This is likely a Lemmy bug but infosec.pub is related because there are so many Android communities that are federated from bad places so I thought I would mention it here as well....
You might prefer smaller instances; … This part of it is clearly not a bug, however you put it. It is a difference of preference.
My personal preference happens to align with fedi principles. Don’t let that consistency fool you. I’m not advocating for what’s best for me. I am saying the list should be ordered in a way that’s healthy for the fedi based on the federation’s purpose and mission.
Showing the biggest communities on top may be your personal preference, but that is not healthy for the federation.
I myself am on an instance that’s almost identical in size to yours.
FYI, aussie.zone is centralized on a US tech giant (Cloudflare) and thus contrary to fedi principles. Though it’s not the worst manifestation of Cloudflare because they have whitelisted Tor. But there are still many other demographics of people likely being excluded from aussie.zone.
I do not see the value in smaller communities being prioritised when they each cover the same topic. If there’s !android with 10,000 subscribers and !android with me and my twelve mates, lemmy.world is the one the app should show people first. It wouldn’t matter to me whether that 10,000 is on lemmy.world or midwest.social, it makes sense to show users the place they’re likely to have the most interaction.
That is not healthy for the federation. That imbalance is a problem that Lemmy has failed to control. The disproportionately large communities need no promotion. Too many people know about them already. They should either not be listed at all or be pushed lower on the list. It’s an extra slap in the face and injustice that these are exclusive Cloudflare instances that are getting prioritized. These are instances without self-control on their growth and power.
It’s not instance-related at all.
It is instance related. If you search for Android on other instances you will get different lists. Users on infosec.pub have subscribed to every Android community in existence which makes the manifestation of the problem unique to infosec.pub. The !android community is also federated to infosec.pub by way of my subscription. It is true to fedi principles of inclusion and decentralization, unlike those that get listed on the top. So it’s an unhealthy sequence.
It could even be one user account that caused this. The activism.openworlds.info Mastodon instance was getting hammered with traffic. After investigation, they discovered that one user was following a shit ton of other accounts. All those follows were responsible for the admins struggling to cope with all the traffic. That instance eventually went under because it could not cope with the bandwidth demands.
This belongs in discussion around lemmy-ui, the various Lemmy apps & alternative front-ends, or in Lemmy itself with what gets returned by its search API.
The software part of the problem is specifically in the stock Lemmy web client. The bug tracker for the Lemmy web client is jailed in MS Github’s walled garden, hence why it was originally posted in !bugs. There may be a configuration element to this, which is why it’s posted in this infosec.pub community. If there is an inactive account with all these android subscriptions, that can be remedied on the instance.
(Lemmy bug) cannot cross-post to !android@hilariouschaos.com b/c the pull-down list is clusterfucked with Cloudflare sites
This is likely a Lemmy bug but infosec.pub is related because there are so many Android communities that are federated from bad places so I thought I would mention it here as well....