Say what you will about reddit, at least an established subreddit was the place to gather on the topic, ie r/technology etc.
With Lemmy, doesn’t it follow that similar communities on different instances will simply dilute the userbase, for example !technology@lemmy.ml and !technology@beehaw.org. How do we best use lemmy as a (small c) community when a topic can be split amongst many (large C) Communities?
This is an earnest question, in no way am I suggesting lemmy is inferior to reddit. I’m quite enjoying myself here.
I don’t think people know (how end-users will cope with the distributed choices of Lemmy). Reddit 2023 is nothing at all like Lemmy. One could be considered a household name for regular users of the Internet, the other a return to something more like FidoNet.
I come from the BBS days of the early 1980’s and even social media radio before that. I come from IRL user group meetings, held at public library and after-hours company meeting rooms. It has always bothered me that current-day subreddits have mostly no identity to the moderators and that moderation is often behind the scenes.
I guess it’s like “corporate experience” that people expect this day in society… that you can walk into a generic franchise chain bar and grill and not really care who the owner/operator and bouncers are of your hangout. Anyone can start a topic/ conversation and there is just some anonymous janitorial crew who is supposed to clean up the overflowing mess if (non-venue) spam or hate messages enter into the space.
The mechanisms of who pays for the venue and the moderators also was a topic most people never bothered to think about. Like it was some taxpayer-funded city park and perhaps the admin police might spot check if anyone was causing a tragedy in that there commons. But reality is that it was a profit-seeking venue charging a cover charge in the form of selling copies of your contribution and changing the tone of your meeting space by controlling the jukebox that visitors hear in terms of advertising messages inserted into the conversation space.
Lemmy seems small, owner/operator focused, and you get a sense that each instance is like some small bar and grill where you can come and meet some strangers or friends to discuss some topics under house rules. Your tips help pay for the hosting and the jukebox isn’t piped in memes from advertisers.
I remember when Reddit had known owners with known ideals, but that was very long ago. I’ve found making it big (with the associated wealth) changes people. One owner even committed suicide over his society ideals about sharing information. Ultimately I feel like a lack of topic participation by the moderators and owners alike made people thoughtless as to their own role in building a human community and people often felt like they were fighting machines and code.
sorry if this meandered off topic, but lately I’ve had some long-time friends ask me 'what is Reddit" since it is in the news lately, and I find it hard to explain what Reddit used to be (before new Reddit and the addition of images/video) vs. the corporate-like entity we know today that our contributions and participation helped empower over the past 17 years. I’ve used it mostly daily for all that time, and I have been unhappy with society’s dehumanizing direction for too many years.
/ramble from a disturbed mind.
I hear you man. I went from active contributor to mostly lurking on Reddit, and it wasn’t even a conscious choice. Gradually, everything became very mechanistic. I knew what the top few comments would be before going to the comments. The churn became cyclic in nature.
After just a few days here, it was actually a little disconcerting how antagonistic and hostile people there are in the comments section. That’s just how people communicate, on a hair-trigger from flamewar.
I recognize your username, I saw what you wrote about SQL scaling. Can you imagine recognizing a username in a major subreddit in the reddit of today?
The dichotomy between the big communities which people subscribe to from all over Lemmy and the small meta/announcement/server issue communities for each individual instance is gonna be interesting to see develop as the userbase increases. Kinda like the difference between seeing people from your street everyday, then many more less familiar people in the city center.
I have noticed this recognition on large posts on modern reddit, but it’s usually for not good reasons, because the poster is just karma whoring.
I agree with what both of you are saying about the antagonism of the community writ large, but I am going to miss the small subs. There are dozens of them I subbed that have 500 or 1k users and are really tightly focused communities. They still have that feel from 2010ish reddit.
I’m ready to close the book on reddit as a whole, but I really will miss r/heavyseas and r/obscuremedia and r/theocho and r/desirepath etc.
It depends on the subreddit as well. There are some where discussion is expected. /r/nbadiscussion versus /r/nba, for example. The former will get into some good discussions if there’s a player looking to be traded. On /r/nba, you’ll get a bit of that but you’ll also get a few dozen, “He gone,” comments.
I appreciate both at various times. I go into /r/nba specifically for the funny takes and will go to /r/nbadiscussion when I’m feeling like reading something more. That said, even /r/nba can get into some pretty impressive posts with stats, diagrams, and excellent breakdowns. It just depends on the day.
I think the funnier times are where you expect one thing and get another. I can go into /r/guitarcirclejerk expecting some light hearted shitposting and end up with a great discussion on one thing or another.
Thanks for laying out this analogy. I agree with your sentiment and think it extends outside of the internet too. When I think of different scenes in the real world, they feel like they’ve all fallen into either super corporate places where you’re encouraged to spend money or meetup groups with no personality.
This is a great analogy, well explained.