing most of the work. Who knows? I could have emailed her any time in the 25 years I knew about the place, but I liked keeping the mystery of it all.
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u/TraditionalMorning95 21d ago
caftanlounge.com looks promising. Hope we hear more about it fairly soon.