Alt Forums

I discovered today that there’s a phpBB fork that was federated and a community is using the software. Looks like I’ve got another forum to join haha. It sucks that lemmybb isn’t being maintained anymore though… I had no clue someone managed to make edits to phpBB to make it federated, there’s only a few forum software that are federated. Anyways here’s the link to RetroLemmy.

https://forum.retrolemmy.com/

While browsing Reddit yesterday I came across a post in Reddit Alternatives for a new modern Imageboard. Everiot is a European based Imageboard but it looks like the staff uses AI moderation. I don’t think I’d join this one, I don’t really care for imageboards to begin with and if they’re using AI moderation I’m sure many posts get flagged as spam even if it’s not. Though if you like imageboards you might like this one so I decided to share it here.

https://everiot.org/

This is just a tribute to what I think it was one of the most decent alternative video platforms ever existed.

For those who never knew about it or never got to use it, it was basically a video platform but with some cool features from classic YouTube, such as full channel customization (colors, backgrounds, GIFs, etc) combined with a modern design, as well as video responses and friends system.

It was created by Jan, developer of the most known “old YouTube” clones VidLii and BitView (which he no longer owns) and launched around 2018. Was used to be popular during 2019 back when YouTube announced COPPA and everyone back then thought it was “the end of YouTube” (and here we still are…).

From what little I remember, long before the platform shut down around 2020, there was a time when the “uploader” was down for maintenance for more than two months and no one could upload any new content to the site (except people who had scheduled videos much before the maintenance), until, just days after they fixed it, the developers received a DMCA takedown that would take down one of the project’s servers and the website temporarily closed.
Some time later, the project was handed over to new owners, who began asking for donations on Patreon until, for some reason, they came to the conclusion that maintaining a video site of such size was becoming too expensive for them, so they finally decided to shut down the website for good in 2021, eradicating all user-uploaded content in the process.
They have been announcing over the years (and even recently in 2025 IIRC) that they will host an archive containing all user content, but so far they haven't done so.

RIP

If you were around in the early days of the internet you probably remember Usenet groups. RootBadger is a modern approach to Usenet groups that I just found out about today. I figured I would share this platform with everyone here. :)

https://rootbadger.com/

Chinese video platform which I personally know and I sometimes visit for otoMADs. They announced a few weeks ago that they have plans to expand globally, releasing their apps for Android and iOS for all countries and also making “programs” for content creators.

I personally don’t trust on it and more being from China (you know what I mean).

This is a modern forum software that can be installed on shared hosting! Most modern forum platforms like NodeBB and Discourse need to be installed on a VPS since they require Docker to function, but this one is written in php. Though the author did use AI, so this was vibe coded. That may be a deal breaker for some people. I haven't tried this software yet, but I've thought about giving it a try. I'll drop a link for the community so you can see what it looks like from a guest point of view.

https://community.convoro.co/

I figured I would start creating threads based around general discussions of alternative platforms, OS, etc. instead of just making threads listing other platforms that exist. So what made you decide that you wanted to start using alternative platforms? Were you tired of the moderation on the more popular platforms, tired of the interface or just wanted to try something new? I go down these rabbit holes where I want to try new things out and that's how I joined Lemmy. I use Root more than Discord because I don't like the direction that Discord is taking when it comes to ID checks. Overall I just prefer forums to anything though, and forums are considered alternative platforms at this point too!

This Reddit alternative really reminds me of the old Reddit from the early 10's, which is the time I joined Reddit. There's also no ads on the site which is great to see. I also prefer the threaded style Tildes has compared to nested over on Reddit. I'm going to sign up and try this platform out! Have you tried Tildes yet?

https://tildes.net/

There's a guy over on Forum Promotion who created a retro like website complete with it's own social media network and forum. He's also working on implementing a monster collecting feature too which is pretty cool! I figured I would share this platform with everyone here in case you haven't checked it out yet. (Generally speaking I think sharing any cool forums you find here is fine btw. They are alternative platforms after all right?)

https://loneportal.com/

I was just browsing the subreddit "Reddit Alternatives" and came across another platform called Plato. Gotta say it seems a bit too barebones at the moment, the only two subs that are currently on Pluto are titled "agora" and "product release". I'm not sure if users have the ability to create their own sub or if the main admin is the only one that can now. It reminds me of Havn.to which was a platform that allowed you to post without having to sign up for an account but that platform shut down unfortunately.

https://ownsub.com/

I forgot about this Reddit alternative, I have an account over there too. I should log back into my account and see what's going on over there. Have you used Discuit before? A few years ago I feel like a lot of Reddit Alternatives were popping up, sort of like what we're seeing with chat clients currently. I think this was mainly when Reddit decided to change theri API policy.

https://discuit.org/

Looks like the guy behind Prata Chat is also working on their own video hosting platform too! I've signed up and uploaded one video so far, there's only a handful of videos on the platform at the moment. It does seem a bit promising, the UI is very minimal but that's okay in my opinion. My channel is Sonikku 1011, so you'll see the video I uploaded on the front page.

https://video.prata.serv00.net/index

Rumble is a free speech video sharing platform that's been around since 2013. Though it's not as popular as Youtube of course it's got a pretty large userbase. In 2020 it gained traction from Republicans because Devin Nunes' Youtube channel kept getting censored. Do you use this platform? I personally don't, but since it's a Youtube alternative I figured I would make a thread for it.

https://rumble.com/

Are you looking for a new video host that's decentralized? Odysee might be what you're looking for. You don't need to host anything yourself, and their moderation isn't as strict as YouTube's. Odysee believes in freedom of speech, and it's also part of the LBRY Blockchain so if you're wanting to earn some cryptocurrency while uploading videos Odysee is a good place to do so. I've used it a little bit, you used to be able to pull your YouTube videos over without having to reupload everything but unfortunately this feature has been removed. Odysee is also new, it's only 6 years old so it's definitely not as active as YouTube but still has a good audience. Have you checked this platform out yet?
https://odysee.com/

This is a platform for scheduling game sessions with random people online, where you pick a game, a date and people show interest on joining it.

Its specially useful for older games and modded games, where their communities are usually locked inside discord, the idea is to get the opportunity to play them out of there.

Having said that this works for pretty much any game where you can make a lobby.

The site is pretty much in its infancy, the community is small but hopefully that changes in the future.

Well when I first was creating this thread I thought Digg was still online. However I just checked the domain name and well, it seems to be offline for now and you're only greeted with a static page talking about how they downsized the team, and there was a bot problem so they're going back to the drawing board and that Digg isn't going offline again fully, but will be offline again temporarily. Welp did you get a chance to use Digg again after it came back for a little bit? Did you use it back in the day when it was more popular?

https://digg.com/

I just discovered this awesome community earlier today on Reddit. The layout reminds me of Windows 95/98, you even get a virtual pet that you can take care of. @Elkaki and I are both members over there, you should check it out! I'm hoping eventually we can interact more with our virtual pets. Right now you can only feed them.

https://cozy.talk/

I forgot this platform exists. I never bothered joining it so I guess that's why I did. While browsing r/redditalternatives I noticed one of the pinned threads they had was a list of websites that had nested comments. (Which I don't care for compared to threaded but meh.) And of course Disqus was listed! have you ever used their platform before?

https://disqus.com/channels/

I just discovered this a few minutes ago so I haven't had any experience actually using this platform just yet. It was also shared on r/redditalternatives five days ago so I'm guessing the platform isn't too old. Anyways, this platform doesn't allow politics which is actually refreshing to see. Not everyone is going to be okay with this, but it's nice to see a Reddit alternative without politics. OddsRabbit also donates to charity every time you sign up for the platform. Here's the link if you're interested in checking it out!

https://www.oddsrabbit.com/

Have you ever used Flarum before? It's a free forum script written in php that takes a more modern approach. I've used it before and it's okay. I used to really dislike this software because I wasn't a fan of how the index page is compared to traditional threaded forums. I still prefer threaded to modern forum platforms though. There's also a free forum host called Free flarum if you want to try out the software without needing to pay for hosting and installing the software yourself.

Forums of course are alternative platforms and I figured if there's going to be any forum host I talk about first it'll be the very one that hosts our forum! Forum Spark is my favorite free forum host. Some people might look at free forum hosts and think they're behind free self hosted platforms. This isn't the case with Forum Spark! If you're looking for a forum host that won't break the bank that comes with many amazing features and is constantly being updated look no further!

https://forumspark.net/

This is yet another video hosting platform. I never tried this one out before, I know people talk about it so it's not some obscure platform but it's certainly not as popular as Youtube is! Have you uploaded anything to Vimeo? Is it worth giving it a go? It's funny that it's older than Youtube, and yet it's not as popular.

I stumbled across another Reddit alternative just now called Otto.Talk. Looks like this one is Australia based since one of the top communities that people are subscribed to is a Australia based community. Though browsing through the community right now, it seems like people are just sharing links from external sites rather than having open conversations like you would on Reddit. Really odd, I'm not sure why I can't find threads created by members. If you want to check it out here's the link.

https://otto.talk/

Peertube is a decentralized video sharing platform that's part of the fediverse. You have to install your own instance if you want to create a channel, which might put off some people from trying it out. You'll also need to have a VPS rather than shared hosting to install it too. I've been wanting to try it out at some point, but I currently don't have the funds to get a VPS again. Have you ever messed around with Peertube?

https://joinpeertube.org/

I figured I would make a thread for Kick, even though it's pretty popular these days. It was also founded only a few years ago so it's crazy to see that it's popular. Anyways Kick is known to have lax moderation when compared to other streaming sites like Twitch. I'm sure this is why it's popular, people who were banned on Twitch probably ended up moving over to Kick. Do you use Kick?

https://kick.com/