It’s not bad, but niche is just that. For a platform to become a genuine alternative to Reddit, it needs to appeal to the mainstream.

I think a big issue with Lemmy is that I think there’s a lot of people who become disillusioned with it, just like how a lot of users became disillusioned with Reddit. When users join this site, they’ll immediately notice that there’s nothing outside of extremist politics, privacy focused tech talk, and shitposting. Unless they’re interested in those topics specifically, a lot of people would rather either just go back to Reddit where there are active communities outside of these topics or find another, more active platform. A lot of people thought that Voat was going to rival Reddit when launched, but it ended up being a niche hub for extremist politics, tech talk, and shitposting until it shutdown. Now Lemmy is definitely better than Voat in every aspect, but I’m not sure how it can over come that big hump that will allow to appeal to general public

The area where Reddit shines is the big communities for non political topics. Here there isn’t an active community, let alone a large one, for any topic that isn’t politics, tech, or memes. There’s nothing here that appeals to average people like sports, gaming, science, cooking, gardening, etc. I thought this would change, at least a little, over the course of a year, but that didn’t really happen. As toxic and ad infested as Reddit is, I don’t see Lemmy becoming a mainstream alternative to it.

I mean Lemmy shares a lot of the same issues as Reddit even if it’s decentralized. I think Lemmy as a technology is better than Reddit because it’s more privacy focused, but most people don’t care about any of this. People put up with Reddit’s shortcomings because it has a massive community that is always active and fills every niche. Reddit’s daily active userbase is over 73 million. That’s hard to replicate in general, but I don’t see Lemmy getting anywhere near that mainstream. I see it as a more stable and active version of Voat, but still a niche platform nonetheless.

I mean good for you, I’m glad you’re happy here. But here’s a question for you, do you honestly think that this platform has the potential to be more than what it is currently? Platforms come and go, true, but it’s very rare for a platform to actually appeal to the general masses. MySpace at its peak had 90 million active users, Google+ had 200 million users, Yahoo still has around 700 million people use its services. While these sites ended up being failures, they still reached mainstream status. I don’t think Lemmy will die, but I don’t see it becoming a mainstream alternative to Reddit. I see it as an upgraded version of Voat. It’s a platform that will remain niche unless something drastic changes.

That’s kind of the point that I was making. This platform has little to offer outside a outside of politics, tech, and shitposting. Most of the active users are here for these specific topics, which is fine, but this places Lemmy as a niche platform not one that appeals the masses. A few dedicated people can’t foster a genuine community out of sheer enthusiasm. If that was the case then Lemmy would’ve regressed after the influx of last summer. You could be right, maybe people like you will lead this platform to grow into something more in a few years. I just don’t personally see that happening.

The whole point of social media is to interact with others… I don’t understand what you’re point is here. You just seem mad because I said something you don’t like.