I think if this gets added it should clearly mark which comment is for which community, or put them as separate blocks of comments entirely. Otherwise it could get confusing when different communities have different contexts.
this post was submitted on 12 Sep 2025
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Off topic, but the new list of crossposts looks really good!
Back on topic, I think the way PieFed does it looks really good.
IMO, yes. I think it would make people more, rather than less, inclined to comment on a cross-post made in a smaller communities, since then their comment would be more visible.
The main concern I can see being raised is potentially leading to brigading? I’m not sure if that’s much of an issue on Lemmy and I would assume being able to de-federate would mitigate that substantially.
System should be designed without credence given to abusers and the abusers dealt with later.
Brigading and insincere engagement should be dealt with by another system, rather than disempowering the users (in this case it would be restraining their reach)
If we build system with the actions of abusers, then we end up building prisons instead.
Completely agree with you.
Yes!
Hmm had an error loading the full post in Piefed even tho I posted in it. But yes I think that showing all the comments to a link across instances like how piefed and many clients do is great and makes the place feel more lively
EDIT: After reading through the Git issue and the other comments in this thread, it is not very clear to me what "combining comments from cross-posts on the post screen" means. I understood it at first to mean that you will pool all comments together and show all of them in all cross-posts, but now I am not so sure. Still, in general terms, I think that mechanisms to share activity with niche communities are good
I would say yes, there are cases in which I have thought that this would be a nice thing to have. Especially when cross-posting to a smaller niche community.
I can think of a few potential small issues. For example, cross-posters can edit the body of the message, so you might in some cases end up with comments that seem out of place as they refer to the content specific to a cross-post. You also have the rare case in which the same post might mean different things in different communities.
But, overall, I see it as beneficial. Quirks can be fine-tuned later on.
Is this something communities could opt out of? Not everyone wants their community flooded with comments from people replying to people who aren't even community members.
I could see a user setting for this being a good idea. With a default being whatever the consensus ends up being.
In this case you have to be posted AS A crosspost to take effect, and any one of the cross posted community can just delete the post, or presumably uncrosspost it.
The problem usually is that, nobody bother interacting with small communities and aggregate around the "one big community" for that topic.
Small community who would want to remain insular have lots of ways of disappearing further if they want to, but that's never the actual problem of small communities. It is always easier to have less reach and become less relevant than the opposite which better crossposts enable.
I like the way piefed does it. Have visual separation letting people know where the comment will go.
It would be nice for Lemmy too.
And if we get this, this is something even reddit doesn't have. A killer feature.
Yes by default, though it should be possible to post without joining the wider discussion, imagine (whatever you think about them) "shit X says" metacommunities' discussion getting mixed in with the sincere commenters
If so, then to which specific instance(s) (or more precisely, local mirrors of instances) would replies be sent?
This is no different from viewing all, going to a federated community, and replying to comments there. This changes nothing about federation.
Would defederated users be able to see and participate?
This doesn't change anything about existing federation; you can even have crossposts in the same server or even the same community (like a historical link).
Oh okay. I think it's a good idea, either way.
No. It's confusing. Maybe make them easily accessible though but still distinct so that the users know it's two different spaces.
The problem is that then people only post in the "one big community" and this neuters the decentralization aspects of Lemmy and fragments the lemmy community as a whole.
I think this is a great compromise where communities remain distinct and granular, but we get a common discussion space for all by default
Maybe if mods from both communities agree to share comments. Some communities want to remain separate.
Its not really combining post comments. It would just be displaying cross post comments in different sections at the bottom.
I stick to my idea.
Each community should be able to decide for themselves.
So if I post something in the comment of a thread that is cross posted to another Community my comments will appear in that Community as well? That sounds awful. I don't know why anyone would want that.
No. Your comment would only go to that specific post you replied under.