this post was submitted on 07 Feb 2025
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I saw a few videos shared on PeerTube recently, and created an account on an instance. However, unlike Mastodon and Lemmy I'm struggling to discover channels to subscribe to. When I use the search functions on my instance, most results are either interesting channels which haven't been updated in years, or random foreign language TV shows and episodes.

Just for example, if I'm trying to find videos on "Gaming" on one of the largest instances, the most recent video is over 1 year ago: https://tilvids.com/search?categoryOneOf=7

Is discoverability on PeerTube bad, or are there barely any active channels?

Edit: BTW one very active creator on PeerTube is https://tilvids.com/c/thelinuxexperiment_channel/videos and his videos are excellent. But can there really only be a handful of active creators to follow on the whole platform?

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 5 hours ago

It's really just missing a great instance. Most of them look really shady or are not accepting new users.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 13 hours ago (2 children)

Its growing like crazy. Try the app they just released. It uses some search that works better than instance search

[–] [email protected] 7 points 4 hours ago

It uses sepia search to search all instances that have opted into being searched.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 15 hours ago

In that case issue is some instances do not allow global search and that's why search will limit to only channels you follow and your instance.

[–] [email protected] 53 points 18 hours ago (2 children)

The discoverability is incredibly bad. Peertube has a ton of videos and more servers than lemmy by a long shot iirc. The problem is that the „frontend“ has seen no love like ever. There recently came an app which is nice but otherwise, its very underloved.

Feel free to voice your concerns in [email protected] for example. The devs should be available through the fedi somewhere.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 12 hours ago (1 children)

Is there a non ml community? I try to avoid the "genocide is ok when China does it" instances

[–] [email protected] 11 points 12 hours ago

Yes someone suggested [email protected] and world seems to have one as well.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 16 hours ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 8 points 13 hours ago

Thank you very much! I love the cooperation in the fedi.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 17 hours ago

that's the chicken and egg problem of any social network: people don't want to go to a social network with only a few number of content creators and content creators don't want to spend their time managing another platform for only a few number of viewer... social networks needs people to be alive and so if you are interested in Peertube, it will be hard at first but use it so, just like voting system where every vote count, the platform will have one more user and if other people do the same, the platform will grow and if it grow enough it will start to attract bigger content creator, etc...

It's in people hand to break the cycle and makes that Youtube alternative a viable alternative.

I'm a peertube instance admin for years now and closed my google/youtube account 10 years ago, so I'm doing my part to break it.

[–] [email protected] 90 points 1 day ago (6 children)

It's both horrible discovery and a limited number of creators.

But, for discoverability, https://sepiasearch.org/ might help you find things to watch, since it's the only good multi-server search I've seen. (And run by the peertube devs.)

[–] [email protected] 37 points 1 day ago (13 children)

I say this everytime someone talks about peertube. You should not need to leave the website to use the website. If I search "crazy guy uses rake to play football", and it's not in the results page, I'm not going to go to ANOTHER website, to search THIS website, for a guy who doesn't understand how to play sports.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 21 hours ago (2 children)

Sepia Search is something that's also build into PeerTube, if the admin have enabled Global Search. Sepia Search uses this list of instances: https://instances.joinpeertube.org/instances

The same can be enabled in PeerTube. You can see here, that I have it enabled on my instance:

[–] [email protected] 3 points 16 hours ago

I'm so glad you pointed this out. I did not have this enabled on mine and I forgot about this option completely. I just enabled it.

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[–] [email protected] 19 points 21 hours ago* (last edited 21 hours ago) (3 children)

I would not recommend using tilvids.com. They do not federate with anyone and do not have global search enabled, which means search only shows videos from tilvids.com. It is however, possible to follow channels from tilvids.com from other platforms (instances).

Simply copy the link from tilvids.com and paste it into the search bar of an instance that has global search enabled.

Platforms can also follow channels directly from tilvids and the videos will show up on said platform.


Discoverability can be a bit finicky on PeerTube. Especially if you don't know how to fine tune the filters.

If you take a look at this list: https://peertube.wtf/home and this one https://lemmy.wtf/post/15810205, you'll see that there's plenty of content creators to follow. I discover new ones almost every day.

There really isn't any other big content creators on PeerTube, other than The Linux Experiment, but if you wanna see your favorite creator on PeerTube, ask them.

If you are looking for a platform (instance) to register on, I recommend looking at this list: https://lemmy.wtf/post/15816115

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 hours ago

Simply copy the link from tilvids.com

...what link?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

Veronica explains is one channel I always enjoys (if you like Linux).

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 hours ago

She is on her own instance now

[–] [email protected] 8 points 14 hours ago (1 children)

I just rejoined PeerTube after I had a quick look years ago, and it's gotten way better since then, actually. I found out Space Quest Historian is on it, too!

But yeah, discoverability isn't good. Lack of an algorithm also makes bingewatching impossible - for better and worse, I guess.

As you linked them, I'd also recommend peertube.wtf - they even reacted very quickly when I reported a transphobic german conspiracy channel/server.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 13 hours ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 hours ago

Excellent instance!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 13 hours ago

Oh :D

Well, you are doing a great job, and I like what I have seen so far! Keep up the good work!

[–] [email protected] 21 points 1 day ago (4 children)

Just horrible discovery leading creators to abandon the platform.

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