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submitted 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) by sunaurus@lemm.ee to c/meta@lemm.ee

Hey folks!

I'm writing this because funding for the Lemmy project has dropped to critical levels, which could seriously impact its future development.

Thanks to the generous support of our lemm.ee community, our server infrastructure costs are covered, and we even have a few months of runway. I'm deeply grateful to everyone who has contributed - lemm.ee wouldn't exist without your help.

However, infrastructure alone isn’t enough. Our servers run Lemmy software, and without ongoing development, the platform cannot grow or even be maintained.

Lemmy is an open-source project with many contributors, but the vast majority of development work has been carried out by a small group of core maintainers. A few maintainers work full-time on the project, relying solely on donations and occasional grants to support themselves.

I've seen Lemmy development up close, and the maintainers have consistently gone above and beyond what I consider the standard for small open-source teams - they are constantly writing code, mentoring contributors, and keeping everything running. Their work is essential, and without continued support, it cannot be sustained.

If you value Lemmy, please consider supporting its maintainers directly. Every bit helps.

Please check out this post for more details about how to support the maintainers: https://lemm.ee/post/63034576

Thank you for reading, I hope you have a great weekend!

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[-] NovaOG@lemm.ee 24 points 5 days ago

It's so sad that liberals will literally cozy up to fascists and monetarily support them however they can... But a FOSS project run by commies gets them clutching their pearls super hard

[-] cashsky@sh.itjust.works 13 points 5 days ago

Just had a whole argument about this on that lemmyworld post that's at the top about boycotting ml cuz someone brought up how they can't donate if the developers are gonna use some of that money on ml server cost. They can't see the bigger picture. Instead they wanna cry over how their $5 or whatever donation is gonna be used. Pathetic.

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[-] rickyrigatoni@lemm.ee 61 points 6 days ago

People are avoiding supporting lemmy monetarily due to the actions of the developers. We do not reward bad behaviors here. If lemmy development ends most of us will just move to kbin or piefed. This is a non-issue.

[-] OpenStars@piefed.social 1 points 3 days ago

Mbin, not Kbin. Kbin is dead.

There actually is one instance left, a tiny little hold-over in Poland, last I checked, but everyone else that was using Kbin has since switched to Mbin.

Except me personally, who switched to PieFed (which is fantastic btw!:-).

[-] peregrin5@lemm.ee 52 points 6 days ago

Just like with Elon Musk, if someone wants people to support them monetarily, they shouldn't work hard to make themselves objectionable to wide swaths of the population they are trying to extract money from.

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[-] Jimbabwe@lemmy.world 22 points 6 days ago

What actions of the developers are you talking about? I’m not trying to start a fight, I’m honestly out of the loop or whatever.

[-] infeeeee@lemm.ee 35 points 6 days ago
[-] GoodEye8@lemm.ee 26 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

I imagine the biggest point are the censorship, disinformation and tankie allegations. These are all documented in this post. Another point worth bringing up is that they are the admins of lemmy.ml, where most of the allegations happen. Lemmy.ml also has something of a tankie problem and one of the devs has said that the donations will also cover the cost of running the instance. So by donating to the devs you're also donating to an instance that possibly has no problem with censorship, disinformation and harboring tankies.

I would be willing to turn a blind eye if I could trust the devs to step away from lemmy.ml and focus solely on the development of Lemmy. But I don't trust the devs enough to actually do that so I personally won't be supporting Lemmy development until someone else becomes the maintainer of Lemmy.

EDIT: just to cover off the inevitable "what will happen if we stop supporting Lemmy. I don't want to go back to Reddit" fear. If Lemmy doesn't work out and it gets abandoned there's always Mbin. Anyone here from the Reddit exodus knows that it's annoying to migrate but Mbin can federate with Lemmy which means going from Lemmy to Mbin is going to be less painful than form Reddit to Lemmy.

[-] OpenStars@piefed.social 1 points 3 days ago

Mbin is one example, PieFed is another. Both are superb!:-)

[-] conditional_soup@lemm.ee 21 points 6 days ago

AND it's open source software. Nothing is stopping anyone from just forking Lemmy.

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[-] person1@lemm.ee 19 points 6 days ago

Hmm glad I found this post and the comments. I recently came here from Reddit and joined some random communities just to have something in my feed. I was a bit shocked at hammer and sickle posted non-ironically in the meme group. Noting that communists weren't better than Nazis got me called an ungrateful shit for existing (which I apparently owe to Stalin) and banned. Moved to the second-biggest meme community the search found, where I'm not banned yet but being educated by Westerners that life in communist coutries was cheerful and Holodomor was an oopsie.

I'm glad to hear that this is not all that Lemmy stands for, but a bit disappointed learning that top developers are a part of the problem. I'm conflicted about donating to say the least, and it does not bode well for lemmy adoption in general. I'll stick around to see if other servers gain momentum, but I'll need to keep an eye open for other reddit alternatives I guess

[-] Alaskaball@hexbear.net 12 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

Noting that communists weren't better than Nazis got me called an ungrateful shit for existing (which I apparently owe to Stalin) and banned.

According to the mod logs the only thing you copped a ban for is being uncivil you lying little shit. And that's even a temporary one at that.

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[-] hakase@lemm.ee 22 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

Most of Lemmy is fine - just avoid the tankie triad of lemmygrad, lemmy.ml, and hexbear and you should be good to go.

Edit: And maybe also the instances that haven't defederated hexbear in particular, since when they show up threads tend to go to shit, as you're seeing here, unfortunately.

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[-] Rentlar@lemmy.ca 52 points 6 days ago

I've been around for long enough, time for me to donate.

Sure the two top admins have some shitty opinions, but they still are the main people who have put this software out. The two have been tirelessly working on it for years and years, and have made code that helps everyone, whether you share their opinions or not.

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[-] milicent_bystandr@lemm.ee 33 points 6 days ago

I'd like to join my voice with those saying it's worth donating even if you disagree with the devs personally. My impression is they're decent about making Lemmy a tech project not a personal political platform, and treating the Internet respectfully as a forum.

The Lemmy software supports so many communities to communicate, including the huge lemmy.world that famously hates .ml. Because the software is open, it can do that freely.

You who hate capitalism, do you donate your ad data to capitalists so they can grow sickeningly rich off your use of their software? Then you might at least let these devs live comfortably off your use of the software. And if you pay in ways you see, instead of ways you don't, does that trouble you so much?

You don't have to agree. And you can still use Lemmy freely! But since this software has been such a blessing to us wanting a non-reddit platform, I hope many will be happy to bless the devs back - and they're only asking for a modest salary.

[-] OpenStars@piefed.social 2 points 3 days ago

My impression is they're decent about making Lemmy a tech project not a personal political platform

But... isn't it impossible to donate solely to the software, when they also will use the funds to pay server costs for lemmy.ml? The referenced post did not exactly highlight that little tidbit of information... yet isn't it true nonetheless?

[-] milicent_bystandr@lemm.ee 2 points 3 days ago

Yes, but as pointed out elsewhere,

  • it works out about 2% of your donation, if that
  • the devs would be entitled to spend their salary on personal projects anyhow, it's an effective salary not ngo funds
  • .ml serves as a useful test server and public beta for the rest of Lemmy
  • it's effectively funding every instance, by providing the software - by that metric, the opposite .world gets the larger share
  • because of the small scales, ordinarily there's not a lot of sense to separate .ml funding because it's so small. It's not like the devs are being devious

To me, that stacks up fairly.

[-] OpenStars@piefed.social 2 points 2 days ago

I'm just being pedantic, but also the problem seems easily solved by having someone else moderate that instance, while they focus on just the coding.

Of course they are 100% free to do as they choose and I would not dream of wanting them to do otherwise.

Then too, the people deciding whether to donate can do the same - and it seems that the rather unusual moderation practices of lemmy.ml are a sticking point for whether they want to contribute funds or not. The amount of those funds, whether the devs have the "right" to do so or not, that is all besides the point. Some people just don't like to fund things like genocide, period.

But now we are veering into political territory that I know less about. Thank you for sharing those facts about the situation, as I continue to learn about it that is very helpful:-).

[-] Spzi@lemm.ee 15 points 5 days ago

it’s worth donating even if you disagree with the devs personally. My impression is they’re decent about making Lemmy a tech project not a personal political platform, and treating the Internet respectfully

I want to underline this. And ask the reader to put themselves in the devs' shoes for a moment.

Usually, when people have strong opinions, like extreme political views, they try to further their goal wherever they can. To abstain from that desire, and create tools which can be freely used, even by their political enemies, requires a considerable amount of decency and deserves our respect.

Either this, or they value FOSS so much (more), that they still keep Lemmy open for everyone.

In a way, they support people from the opposite side of the political spectrum, by providing them their platform freely. Isn't that exemplary in putting the fedi spirit above political differences?

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[-] AnonomousWolf@lemm.ee 22 points 5 days ago

I signed up for a medium donation.

While I don't agree with some things happening on .ml We should not discard imperfect allies. Thank you devs for the great work you're doing.

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[-] imaqtpie@sh.itjust.works 15 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

Dessalines and Nutomic are criminally underpaid. Lemmy development still has a long way to go and we could get there much faster if people donated more. But in typical Lemmy fashion, people would rather sit on their high horses and throw stones from their glass houses.

I started donating to the developers 2 days after I joined Lemmy and have given over $1k since then. I find the developers to be competent, mature, and reasonable. Similarly to many other contentious topics on this platform, the conversation regarding their perceived or imagined political beliefs is completely lacking in objectivity, logic, and nuance. Y'all actually be gossiping like teenagers about these developers even while taking advantage of the fruits of their unpaid labor. I've seen the evidence of their extremism and it's quite underwhelming when you lay it all out.

And even if I did have major qualms about the devs, I would still argue that it's much harder to justify using any products or services from large corporations like Amazon or Reddit than it is to monetarily support a FOSS project such as Lemmy. Out of everything I've spent money on in my lifetime, Lemmy is easily among the most morally justifiable expenses.

I eventually had to reduce my monthly contribution once sh.itjust.works started accepting donations, because I also feel strongly about supporting my own instance. It's unfortunate that so many lemmings seemingly understand the fact that reddit has become an evil cancer and an alternative is sorely needed, but don't seem to understand that creating such an alternative is a project that requires a massive amount of time and effort. Donating to your instance is great, but without continued development of the underlying software, it's a futile effort. Even if you want to die on the hill of not donating to the big bad Lemmy devs, at least donate to PieFed or something! 2 patrons?!? As an early adopter userbase, we can and should be doing a lot more to support the fediverse monetarily, imo.

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[-] conditional_soup@lemm.ee 28 points 6 days ago

The devs also say that they would gladly accept any development help as well, if you're either unwilling or unable to financially contribute.

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[-] Carl@hexbear.net 35 points 6 days ago

lemmy development mentioned

dessalines criticized

commies counter criticism

thread turns into a shitshow

aww yeah, it's Lemmy time.

[-] goferking0@lemmy.sdf.org 7 points 5 days ago

At least it's nicer than the thread on lw :(

[-] td_sp@lemmynsfw.com 23 points 6 days ago

Damn this community is a fucking joke. It's actually not funny, just sad.

You all parade around the internet mounted on your high horses about FOSS this, decentralized that, libre this, reject capitalism that, etc.

But the moment you are asked to contribute your part you all start pretending to be holy saints lmfao. Most upvoted comments in these threads go like this:

"I can't possibly donate to this project because this guy said that thing about trans"

And meanwhile every day you forgo your moral codes to buy all kinds of shit. Otherwise you'd be living in the middle of a remote island.

The people you all buy from don't merely say something you find offensive, they do lobbying with their truckloads of money that affect how you live your life and further their own agenda.

These Lemmy devs put their work under a license that gives up the ownership and just ask for a living wage, yet by your logic they don't deserve it?!

[-] hakase@lemm.ee 18 points 6 days ago

That's correct. People actively shilling for authoritarian regimes committing human rights atrocities, denying genocides, and aggressively silencing all dissent do not deserve it.

All they'd have to do is develop from behind the scenes and not actively contribute to one of the worst places on the platform, and I'd have no problem donating to them.

But they don't, and so I don't, and instead I get to listen to your whataboutism, literally the guy in the "and yet you participate in society" meme.

[-] nutomic@lemmynsfw.com 21 points 6 days ago

Lemmy dev here, for what its worth I stopped posting about politics years ago, and also dont do any moderation on lemmy.ml besides occasionally banning an obvious spam account. I simply dont have the time or interest anymore, and prefer to focus my time on development which benefits all Lemmy users.

Posting from alt account because these comments are not federating to my home instance.

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[-] 1984@lemmy.today 22 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

The original post on lemmy.ml by the creator of Lemmy had a lot more details, so maybe just link to that one?

https://lemmy.ml/post/29579005

Tldr: They are down to about 1000 dollars per developer and will have to take jobs and stop Lemmy development if they dont get 2500 dollars per developer.

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[-] JudahBenHur@lemm.ee 21 points 6 days ago

thanks for the post sir, happy to throw a few money units in

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this post was submitted on 04 May 2025
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