Let’s be honest, the real reason Lemmy build most of its traffic is because of Reddit users. But the thing is, outside of the mass exodus in the west that too from the PC era.. people discover and join Reddit not because it’s another social media like Facebook or Twitter that people need to reserve their usernames on like a brand or celebrity but because Google Search is kinda… actually absolute trash by SEO and machine learning crawlers.

Most of the world (I am from India btw, hello~) join or even discover reddit because they’re trying to search for actual solutions, recommendations, advice or even reviews by actual experienced people without having to go through another YouTuber which can stem from troubleshooting a router, finding an actual FOSS option or seeking immediate solutions to the recent CrowdStrike fiasco for example. After having to visit reddit every time whenever using a search engine including for education to career advice, I ended up directly signing up with reddit a decade ago.

Recently, Reddit even restricted its search results to Google only in a business partnership meaning those using Bing, DuckDuckGo to Ecosia or even SearchGPT wouldn’t be able to access Reddit answers anymore. Say, if someone searches for how to block ads on chrome as example - Solutions like uBlock Origin come into existence and continue to exist because of the combined community in Reddit that Lemmy is trying to preserve.

Unlike others, am not saying Lemmy would be dead but it would be pretty much like Discord-Telegram or Tumblr instead of wiping Reddit or correcting Facebook. Reddit is not something you discover from word-of-mouth or join from peer pressure unlike other social media which is even truer for Lemmy but because it actually helps and is useful to people.

Lemmy can’t be taking the path of 𝕏 (Alone Mask’s Twitter) but any of the good platforms were before the Enshittification with Facebook’s way~

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[–] atmur 5 points 2 months ago

Yeah, I think that's definitely one of the roadblocks Lemmy is facing at the moment. Even though I deleted my Reddit account after the API nonsense, I'm absolutely still appending every DDG or Startpage search with "reddit." Especially with the flood of AI-generated garbage filling search results, it's the easiest way to get quick answers from (probably) real people.

However, that also relates to Reddit's other advantage, in that it actually has a decade and a half of content to be indexed in the first place. The magic of Reddit is that every question has been asked in every way at least 5 times over, Lemmy just doesn't have that history yet.

[–] over_clox 4 points 2 months ago (12 children)

Interesting and well written (cross)post. If you hadn't said you're from India, I would have never guessed. The only spelling error I spotted is right at the end where you said Mask and not Musk.

All good though, we're (almost) all human around here. That's one of the big reasons that more experienced and educated people are switching towards the fediverse..

Fuck Spez

[–] MarkalAlvarez 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Twitter has been turned into a dumpster fire and people are still using it because of convenience, the same applies to Reddit.

I left Reddit not just because of the CEO but also because of the awful app they forced their users to use full of ads.

[–] over_clox 2 points 2 months ago

Spez (or one of their admin monkeys) perma-banned me from Reddit after like 7 years, for of all stupid things, posting actual facts about Elon Musk and his Boring Company's "Not A Flamethrower" contraption.

Wasn't any hate speech. Wasn't misinformation, I even posted reference links. Wasn't anything inappropriate or gory. Just straight up facts.

That was not all that long before Elon bought Xhitter.

Gotta love the irony huh? Fuck Spez and Musk.

[–] pocopene 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)

You mean other than "it's content" in the title?

[–] over_clox 2 points 2 months ago

Meh, true that. Hell, I dunno how to properly cross post on Lemmy, nor do I bother doing that anyways so whatever. 🤷‍♂️

[–] Lemminary 2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Maybe OP is fluent and I'll give the benefit of the doubt but I've also seen many developers specifically from India use Grammarly or ChatGPT to correct their writing. Idk, it's something to consider.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

The only spelling error I spotted is right at the end where you said Mask and not Musk.

It's a wordplay. I personally call him Melon Husk.

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[–] Lost_My_Mind 4 points 2 months ago (8 children)

There are MANY reasons that Lemmy won't replace Reddit.....the list is almost endless, with each individual reason not being a hurdle on its own that can't be solved. However the combined number of problems is just mind blowing.

There is one chief problem that sums up all the little problems quite nicely. It's the Fediverse culture. It's somehow a platform that is designed to be open and free, but because of the userbase comes off as a walled garden. If you're not a programmer, or a linux user, or have techie interests, it's not the platform for you. And in order to even be comparible to reddit, it has to be a platform for everyone.

As it stands though, Lfmmy is a disjointed, unorganized mess that if you aren't part of their clique, you're not welcome. If you say anything bad about linux, or star trek, or github, you get downvoted to hell. Ask me how I know.

Oh, and for the record, linux is ALSO a confusing hot mess for the average person. But until linux developers accept this, and make a linux distro that is as easy to understand as windows, it's userbase will remain something akin to a rounding error for windows userbase numbers. And I'm saying that as someone who's remaining on Windows 7, because everything since has been hot garbage.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago

You're not gonna get many linux users respecting your opinion on tech if youre such an outlier. Windows 7? Cmon, ya gotta expect to get pushback on this right? Not just Linux nerds either... like Who do you tell this bombshell to and they're like "yeah ok that's normal?"

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago (2 children)

You are right. I made a post about why I liked my iPhone in the Apple Enthusiasts community, and some Lemmy users were furious.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago

I've seen your post. Ouch - you stumbled upon some nasty circlejerking there. On multiple levels.

Plenty people here expect you to treat their "vision" as above everything else. Including your agency ("free will"), issues that you might want to solve, etc. That makes them unable to tell the difference between "criticising Apple" (a fair thing to do) versus "treating someone who bought an iPhone as an emissary of Satan" (what they're doing against you).

To make things worse plenty muppets there are putting words in your mouth, regarding Samsung vs. Apple.

If it's any consolation, it isn't just Lemmy. The whole internet of the 20s feels like this nowadays.

TL;DR: I know that feel, bro.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago (1 children)

That needs to stop. Did the moderators jump in?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago (1 children)

No. My post got 40% down votes. One particular user insisted that I was using Samsung flaws as an excuse to like the iPhone. That I should admit that I just wanted an iPhone and my criticism towards Android were invalid.

I felt like talking to cultists. But I don't think mods needed to involve. Lemmy is what it is.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Sad to hear.

But I don’t think mods needed to involve.

I think they should to an extend, especially if the topic is Apple, being Apple to like Apple products seems like an evidence.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago (2 children)

I sometimes wish voting (or downvoting) could be limited to subscribers the subscribers of a community. Do you think this could help reduce cases like this?

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

If you say anything bad about linux, or star trek, or github, you get downvoted to hell

If not simply moderated out of the community because 'fostering dialogue is an important goal'.

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[–] badbrainstorm 3 points 2 months ago (6 children)

It does suck, that even within the apps or sites themselves, the search only gives communities.

Like, not being able to search for specific issues, people, or any other topic already posted even within your own instance is my biggest issue with Lemmy not being a sufficient replacement.

Like Reddit was the best place on the internet to go when was stuck with a Linux issue for instance. And rarely even having to post. Just searching the issue would generally get you fixed. Then we could start copying all the invaluable information over here from our communities efforts, and could then be truly free of Reddit once and for all!

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago (3 children)

I don't understand the Fedievrse objection to search indexing. Search indexing is the most important piece of what makes the internet.

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