Hey! This post is not specifically related to the lemmy.world instance. From now on, posts such as these will be removed, in order for the community to stay on topic. However, as this is a highly upvoted post, I'll just lock it for now.

A concern that I haven't seen mentioned is Eternal September. Right now, Redditors are the school kids who are barging into someone else's space and trying to make it their own, without first knowing what the community is like.

The same thing happened on Reddit. I've always seen the Obama AMA as triggering Reddit's Eternal September, though it can be argued that it was happening before that. The influx of users killed the Alot Monster, and forget about anyone helping with grammar; they'd be ridiculed and downvoted into the negative. Then, Reddit got rid of the up/down counter altogether, so nobody coming from Facebook would end up with hurt feelings.

Anyhow, there's a risk that Redditors are going to ruin the fediverse. I'm new here and can already see it happening. Fingers crossed though, I'm staying optimistic!

In general, I prefer quality over quantity. I never joined Reddit, and only visited under duress (i.e. troubleshooting Linux install & Reddit was the only place w/the info I needed).

For some reason, using Lemmy feels like I'm using old-school forums like EZBoard (I know...dating myself). I don't think that it needs to "become the next Reddit" to be an effective community platform.

Kind of a weird analogy, but it's like Mallrats...practically NOBODY saw it in theaters, but over time, it found its audience.

Just focus on quality community interactions, and the user base numbers will find the right level.

While a part of me doesn't think this will last forever, it's nice to be a part of a growing community in which you were a part from the relatively beginning (of an exodus, if we'll be more specific about it). It makes people feel more involved and closer to each other, and see each other beyond just being a random name or a number or a statistic. Honestly, the fact that there isn't a million eyes looking right now and scrutinizing every word I say gives me more confidence to simply... comment. Put myself out there. Like what I'm doing now. I've probably commented more in the past two days than I have from years on Reddit.

And I feel like even if it does get bigger (maybe not exponentially; I honestly doubt Reddit will lose a lot of people as some people just don't care for change. Look at Twitter :/ ), I feel like the fact I've been here from when it was in its infancy to whatever point it may become in the future would give me the courage to keep expressing myself.

Just my two cents!

Denial is the most predictable of all human responses. But, rest assured, this will be the sixth time we have destroyed it, and we have become exceedingly efficient at it.

I think the beauty of a community-of-communites platform like Reddit/Lemmy is that we can have both in a way. Sub-communities should be encouraged; where high-level communities can grow for the increased engagement and content while sub-communities can remain small and connected.

The longer ive stayed off reddit, the more I have grown the love the benifits of Lemmy. Discussions are civil, the vibe is a lot more chill and if anything, it invites users to participate. I wasn't sure if I would manage to avoid reddit given how addicted I was to it. Suddenly, I feel like I've found a better place...

i tried to become active in mastadon and i realized pretty quickly that the majority of the conversation was about mastadon growth and adoption. i just didn't care enough about that to stick around. i hope there is more here.

I've noticed that with Lemmy and a couple other alternatives it feels like the first days of 4chan and Reddit. People are actually being civil and conversations are happening instead of people staying quiet because they know their comment will be lost in the thousands.

It's really relaxing tbh.

You've got a very good point here that I don't think a lot of people have considered. I'm glad someone had mentioned it -- it could very well be just what we need.

I have nothing else to add that wouldn't be portrayed as negative so I believe putting efforts frontwards to bettering what currently is, is a great course of action.

One of the major flaws of R*ddit was the upvote/karma feature, which turned posting into a performance and a popularity contes, as you've mentioned. I hope as Lenny and the fediverse develops, we can shed those features in favor of a more simple and equitable system.

I totally agree with you. Genuine participation > growth for the sake of growth.

(Long-time reddit user, and former IRC (and ICQ!) user here too)

Better, not bigger.

I think you're pretty much right. Communities need to be big enough, not necessarily the biggest.

I was happy with a handheld CB radio hoping to catch a conversation with passing truckies, so yeah, you're good with me.

I am not interested in irc chats. Reddit was home to many interesting niche communities that are not replicated here.

On one hand, yes, it will be nice to not have posts or comments go unseen because they are lost amongst the masses. But without those masses, there is not enough to cover specific topics that have only a small community associated. This is even a larger problem due to to nature of the fediverse, were similar communities are being founded on different instances rather than a single community on the topic.

I loved IRC! I'm sure it's not super popular these days, especially with the rise of Discord, but it was super fun. I always used PurpleSurge as the server which is now gone. Maybe it will come back into fashion?

Completely agree..... I see so many posts with "I would like this feature from Reddit etc." But honestly, it's quite refreshing to have something different.

The API changes were just the straw that broke the camel for me as after 13 years plus on the platform, it didn't even resemble what I initially signed up for.

I legit hope Lemmy doesn't turn in to a Reddit 2.0 where every reply to question is someone trying to be a smart ass and where not conforming to the ideology of the masses gets you nuked.

I too remember the days of IRC and I remember sitting in certain channels where we would all take turns in staying silent and allowing someone on the chat to hit the record voice and play a Jazz song they loved. I would sit there all night listening to and sharing music with people from all over the world drinking beers and chatting among ourselves.

Man, the early days of work arounds and early internet I miss. Every night of surfing was seriously exciting as you never knew what you would stumble on or find. Now it's the same dozen websites over and over rinse and repeat.

Anyhow, nostalgia and gripe over..... I agree 100%.

I'm really enjoying Lemmy as is and don't want to be wishing it away any time soon !

Totally agree. We should worry less about coaxing redditors or about how many users joined etc etc. Interact with people. Post and comment. Create good content and share it. That's what drives engagement, and all of the other concerns depend on engagement.

Im old enough to miss chat rooms on aol. Anything like that still exist?

the real treasure is the lovely human beings all around us

This is one of the biggest things I have been saying. While a bigger community is great, I’d be happy with a community of just 1% the size of Reddit. The small community vibe really gives me memories of the older days. Glad to see other people feel the same way.

I agree somewhat when it comes to the giant subreddits, but the best thing about Reddit is that there were vibrant communities around an absolutely high variety of interests. Some of those communities were reasonably sized, but provided excellent discussion. On a smaller service like Lemmy, those small communities become ghost towns, with 1-2 people in there, and that's not fun at all.

think the difference is community vs attention (or lack there of). while i personally am not currently looking for the latter, don't think i appreciated how much i enjoy the former until this whole spez driven melt down happened.

am sure things will evolve as they're meant to, in the meantime just happy to be here.

I kinda love the anonymity of Reddit, I could talk about my personal life with strangers who won't remember me within 5 minutes so I felt safe being open about things I can't talk about IRL even if I didn't get any feedback. I'm hoping that regardless of size, the communities here allow me to do that and still feel safe. Obviously I'll be more cautious here with a smaller user base, but I was still cautious on Reddit too because bad actors who would do you harm exist everywhere and can't be totally avoided if you engage online at all. Sometimes a larger user base simply helps alleviate the stress because you are just another random user rather than a recognisable user for people like me, but it definitely cuts both ways and sometimes people forget you are a human too. The quality of the community is absolutely the most important thing tho, and good communities will grow naturally.

yeah, looking back at it now that you mention it, the only names I really recognized in reddit were the famous/infamous ones, or the ones that were obnoxious enough on the subs I subscribed to. in reddit, over the 15 years I used it, I created a new profile every year or two - had to, I kept getting banned from top-level subs. a profile name generally meant nothing inasmuch as it was required to use the platform...

Bigger is not always better. Smaller communities are exactly why the old internet used to be better. Less centralization of userbases meant more productive discussion and friendlier communities.

As a "reddit refuge" I agree with this. I showed up on Lemmy a few days before the blackout, and even that small amount of time has been enough to notice a difference. I know people are hoping to recreate the things about reddit they love/miss here, but I really hope it doesn't become a carbon copy of that place. Like many have said, I didn't feel the urge to engage on reddit since it just felt a bit pointless, no one was gonna read it. Here I've felt like I can actually have good conversations with people, and have been doing so. Ultimately things will be what they will be, but I hope we can maintain that friendly community feel for a while longer.

After a certain point, change for the sake of change is undesirable.