Why YSK: If you use a VPN, (which you likely have at some point) you have probably encountered this:

really annoying! Today I had enough and googled a way around it.

Here's the instance that i used today as an example:
https://redlib.ducks.party/

github repo for more information & other instances:
https://github.com/redlib-org/redlib

It's not possible to interact with any of the information like replying or upvoting, but for simply getting a niche question answered it's pretty helpful.

Not fully related, but I would only recommend it for information that isn't on lemmy, it's best to try to move content over to here if possible.
I kinda want to make some communities for stuff I have to use reddit for, but I mainly use Voyager (mobile) which doesn't have all the options to operate a server and I wouldn't want to get in trouble

Very simple, from the source:

Lemmy Universal Link Switcher, or LULs for short, scans all links on all websites, and if any link points to a Lemmy instance that is not your main/home instance, it rewrites the link so that it instead points to your main instance.

In essence, any Lemmy link you come across is automatically redirected to your home instance. It's also easy to customise, you can add/remove instances and prevent it from working on particular sites (or force it to only work on sites you wish).

Can be installed with Tampermonkey or ViolentMonkey (or similar tools).

note: this may also work just fine on mobile browsers that support extensions (and would likely help direct your browser to opening your lemmy app - if you have one - more often), but I haven't tested this.

Many people might already be knowing this, for example people who use custom keyboard layouts, or people using different keyboard layouts, other than US, which most manufacturers and operating system and desktop environmnets use as default.

Most of my applications use vi like bindings, so pressing shift + ; to get : was a bit annoying, and so i was trying to find a way to swap them, and while doing so, I added most of greek alphabet, makes my technical writing a bit more easier (instead of doing $alpha$, I can do alt + a to get $α$), If you use TeX, then you can use #XeTeX to enter unicode, I use Typst, so I can directly use them, and they are used appropriately in text and equation mode. This also is helpful if your notes system does not have some math mode rendering (like plain markdown, without any katex).

If you are multilingual, but don't write much in the other language, this approach works well, if you

Lemmy's default sort is "Active", which means that the most active threads will stay at the top of the frontpage, which can make the same few threads stay for ages. It does give the impression that lemmy is more active though.

On ublock origin (full version, not lite), click on the settings icon:

Then go to "Filter Lists" and enable both of the "Cookie Notices" options:

Why YSK: Youtube's enshittification creates an abysmal experience. There's a list of Chrome extensions I've collected over the years that each fix an aspect of Youtube to bring back a genuine experience. I've seen in comments people mention one or two of these at a time, so this is a pack that contains everything you could need, and more.

Sample:

• My Feed
• Video View

Essential Plugins:

• Ghostery: Blocks trackers and ads
• uBlock Origin: Blocks In-video ads
• [SponsorBlock](https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/sponsorblock-for-youtube/mnjggcdmjocbb

In many countries, websites, social media and blogs are controlled by oppressive leaders. Young people, in particular, are forced to grow up in systems where their opinion is heavily manipulated by governmental disinformation campaigns.

But even where almost all media is blocked or controlled, the world’s most successful computer game is still accessible. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) uses this loophole to bypass internet censorship to bring back the truth – within Minecraft.

This might be relevant to those who wish / have to use Windows 11:

This week, Microsoft made it very clear that it wants to block the popular BYPASSNRO workaround, used to skip the internet and Microsoft Account requirement checks during the Windows 11 installation OOBE (initial setup), although thankfully, the script can still be created using Registry edits.

A 7 step guide.

YSK because webpages are increasingly bloated from excessive trackers, popups, sidebars, and more. This diminishes the experience of reading, eats up your precious internet data, and threatens your privacy.

Newswaffle is a public service created by Acidus that intelligently strips webpages of their cruft and leaves only the valuable text content. Its based in gemtext and was originally intended to be accessed using the gemini protocol, however it can very easily be reformated to HTML and proxied through HTTP for normal web browser usage. The proxy I am using is SmolNet Portal by Mozz.

Newswaffle Homepage (proxied)

If you have a kobo e-ink ereader or similar

Put simply, being in the right place at the right time, and having connections, can be as important as having the skills and experience.