this post was submitted on 15 Nov 2023
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Asklemmy
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About this particular problem, I see no reason to not join the largest instance in any case. Sheer discoverability of content is massively improved from sitting in the biggest pool, as I still have to subscribe to the communities I want to see.
It's the Fediverse, not the Decentriverse.
If everyone joined the largest instance, then the decentralized aspect would become kinda moot. That would give lots of power to the owner of that instance, almost like on centralized social media.
Of course, but for the user, there's signifcant upsides to doing that unless the underlying system can essentially make the barriers between instances invisible.
Now of course this is a Lemmy-specific thing. Reddit benefitted massively from stumbling into amazing commuities and discussions, and hence sitting in the largest pool is quite useful.
I'd agree. Having one large instance isn't necessarily bad. Yes, it gives the admins quite some power, but they're obviously doing something right there. And the federated aspect is still baked into the software and present. Once they act out, all the content is replicated everywhere else and people can just switch to another instance. This isn't the same like a centralized platform. Even if people mainly use one instance.
My advice is to join a cental hub in the network if you're interested in a very broad range of content, and a specialized hub if you have more particular interests. The relationship between for example lemmy.world and startrek.website is a great example.
I think a lot of the perceived complexity of the fediverse is that it's not just a social network, but a network of social networks. You'd want to start out on a node that reflects your interests; if that interest is merely "more content", make it a central one.
If you want to be on a tiny or self hosted Mastodon instance it might even make sense to build the base of your network on a central network hub first, and then migrate when you already have rooted yourself in the network.