Lemmy is like a public library of the internet: it's one of the few places where you can exist without the expectation of paying either through watching ads or through direct payments
you can use open source apps for youtube and reddit, you dont even need to register or watch any of the ads. however yoz get promoted posts that are upvoted by bots, pretty sure its true here as well.
Admins secretly taking money to inject stealth ads? I don't know the mechanisms too well but it'd be nice to know where the cancer is likely to start from.
They were so sinister, but back in the 80s they were just randos. There's a documentary out there about their cult. Really weird, from my perspective, because when I was like 9 years old, I thought it might be nice to be like them at the airport runnning around with a tambourine. I'm so glad I wasn't. Anyway, look it up and read about them. Then, question everything. The Krishna people, in a nutshell, were worshipping a huge drug lord and it was a mafia, that brainwashed them. Back in the 80s, and even 70s, they were just hippy dippy people. John Waters even made a film about how the daughter wanted to run away from the mother to join the Krishna people. Hare, hare krishna!
There’s a temple of theirs very near me. I don’t see many around now but back in the 90s it’s was a big thing. But they were always very peaceful here, not remotely sinister. They just played that tambourine and chanted away and did their own thing
Yeah, that whole documentary about them I saw 6 months ago was like something that blew my mind. That's how I remember them. Just peaceful people chanting in public with their veils and what not. I'm fascinated by how there's a temple near you of them! Some of them kept faith and continue their dedication to whatever they dedicate themselves to? I remember a loooong time ago when I was 12 I said to my mother in a heated argument, "I'm going to run away and join the Krishna people from the mall!" She won the argument (because age and wisdom) but I gave her a run for her money because she saw the same movie I did by John Waters.
Well now I just looked up the documentary and put it on! Whatever this faction is I don’t think it’s representative of the whole. The ones near me I think have always embodied peacefulness. The temple has its doors open regularly, I’ve never really walked in and looked around but it would be interesting. It’s also in an area that’s really blown up in value since they bought it, worth many millions today. I’m sure they’ve been offered buyouts by developers but clearly didn’t accept any if so. Just goes to show it’s not about the money for them!
A group of them came by my college every week and provided a low cost, all you can eat vegetarian lunch. Don't know much else about them, but that's a point in their favor in my books.
I just need a place to shitpost for stress relief, I get drawn into deeper discussions but my main goal is to be as thoughtless and as dumb as possible Wheeeeeeeee
In my city/county, you get a free card if you can prove you live here (show something with your address)
Our system will also do fundraisers to supplement the budget from taxes. We almost lost some libraries a gew years ago, but voters remade the local government and they are safer now.
Don't know where I read it, but I also like this metaphorical comparison:
Traditional social media is like a shop, except the customers are advertisers and you, as a user sit on the shelves, waiting to be bought. It's made entirely for revenue and profit, everything else is secondary. The shop will gladly show you an advertiser that pays for your attention before showing you your parent's vacation photos or the important post from that group you follow.
A fediverse instance is like a community garden. Nobody is a product and nobody is buying anything for themselves. Instead, everyone grows the garden together. Some people took initiative and responsibility with running the garden (admins/mods) and others joined and shared the garden with them and supported the garden with funds and content.
In the fediverse garden, there is no other point than talking amongst each other and the garden is connected to other gardens that work mostly with the same principles and the gardens "cross-polinate" each other with discussions and content and through that help each other grow even more.