Suggestion: Thread Entanglement, or automatic merging of duplicate threads

See the quick inspect-element mockup I put together for an example. I'm bad at design, but I think it gets the point across. Current implementation on left, suggested on right. Also, I'm using Kbin Enhancement Suite for the modifications to instance names, but I think they are even more useful for this demonstration.

How it could work: If the same link is submitted across multiple communities in your current view (subscribed, favorites, all, etc) within a certain time period (probably 24 hours), then have them automatically group themselves into the same box, along with a brief list of the duplicate threads and instances. Use whichever of the threads has the highest score as the one to fill the title and thumbnail for the grouped thread.

I didn't make a mockup for this, but when clicking the thread, it could then import the comments from each of the grouped instances. Options on the sidebar could show you each of the instances whose comments are being shown on that page, along with an option to filter them out of your current feed, and options to add your votes to each instance's thread.

EDIT: To add, as I'm seeing some confusion in the comments: I'm envisioning this as a strictly user-side bundling of threads. This would only bundle threads as they are displayed to the user in their own feed based on communities you're subscribed to. So if the same link were to be posted to 5 different communities you subscribe to, when you view the feed, you'll see those 5 links all bundled together. Though perhaps an option could also include seeing non-subscribed duplicates, as well.

35 comments

There was different subreddits for the same topic too and people didn't want those merged, communities with the same name on different instances aren't necessarily the same community overall and might not want this at all.
- Well said. This feature will cause more harm than it is worth.
  
  Yeah I think I agree even though I like it. Joey for Reddit did this and I liked it. Increased the unique posts I saw. Should be an app/feed option rather than a default.
Might have to play with this idea in the Artemis app 👀
- oh hi
  
  there's a couple issues to consider with this that come to mind immediately
  
  large difference in subscriber count, and intentionality of posting to a smaller community, not wanting larger traffic (e.g. /m/TrueTrueTrueTrueWorldNews doesn't want the traffic from /m/AnimeTitties or /m/WorldNews or whatever the main one is called)
  
  the same link can be posted to different communities for drastically different reasons, e.g. a headline "Alot of new fantasy releases this summer" gets posted to /m/alot for the grammar mistake, /m/fantasy for book reviews, and /m/journalism for critiquing the writing. All three could be similar size (I can only pretend /m/alot is this popular) but no one wants to see grammar purists on /m/fantasy, and no one on /m/journalism actually cares about the book recs themselves, just the article format
  
  edit wow /r/ is a deeply ingrained muscle memory
  
  Great points! Maybe not so much merging into a single thread then. Maybe a tab view that lets you swipe between other posts of the link. Could have the header show the community info and rules. Could help users find new communities. Just spitballimg tho, lots to think about here 😜
  
  Maybe you could make it so that people/communities can opt out of it. Maybe add a hashtag to comments made on merged threads?
- Oh please don’t. I really don’t want threads from communities I’m not explicitly choosing to follow merged. Again, I’m here instead of Reddit because I want more control over what I do and do not see.
  
  Features like this or the “discovery” feed showing recommended posts are the opposite of the experience I want.
  
  If I didn’t explicitly seek out the community and subscribe to it, I don’t want to see it. I don’t care if there are multiple posts on the same article or topic - I’ll find the community I want to subscribe to and if I’m that interested in the topic I’ll go search for it myself.
  
  If you feel like you must address this the “see other discussions” approach feels the least intrusive.
  
  A huge part of the fediverse is the autonomy to choose. So I think Artemis will keep adding all these optional features users can turn on and adjust to their liking. I don't think having these choices is detrimental to anybody who doesn't want to use them.
- Please do!
I think something like this is necessary at some point, since duplicate posts across duplicate communities is an inconvenience when compared to more centralized communities in Reddit. Some thoughts:

When you go to the comments, which instance's comments are we seeing? If we make a comment, which instance is our comment posted to? My idea would be to throw everyone's comments into a singular bucket as you said, but then you'll have to select which instance you're posting to when commenting. This does introduce an issue with moderation though, as different communities may have different rules. So there may need to be a moderation option on whether you'll allow post collation across other communities.

Aside from grouping duplicate posts like this, we could also group different communities. If we have a kbin.social/m/technology and lemmy.world/c/technology, we could just combine the posts from both communities into one group. This could be done automatically for communities with the same name, but a better option may be for moderators to add "sister communities" whose posts will appear in the magazine. That way, from the user's perspective, there is just one technology magazine that assembles content from multiple instances.
- I think the base Lemmy project needs to have some better, built-in support for cross-instance posting. That would make it easier for serial posters to treat communities more like hashtags when submitting links, but still keep feeds clean for the users by keeping the clutter nice and tidy.
  
  In fact, that could help smaller communities grow, too, as you could have it show you "mirrored" versions of that thread from other communities/instances. For example, the same link could be posted to tech@instance.one and gaming@instance.two, but I'm only subscribed to tech, but seeing an option to view the comments from the gaming community's version of that thread would help me discover more content I may be interested in.
  
  Actually, Lemmy already does crossposts, Kbin doesn't. This user just crossposted their post, and interestingly, they just show up as separate posts to us. I'd think Lemmy would use the protocol's boost feature, but maybe there's some limitation that prevents this
I LOVE THIS.

I imagine the experience playing out like this:

Thread Entanglement is a toggle in a user's settings menu.

The comments section of an entangled thread merges all comments from every iteration of the thread entangled. Each comment would have some indication of which entangled community it actually belongs to. Replying to a comment will of course federate your reply to that community's thread.

Posting a new top-level comment offers something like a drop-down box to determine which community a user specifically wishes to affiliate that comment with, but could otherwise default to the local-most, earliest, most populated iteration of the thread, or even a general hashtagged post -depending on user settings.

A community filter/toggle within an entangled thread would allow users to instantly remove all comments from one or more communities.

Communities blocked or not subscribed to by a user will of course not appear in entangled threads unless directed to do so in settings.

Entanglement-exemption options in a user's settings menu could include which communities or users to omit from entanglement, or if any specific communities should be omitted from consideration when posting a new comment in an entangled thread.
- @Eggyhead before you comment to one of 20 or 30 different communities a url has been posted to, how do you review the community guidelines to make sure stay within them?
  
  I see how this idea is appealing but I think at the end of the day everything would be a real mess. It would be impossible for communities to have any sense of themselves as randomers would constantly be parachuting in. Eventually they would ban posting link that are already posted to communities where annoying people hang out. What you are suggesting is integrating brigading into the platform so it would be done unintentionally all the time.
  
  The way to consolidate posts, for those who wish it, would be to display the post on feed once. Below it, list details for various communities which the user is already subscribed to:
  
  user@host.org posted 1 hour ago to community@host.org 0 comments
  otheruser@host.io posted 3 hours to othercommunity@host.io 20 comments
  
  @Chozo
  
  It would be impossible for communities to have any sense of themselves as randomers would constantly be parachuting in.
  
  Entangled threads would only show you posts from communities you’ve subscribed to, so it wouldn’t be randomers “parachuting in”, it would be community members who have presumably already encountered that community’s guidelines.
- Yes! This is very much how I was picturing the idea in my head.
Love it. Hope it's technically possible.
Need a mockup that has >0 comments on both submissions to show how you deal with those.

35 comments