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On the future of Lemmy vs reddit (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 10 months ago by fresh@sh.itjust.works to c/fediverse@lemmy.world

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Please indulge a few shower thoughts I had:

I wouldn't worry about Lemmy having as many users as reddit in the short term. Success is not just a measure of userbase. A system just needs a critical mass, a minimum number of users, to be self-perpetuating. For a reddit post that has 10k comments, most normal people only read a few dozen comments anyways. You could have half the comments on that post, and frankly the quality might go up, not down. (That said, there are many communities below that minimum critical mass at the moment.)
Lemmy is now a real alternative. When reddit imploded Lemmy wasn't fully set up to take advantage of the exodus, so a lot of users came over to the fediverse and gave up right away. There were no phone apps, the user interface was rudimentary, and communities weren't yet alive. Next time reddit screws up in a high profile way, and they will screw up, the fediverse will be ready.
Lemmy has way more potential than reddit. Reddit's leadership has always been incompetent and slow at fixing problems. The fediverse has been very responsive to user feedback in comparison.

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[-] ja2@lemmy.world 15 points 10 months ago

for me, reddit nearly always has way more quality content and news for me though for the time being

It's not just you.

As constructively as I can put this, reddit has been building community and goodwill for many years. Lemmy has only recently become an option and it's done wonderfully in the short time it's had.

The challenge is the catch 22. People go where there is more content, they produce content there, and then there is more content there. There no vacuum, reddit didn't disappear. It became toxic and people apparently care less about avoiding toxicity than filling up on dank memes.

All I can say to that is we all need to be the change we want to see in the world. Adopt a Lemmy First mentality, and go to reddit only to pick up legacy slack. Continue the conversation from there over here. Link it up.