Messages

When the instance has social features and messages turned on, you can write privately to your friends.

Who you can write to

A friend, here, is someone you follow and who follows you back, both follows accepted. Open the conversation from the message icon on their profile, or from New message in Messages, which only lists them.

A conversation stays readable but nobody can write in it anymore when:

you no longer follow each other;
you blocked the other person (the person you blocked no longer sees the conversation at all);
the other account was deleted (its messages are erased, yours stay).

Where to find them

On a computer, the round button at the bottom right of the screen opens the Messages panel, with its unread count. The column on the left lists your friends: hover over one to see their last message, or widen it to read every name and last message at once. The full screen button turns the panel into a page.
On a phone, the Messages tab sits beside Notifications in the bottom bar.

Discussions about works

The Works tab gathers the discussions about a show, a season, an episode, a movie, a game, a book or an album that you wrote in, or where someone mentioned you: the latest of your own activity first, each with what was said since you last read it. They count in the Messages button too. A work’s Discussion button opens it here, and so does a reply or a mention.

These are the same comments as before, and the same rules: anyone can read them, writing needs the work in your library, and a spoiler stays hidden until you show spoilers. Replies and mentions still reach the bell too, and your phone if you turned their push on.

A comment is written like a message: the same formatting and shortcuts, ||spoilers|| within the text, /spoiler to hide all of it, # to mention a work, links that turn into cards, Enter to send and ↑ to edit your last one. @ still names someone from the discussion. An episode code such as S2E5 points at the series the discussion is about, unless the comment names another one.

Each comment has the same two buttons as a message: one to react, one for its menu (reply, edit, copy the text, mark as unread from there, share it with a friend, delete or report). On a phone, press and hold the comment instead. The … above the discussion leads to the work’s page, mutes it (its unread then shows on it alone, not in the Messages button) or searches it, as Ctrl+F does.

Writing

On a computer, Enter sends and Shift+Enter starts a new line. On a phone, Enter starts a new line and the send button sends.

Messages understand a little formatting:

Type	Shows
`bold`	bold
`italic`	italic
`*both*`	*both*
`~~struck~~`	~~struck~~
`code`	`code`
`\|\|spoiler\|\|`	blurred until clicked

And, at the start of a line: > quotes, - makes a list, and a line of three backticks opens a code block until the next one.

Select text to get a small bar that applies them for you, or use Ctrl+B, Ctrl+I, Ctrl+Shift+X (strikethrough), Ctrl+E (code) and Ctrl+Shift+S (spoiler). Each one is a switch: applied to text that already has it, it takes it off. Links become clickable; no preview is fetched, so a link you receive never contacts the site behind it until you open it.

Typing / at the start of a message opens the commands:

/spoiler hides the whole message behind a “tap to see” until your friend chooses to read it.
/reco, /review, /list: a work, one of your reviews, one of your lists (see Sharing a work).
/poll: the question goes in the field, two to five options above it. An option starting with # becomes a work, shown with its poster. Everyone votes with a tap, sees who chose what, and changes their vote by tapping another option.
/saga: one of your sagas — films and anime, games, book series — with its works in order and a progress row for each of you. A poster opens its work.
/pick video, /pick games, /pick books, /pick music: a work drawn at random from your pile — what you plan to watch, play, read or listen to. Only the domains you turned on are offered, in your order. The draw shows before you send it: draw again, or draw only among the works you both have in your piles (In common).
/where: a film or a series, with the platforms it’s on in your region and, on each, the faces of the friends who have it — for those who share their platforms (see What the other side sees).

Typing : and two letters offers emoji by their code (:fire → 🔥); a code typed in full turns into its emoji on its own. A message of one to three emoji alone shows them large.

The field shows the formatting as you type: bold in bold, a spoiler hatched. The markers (**, ||…) only show while the cursor is inside what they format.

Hover a message for its 😊 (react, one reaction each) and ⋯; on a phone, press and hold it. The ⋯ edits, copies the text, forwards it to other friends (marked “Forwarded”, without saying who wrote it), pins it, marks the conversation unread from there, deletes or reports it. An edited message says “edited”; a deleted one leaves “Message deleted” in its place.

Pinned messages are the same for both of you: they carry a pin, and the pin in the conversation’s header lists them, up to fifty. Marking a conversation unread draws a New line above that message, as opening a conversation does above the first message you hadn’t read.

The conversation’s ⋯ also searches it (Ctrl+F) and gathers its shared works: every work that went through it, once each.

On a computer, ↑ in an empty field edits your last message, and Alt+↑ / Alt+↓ move to the previous or next conversation. Every shortcut is listed in Settings › Help › Keyboard shortcuts.

A show, a film, a game, a book or an album travels as a card: its poster, what it is, its year, and a link to its page.

Share, in the ⋯ menu of any work’s page: pick one or more friends (the ones you wrote to last come first), add a few words if you like, and each friend gets it in your conversation together, as a message of its own. The same window copies the link, shows its QR code, or hands it to your device’s own share sheet.
/reco in a message: type the title, pick the work, and it goes with what you write.
/review and /list: one of your reviews, quoted with its rating (a link opens it in full on the work’s page), or one of your lists, as a strip of its first works. Both stay up to date; a private list can’t be shared.
# inside a sentence: type # and a few letters of a title, pick the work, and its name becomes a link to its page — without a card.
A link to a work’s page, on Loomkeep or on TMDB, IMDb, AniList, Steam, IGDB, Open Library or MusicBrainz, turns into its card on its own, a moment after the message is sent. Up to three per message.

While you write, links and # mentions are underlined, and the cards your first three links will become show above the field: a card’s × sends its link plain, and the next link takes its place.

A card you receive has a + that adds the work to your library — to watch, to play, to read or to listen to — and a check once it’s there.

An episode code such as S02E05 opens that episode when the message names a single series (by #, a card or a link); otherwise it stays plain text.

18+ titles never become a card. A card for a domain you turned off shows a warning instead of opening: turn the domain on in Settings › Domains.

What the other side sees

By default your friends see when you have the app open, when you’re typing, and when you’ve read their messages. Both are settings in Settings › Privacy › Messages, and both are mutual: hide yours, and you no longer see theirs.

Your streaming platforms (Settings › Streaming) stay yours unless you switch on Share my platforms with my friends in the same section: then a /where card shows your face on the platforms you have. On a /saga card or an In common draw, a friend’s library only counts where their library’s visibility lets you see it.

A new message reaches you by push only while you have Loomkeep open nowhere, and the push never contains the text. Turn it off, or mute a single conversation from its ⋯ menu, in Notifications.

Privacy and moderation

Messages are not end-to-end encrypted: whoever hosts the instance could technically read them. Moderators only see a message when one of the two people in the conversation reports it, from its flag button; the report shows them that message and the few around it.

Messages are part of the complete archive, sent and received alike.