Do we need more users ?
-
Niche hobbies and small communities (that are active) is what is needed
This is it exactly. I made a hard cut with Reddit, but I'll admit to missing the sysadmin subreddit. The place was full of very smart, helpful people and also cranky. The PowerShell subreddit was another great resource. I haven't been willing to go back, but those sorts of communities only exist when you hit a certain mass of people on a platform.
-
Maybe its a question of organization. Perhaps we shouldn't have generic instances just instances around topics. That way niches can form without being too fractured and if said topic goes away it does not take several other coms with it.
One issue is I think Lemmy's UX means there's less friction with local communities than remote communities (not sure why) which is why usually the lemmy.world version of communities typically wins without a lot of effort to steer people
-
Isn't that how Piefed onboarding works?
Yes.
I've seen so many discussions like this about what needs to be done. So I did those things.
Very few noticed and I quickly got tired of popping up and saying "oh yeah I fixed that" to everything. Besides it makes me look like a smug asshole.
-
I just went to "All" and sorted by "Top: Today".
90% is memes.
All will always be a dumpster fire.
PieFed has Popular, which is similar except curated to have less memes https://piefed.social/home/top/popular
-
All will always be a dumpster fire.
PieFed has Popular, which is similar except curated to have less memes https://piefed.social/home/top/popular
The reason why I checked "All" is because I wanted to see which posts has the most upvotes.
This to me is an indicator of the quality of the users. At the time the top post in "All" had ~950 upvotes.
What does the majority of the users consume and deem worthy of upvoting? If it's all memes that have the most upvotes and not original content or genuine posts then it's the users themselves that are the problem.
As an outsider why would I want to join the Fediverse if the first things I see are memes/shitposting/bad news? I can get that on all the other already established social sites.
If you want others to join the Fediverse then you all need to create better OC. It's literally that simple.
-
Following https://tarte.nuage-libre.fr/c/fediverse/p/194717/we-need-more-users I decided to explore data a little bit more. I'm not the biggest fan of growth-as-as-target so I wanted to see how much the people were participating in the discussion.
The data
I took the data from the API explorer in https://api.fediverse.observer/ with this query:
query { monthlystats { date_checked softwarename total_posts total_users total_comments } }Then parsed the json with this https://jqlang.org/ filter:
jq '.data.monthlystats | map(select(.total_users > 0 and (.softwarename == "lemmy" or .softwarename == "mbin" or .softwarename == "kbin" or .softwarename == "piefed"))) | group_by(.date_checked) | map( {date_checked: .[0].date_checked, total_users: ([.[] | .total_users] | add), total_posts: ([.[] | .total_posts] | add), total_comments: ([.[] | .total_comments] | add)}) | map({date_checked, posts: .total_posts/.total_users, comments: .total_comments/.total_users}) | sort_by(.date_checked) | map([.date_checked, (.posts | tostring), (.comments | tostring)]) | .[] | @csv'(As you see I filtered for the threadiverse. I also did the same with all software, I'll put the graph for that in comments)
Then did a good old' chart
What to think of it
I don't know. Users' activity is on the rise and I find it nice
I had the idea to revive dead c/ by reposting from reddit. It's controversial to use a bot
-
Yes.
I've seen so many discussions like this about what needs to be done. So I did those things.
Very few noticed and I quickly got tired of popping up and saying "oh yeah I fixed that" to everything. Besides it makes me look like a smug asshole.
You should be a proud smug asshole (endearing) for fixing the missing capability of Lemmy poisoned the well.
I wouldn't have stuck being in the threadiverse if it wasn't for piefed. It would just be a failed third attempt to join Lemmy since the reddit APIpocalypse.
-
Just my two cents, but there's just no reason for people to come here when it's 80+% political shit and rage bait and virtue signaling. Hell, I've got 80% of the content here filtered out as it is, and I want to be here.
Find your nearest non-political hobby community and start posting things people actually want to see and maybe we might see some growth or people sticking around. My current hyperfixation/hobby is Meshtastic, so I've been pretty active there lately. If that's not your thing, then there's:
- !woodworking@lemmy.ca
- !leathercraft@lemmy.ca
- !artshare@lemmy.world
- !gardening@sh.itjust.works !Houseplants@lemmy.ca !houseplants@mander.xyz
- !baking@sh.itjust.works
- !sewingrepairing@sh.itjust.works or !sewing@lemmy.world
- !television@piefed.social
- !movies@piefed.social !movies@lemmy.ca !movies@lemmy.world
- !jigsaw_puzzles@lemmy.world
If you're like me and not good at any of that, tell us about cleaning your gutters or doing your laundry over in !Dullsters@dullsters.net
The point is, we need more posts about what make us happy and less about what we're angry at (which is pretty much goddamned everything).
It would be a huge improvement if politics were corralled into the political communities.
There are accounts that double post in both politics and news as well as other communities, I assume because people who have politics filtered actually secretly want to see politics... (/S)
-
We have a lot of non-voters that love to complain about the results they helped achieve.
-
I had the idea to revive dead c/ by reposting from reddit. It's controversial to use a bot
Here's the thing imo. Bots used well can be really useful. The most attractive part about Reddit/Lemmy though is the comments. Seeing what people have to say about stuff is quite nice.
BUT. I can see how bots can be super helpful to subscribe to content where community interaction isn't that important (like art posted by artists on Instagram, Twitter and so on). The main attraction is the art itself. Not the comments.
This way, I can see what my favorite instagram artists are up to without selling my soul to zuck.
-
Niche hobbies and small communities (that are active) is what is needed
Comes with numbers. Not before.
-
I agree with everything that you've said. I would also add:
Find your nearest non-political non-tech hobby community and start posting things people actually want to see
Because if we're going to cast the same net reddit does, people with a more varied set of interests need to come here. Can't be all linux, politics, and news. We're going to need people who like baking. We're going to need sports fans. We're going to need music.
I could type new communities we need to be active all day. Humans are surprisingly a diverse set of creatures. You have one set of interests, I have another. Different set of interests. And both are totally valid.
The thing people here don't seem to grasp is that OTHER interests and OTHER people using the fediverse isn't a bad thing. If a bunch of boomers come here, and make their own communities to talk about Taylor Swift, and whatever else they talk about on facebook. That's good that it would be here! Not bad!
They could talk about gardening, and model trains, and whatever else. It wouldn't appeal to you, and thats ok.
We're going to need sports fans.
This. We are in huge lack of sports discussion here on lemmy. I'm looking at other places for sports content because it's just not here. I miss live threads.
-
We're going to need sports fans.
This. We are in huge lack of sports discussion here on lemmy. I'm looking at other places for sports content because it's just not here. I miss live threads.
I agree, Go Guards!
-
Following https://tarte.nuage-libre.fr/c/fediverse/p/194717/we-need-more-users I decided to explore data a little bit more. I'm not the biggest fan of growth-as-as-target so I wanted to see how much the people were participating in the discussion.
The data
I took the data from the API explorer in https://api.fediverse.observer/ with this query:
query { monthlystats { date_checked softwarename total_posts total_users total_comments } }Then parsed the json with this https://jqlang.org/ filter:
jq '.data.monthlystats | map(select(.total_users > 0 and (.softwarename == "lemmy" or .softwarename == "mbin" or .softwarename == "kbin" or .softwarename == "piefed"))) | group_by(.date_checked) | map( {date_checked: .[0].date_checked, total_users: ([.[] | .total_users] | add), total_posts: ([.[] | .total_posts] | add), total_comments: ([.[] | .total_comments] | add)}) | map({date_checked, posts: .total_posts/.total_users, comments: .total_comments/.total_users}) | sort_by(.date_checked) | map([.date_checked, (.posts | tostring), (.comments | tostring)]) | .[] | @csv'(As you see I filtered for the threadiverse. I also did the same with all software, I'll put the graph for that in comments)
Then did a good old' chart
What to think of it
I don't know. Users' activity is on the rise and I find it nice
The post the other day about lemmy needing more users and engagement gave a little nudge to me commenting more. I guess same thing happened with many users and you can see the spike in the graph.
-
Yes. I'm here for the long tail, the niche communities. And what do I see? Not enough photos of houseplants! Come on, you must have some too. And to add to the list, !books@lemmy.world looks nice.
Hearing this from someone that from what I can see has one post and four comments in 3 months is more than a little ironic.
-
Just my two cents, but there's just no reason for people to come here when it's 80+% political shit and rage bait and virtue signaling. Hell, I've got 80% of the content here filtered out as it is, and I want to be here.
Find your nearest non-political hobby community and start posting things people actually want to see and maybe we might see some growth or people sticking around. My current hyperfixation/hobby is Meshtastic, so I've been pretty active there lately. If that's not your thing, then there's:
- !woodworking@lemmy.ca
- !leathercraft@lemmy.ca
- !artshare@lemmy.world
- !gardening@sh.itjust.works !Houseplants@lemmy.ca !houseplants@mander.xyz
- !baking@sh.itjust.works
- !sewingrepairing@sh.itjust.works or !sewing@lemmy.world
- !television@piefed.social
- !movies@piefed.social !movies@lemmy.ca !movies@lemmy.world
- !jigsaw_puzzles@lemmy.world
If you're like me and not good at any of that, tell us about cleaning your gutters or doing your laundry over in !Dullsters@dullsters.net
The point is, we need more posts about what make us happy and less about what we're angry at (which is pretty much goddamned everything).
!Nonpolitical_comics@piefed.social!
-
Here's the thing imo. Bots used well can be really useful. The most attractive part about Reddit/Lemmy though is the comments. Seeing what people have to say about stuff is quite nice.
BUT. I can see how bots can be super helpful to subscribe to content where community interaction isn't that important (like art posted by artists on Instagram, Twitter and so on). The main attraction is the art itself. Not the comments.
This way, I can see what my favorite instagram artists are up to without selling my soul to zuck.
Yeah I did plan to interact with whatever gets cross posted from reddit
-
Look at it from a new user's perspective; someone who has not curated their feed or otherwise "made the fediverse what they want" yet. e.g. They land on Lemmy World or another big instance and their default sort is "active". Doing that now in an incognito window, and half the front page is rage, same on the second, and the stuff that's not are some random shitposts and Linux filling in.
Truth be told, looking at that, I probably wouldn't want to sign up. Especially if I didn't know that different instances have different cultures, etc.
Assuming they're a normie (which we desperately fucking need here), I just don't see that they'd want to stick around. Aside from trolls and spammers, the only people we seem to consistently attract here are the "Wah wah I was banned from Reddit" types and, while there's certainly a sizable pool to draw from, I wouldn't exactly consider them the pick of the litter for growing the fediverse.
The point of OPs post is that usage here is declining, and I am simply pointing out that I feel all the rage and politics is not particularly inviting.
Edit: And you know what? I'm just going to fucking say it. There's too many armchair activists here who won't let you enjoy a single moment without reminding you that something bad is happening somewhere in the world and that you have some kind of moral obligation to be angry all the time about it. And if you're not angry all the time then you're somehow part of the problem.
Rage bait, tiktok/twitter/facebook/Instagram reposts, politics just happen to be what tends to get the most activity across social media. That's what you see when you view social media without an account whether it is lemmy or popular corporate run sites.
Its why filter tools, avoiding all, and sticking to subscriptions has been a thing for a long time prior to the reddit third party hammer.
I don't know any social media that isn't explicitly niche focused that isn't a terrible default experience. And by niche I mean like some old school forum that only talks allows talks of a specific topic like video games.
Broad appeal talk about whatever topic you want is going to be generally trash by default, since so many different topics and communities are sharing the same space.
-
We had the same thought. Right before I saw your reply, I added some hobby communities to my comment as examples.
This place is so flooded with politics and raging over the news that I'm about to choose a random hobby community that's active and pick up said hobby just to be able to have something besides Star Trek and Linux to talk about here lol.
What social media isn't filled with politics and rage when looking at the all category? I don't know any social media that is broad appeal that doesn't have that stuff unless you stick only to your subscription feed or use filters.
Only social media I've seen that's been free of that stuff by default have been niche topic focused communities like a video game forum that only allows off tangent stuff in the offtopic section.
-
Following https://tarte.nuage-libre.fr/c/fediverse/p/194717/we-need-more-users I decided to explore data a little bit more. I'm not the biggest fan of growth-as-as-target so I wanted to see how much the people were participating in the discussion.
The data
I took the data from the API explorer in https://api.fediverse.observer/ with this query:
query { monthlystats { date_checked softwarename total_posts total_users total_comments } }Then parsed the json with this https://jqlang.org/ filter:
jq '.data.monthlystats | map(select(.total_users > 0 and (.softwarename == "lemmy" or .softwarename == "mbin" or .softwarename == "kbin" or .softwarename == "piefed"))) | group_by(.date_checked) | map( {date_checked: .[0].date_checked, total_users: ([.[] | .total_users] | add), total_posts: ([.[] | .total_posts] | add), total_comments: ([.[] | .total_comments] | add)}) | map({date_checked, posts: .total_posts/.total_users, comments: .total_comments/.total_users}) | sort_by(.date_checked) | map([.date_checked, (.posts | tostring), (.comments | tostring)]) | .[] | @csv'(As you see I filtered for the threadiverse. I also did the same with all software, I'll put the graph for that in comments)
Then did a good old' chart
What to think of it
I don't know. Users' activity is on the rise and I find it nice
As for the title question:
Do we need more users ?
We don't need more users. It might be nice, there are benefits, but we don't need it. I agree with you on not caring much about growth-as-a-target, "growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of a cancer cell". I was here years before the first big reddit exodus with the third-party API changes and I was having a good time back then too.
