The difference for me is Reddit started treating it's loyal users like sellable assets. I loved Reddit, it was a comfort zone for a long time, but they betrayed my trust, so I left and I have no intention of returning.

I doesn't matter if Reddit is really dead or not. They are dead to me.

Lemmy not catching on and Reddit dying aren't mutually exclusive, unfortunately. I personally know quite many users who left Reddit, but never made the jump over to Lemmy, because they mostly stayed on Reddit due to particular communities. With those communities getting decimated during the APIcalypse and its fallout, they had little incentive to join Lemmy.

Ultimately my personal opinion is that Lemmy is going to persist, even if it doesn't cross certain thresholds, it is still a part of the larger Fediverse and due to its interoperability, Lemmy can benefit from the success of the Fediverse, even when not being all that successful by itself.

It seemed to me like Reddit basically drove off half their content creators AND Lemmy didnt really steal too much of Reddit's userbase (around 1%)

I stopped posting there when it was clear they were hell bent on enshitifying the site. It was kind of dead here for a while after that and still isnt where reddit was/is contentwise but its getting there slowly. It is certainly to a point where I dont feel like going back to reddit for anything.

Reddit: 80% absolutely vacuous memes or self references. Gimme gimme dopamine I want more pls. 20% political news

Lemmy: Same but more like 50/50. Small percentage of very satisfying human or creative content like Reddit of old. Also every person is convinced they're right about everything and you're a moron for thinking different.

Mastodon: Everyone's a game developer or an artist, very high quality content but makes you feel useless in your life

Twitter: WTF why does Tucker Carlson live here now when did this happen

Bluesky: Lol

Meta: GREETINGS FEDIVERSE HUMANS. MAY I EXAMINE YOUR DATA FOR PURELY ETHICAL REASONS PLEASE

Lemmy won but Reddit didn't lose.

Lemmy culture was great during the initial exodus, but now sometimes I don't feel like I belong here. On Reddit, you could often find your subculture. I want the fediverse to succeed tho.

Ads. I loathe them. I will not engage with your community that forces adds.

Sure, I miss Reddit, and Youtube, and Netflix, etc., but I'm happier having stood for my principles.

I don't really care, as long as I can keep avoiding it I'm fine. I replaced my muscle memory which was what kept me going there for so long. For the rest, we'll see how things go.

that reddit feel where if you referenced something most people will get it or when you say something everyone will say the same thing and fill the thread

I think that's what people want to get away from for the most part.

I like the more serious discussions, and when there is humour it tends to feel more genuine than just a rehashed joke. Reddit definitely has more content though, and more discussion on specific communities (formula 1 being one example, here there'll be 1-5 comments on a thread that on reddit will hit 200+).

Right now I use both, I think they both have their place, but I do prefer lemmy.

Honestly, I do wish more people used Lemmy, especially for more posts and engagement for certain communities. But also, I like the smaller user base on Lemmy. I only lurked on my old reddit account because it was too populated to have real discussion. Here I feel more comfortable commenting or posting because it feels like there's a chance my comment will be seen. Also, I just don't care all that much about being on social media anymore. Feels better to have more healthy activities.

If Lemmy ever picks up, great I guess. If not, oh well. As long as I don't have to use that godforsaken reddit app, I'm fine.

Except that Lemmy did catch on.

It didn't catch on to the point that it got as big as Reddit, but anyone who expected that is a fool. It caught on to the point that it's viable - it's not going anywhere. And as time goes on, it's going to continue to grow. And that's sufficient, and really IMO to its advantage. Lemmy has a different feel from Reddit, and I like it better. And the new users it attracts over time are going to be people who appreciate it. And if the bulk of the meme-regurgitating karma whores stay on Reddit, all the better for Lemmy.

Yeah, that's pretty much it. I can't go on r/all anymore without blocking 99% of subreddits. It's all garbage. Meme after stale fucking meme and copies of memes and memes on top of memes inside of memes and ughhh. A waste of electricity and everyone's time and the only reason anyone participates is because it give the illusion of social interaction without actually providing it. There are some decent niche subreddits that still have living communities, but a significant fraction of "interactions" on reddit generally are bots circlejerking bots to get their karma threshholds so they can spam with Spez's approval. The general user isn't allowed to use an app so they can force you onto the main app, but botspammers can abuse the API all day long because it give the impression of a userbase that doesn't actually exist ahead of their IPO. I would guesstimate the number of active bots on reddit right now is higher than the number of active humans.

Fuck reddit.

Reddit feels very hollow to me, and it's something I've noticed more having avoided it for several months. On the Steam Deck subreddit for example, nearly all the posts are 'hey I just got my Deck!' and it's just people fishing for upvotes. Endless pointless posts and rarely any meaningful discussions. I don't think Reddit is dying and I hope it doesn't, because every now and then it's super useful when you find some old post from 2011 where the poster had the exact same niche IT issue as you with a helpful solution. The culture in general over there sucks though.

I've found a good mix of serious and lighthearted content on Lemmy.

and reddit's worst part are here so reddit is now better.

Reddit's worst part is Spez. I hope Spez isn't here.

All I care about is not being forced advertisements

Don't care, reddit deaddit.

Gotta hop off the eshittification train somewhere.

I'm here, but would still be on reddit if their app didn't suck compared to what I was used to before the API purge. I still prefer reddit's content, but hate how I have to view it now so I'm here with y'all trying to blend in.

everyone will say the same thing

Glad that was left behind

no niche subs

We don't have enough people yet. It'll happen if we grow.

more serious and politics

I think the people who had strong enough opinions to leave reddit probably have strong opinions about other things too

Reddit had its time, I'm ready for something different. I can still use it as stackoverflow 2 when I need to google something lol

Eh, I go back on Reddit every few days, it's definitely worse. Faker, more moderated than before (tons of deleted posts and banned users). People are the same assholes as usual though so that hasn't changed much. Also these communities take time to grow, alternatively, there is nothing wrong with them being small either.

I genuinely never engaged with Reddit at all, so I'm not in a position to compare, but I don't think the numbers suggest that Reddit "is dying" or even that it got significantly impacted.

Which is fine by me. If anything, the vibe here is less Reddit and more "late 90s/early 00s forums" and that's an improvement on my book.

I'm really not sure where this argument could come from that somehow all the bad drained out of reddit?

Every time I visit that site, I'm met with 200 reposts.

Yes, we get it, you're not happy with your earning power as a young person. Yes it is indeed very sad that somebody you once saw in a TV show died. You don't like the politics of your region, I understand.

I literally do not even understand why people go there anymore, there is nothing novel or meaningful to be gained from visiting that site.

I mean, do people think reddit will get better once it IPOs?

Reddit blocked my favourite app (Apollo) and now block every IP I use (proton VPN) so I don’t use it because they’ve made it too hard to use; not because I hate them.

Don’t get me wrong, I think reddit itself is a terrible company who I feel better not supporting, but I’m not going to act like there isn’t value to the content hosted there.

I go back to reddit occasionally for certain things, and I'm always instantly reminded how many more trolls and alt right losers reddit has. So I think it's safe to say we have the better community, even if reddit isn't dying.

I don't really have a choice, Reddit became unnavigatable. But still it's true, we're all vegan DIY communists here, so careful where you tread... Redditor

What's being called "worst" changes from one platform to another, and also the metric for thriving/success/failure/dying. So, more objectively, here's what I believe that will happen:

• [Almost sure] Reddit will die in the next 1~2 years. The death will be caused by noise, brain drain, lack of moderation, and higher-up abuse. Reddit is by no means as resilient as Twitter.
• [Somewhat certain] The "Fediverse forums" will enjoy some moderate success. They won't become as big as Reddit, but they'll get way bigger than they are now.
• [Somewhat certain] Lemmy and Mbin will become part of a plurality. Other forum platforms for the Fediverse will appear, and compete with both internally.
• [Uncertain, but worth mentioning] Lemmy will become rather small in said plurality, as one of those in-Fediverse alternatives will have killer features that Lemmy won't develop due to lack of interest, in a vicious cycle.

Your first part about references was one of the things I disliked the most about Reddit where someone would make a pop culture reference and it would spiral into.a comment chain of just quotes with no originality, I'm glad that hasn't caught on in Lemmy.

My second least favourite thing, US defaultism, is alive and well on Lemmy unfortunately. On Reddit you would be told it's an American website and to deal with it, well this is the fediverse and I don't want to deal with it. Just say where you are from or what country news are about, it's not much to ask.

I’m in a fair amount of niche communities here.