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I see mostly the same content on Lemmy/PieFed as Reddit, but without the niche stuff. What’s the actual benefit? (piefed.zip)

submitted 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) by MindfulMaverick@piefed.zip to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml

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I’m trying to understand the appeal of the Fediverse alternatives, but I’m struggling to see the value.

Right now, when I browse Lemmy or PieFed, I feel like I’m seeing 95% the same content I see on the front page of Reddit—memes, politics, and tech news—just with fewer comments and less activity. Meanwhile, the niche communities I actually use Reddit for just don’t exist here, or are ghost towns.

I thought the main draw of the Fediverse was the idea of finding a community where you feel like you belong, that fits your interests, but the structure seems to work against that. We have thematic instances, but as soon as you look at the “All” feed, it just flattens everything back into one generic Reddit clone. If you only look at your local instance to avoid that, you’re just isolating yourself, and at that point, you might as well just use a multireddit on Reddit without needing to make a new account.

So, what is the actual benefit of using Lemmy or PieFed over Reddit?

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[–] TORFdot0@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

It’s the same content but you retain ownership of your data (depending on your instance) and the ability to influence moderation policy by voting with your feet and moving your account if your instance doesn’t align with your preferences.

I don’t see much downside as I didn’t really engage with niche subs on Reddit. Or at least I don’t remember it anymore.

[–] davel@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Practically speaking you don’t retain ownership of anything you publish here. It’s all out there in the open, being scrapped by bots.

[–] ferric_carcinization@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

being scrapped by bots.

I think you might have meant "scraped'. I don't think that AI companies would throw away valuable training data without a goo reason.

[–] davel@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 day ago

I satnd corecded 🫡