It appears API rate limiting has effectively killed these alternatives. You essentially get nothing but “Too many requests” 429 errors.
Lemmy sadly does not have the active niche news and discussions I want. But now nothing can be read without going to Reddit. I hate Spez
I just started using rss for the communities I still want to know about.
You only need to add the reddit name of the community and
.rss
at the end in your reader.For example
https://www.reddit.com/r/technology/hot.rss
Not the most privacy-friendly option, but I use RSS in Inoreader.