This is a theory that’s previously been stated in log/39-normie-hypothesis.gmi, but I think it’s worth expanding on as it’s become very relevant with the recent Reddit shit-show actualizing just how bad that website has gotten along with social media in general.
I think the model demonstrate how the ’enshittification’ process is an inevitability with any social media that is run on a venture capital model.
An online community can be like a village, where you have familiar faces, collective experiences, shared values and so forth.
I agree. The problem is that many people who come to Lemmy don’t know how it works, and they gravitate to the biggest instances automatically. Heck, it’s what I did when I joined Beehaw. It wasn’t until a few days later that I understood the pro’s of this method. Fortunately, the Beehaw community rules really aligned with me, so I was lucky in that way.
Im definitely in that boat. Tying back to the baseball example I searched for communities with the keyword baseball and subbed to the largest. With some other interests I have actually joined multiple of the same communities that are just in different lemmy servers.