this post was submitted on 27 May 2024
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Privacy

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Shoelace: Alternative frontend for Instagram's Threads (sr.ht)
submitted 6 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/9961019

Hello Lemmy! Yesterday I released the first version of an alternative frontend for Threads: Shoelace. It allows for fetching posts and profiles from Threads without the need of any browser-side JavaScript. It's written in Rust, and powered by the spools library, which was co-developed between me and my girlfriend. Here's a quick preview:

A screenshot of Shoelace's homepage, showing the logo on top, the title "Shoelace", the subtitle "an alternative frontend for Threads", an input bar with the tooltip "Jump to a profile...", and at the bottom three links: "hub", "donate", and "v0.1".

Mark Zuckerberg's profile on Shoelace, showing three posts: One showcasing columns on the official Threads frontend, another congratulating himself for 1.2M+ downloads in his company's new AI software, and the glimpse of a post related to the "metaverse" Post by münecat on Shoelace, announcing the release of a video essay criticizing the field of evolutionary psychology

The official public instance (at least for now) is located at https://shoelace.mint.lgbt/, if y'all wanna try it out. There's also instructions to deploy it inside the docs you can find in the README. Hope y'all enjoy it!

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 months ago (2 children)

To bad Mastodon doesn't exist. Oh wait...

Not to say this shouldn't exist as having a front end is great for privacy but I think it is better to not grow these platforms.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 months ago

I'm assuming you didn't put a lot of thought in this comment.

Mastodon is great but expecting the majority of people to use it is just naive. I'm all in for tools that disrupt the usage of walled gardens.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Hi! Dev and OP here.

Yes, I am more than aware that the fediverse can see Threads profiles and posts. However, adding to what T said:

  1. Federation is an optional feature, and does not account for profiles which have it disabled. So those simply won't pop up on Mastodon.
  2. Threads has not been received well by a huge chunk of the fediverse, including myself, due to Meta essentially collecting data from users outside of Threads without their explicit consent. As such, many instances have defederated from Threads.
  3. Federation on Threads is only available in certain regions. To be exact, if you're a Threads user, you cannot enable federation unless you live in the US, Canada, or Japan.

It may be an option for you, but it really depends on the instance your account is in, and who do you want to follow. Shoelace, on the other hand, would only be limited by the capabilities from unauthenticated API endpoints Meta provides, but any public post or profile can be opened.