I have noticed that I interact a lot more in Lemmy than I ever did in any social media. Let it be Reddit, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter… I am used to be the lurker, but here for some reason things are different. Wonder if more people feel like I do.
I’ve always disliked the current state of social media, because it always felt like everyone is shouting at each other rather than talking to each other. That’s why I like having penpals to writing letters back and forth and shoot the shit on whatever, and I’ve blamed Facebook and Twitter for killing that.
I lurked reddit anonymously but I don’t comment much, because it felt like the only place that you can discuss various topics with random people and learn cool things. But part of it is that slowly, it made me miserable, the hivemind with all the arguing and smugness and unfunny one-liners and most of all, the cynicism.
This place is a bit different I think, I really didn’t expect to get as involved as I am, but it kind of brought back that feeling of writing back and forth to random people and having a conversation again.
I’ve made it a goal to read and write more and talk to more people when I have the time to spare right now.
I was mostly a lurker on reddit for many years. Before that was a forum board user, moderator, and even setup a few for sports leagues. Despite being sports centric there was usually off topic sections for politics and other off subject debates. Often these sections became more popular than the sport.
Then it would became drama filled and once a year there would be complaining about all the new summer users once kids were out of school. They would flood the forums with newbie stuff and people would leave the forum and find a new home. Seems like this pattern repeats to the newer socials too.
With FB etc the forum boards seem to lose a lot of that daily traffic over time. FB and other Socials delivered that quick dopamine hit and it didn’t even need to be in the niche the forums were. For those that wanted the niches, FB groups came on the scene.
For me with Reddit it came on one of my early Android phones which was great for reading with. I didn’t comment much as the threads were usually fairly deep with comments and sort of done by that stage. It didn’t have that small town feel like the old forums so I wasn’t as inclined to add much. Still there was plenty to read, perhaps too much as books began to be replaced by socials too. Since I was only a mobile user, the API changes were a great reason to get off reddit and read books again. Still working on that.
I’m finding myself commenting more on Lemmy but like the life cycle of the forums and reddit, it’s only a matter of time when the users reach the tipping point and the feel of the place will change.
So I’m trying to enjoy things as they last these days. Hopefully get some books in there now too…
I miss having pen pals, social media really ruined that for me as well. I still remember when my, then, close friend moved over to Facebook. Our usual bi-weekly exchanges slowly changed into her posting updates and dozens of followers writing simple replies. No longer having the time to write individually. I still don’t know how exactly, but we just drifted apart after that. Still hurts a little when I think about it.
Anyway… That was about 15 years ago and until now I haven’t really been vocally active online, just spend my time lurking like so many others. I really had to make a conscious effort to get more interactive and I took the move to Lemmy as my excuse to do so. People were already complaining that no one commented and only upvoted, so I’m trying to be the change I want to see :)
It’s not like the old interactions I had with my pen pals, but I do like the human connection I sometimes get with others.
I had intended to interact more when I joined Lemmy. But given that this is only my 4th comment ever since I joined 4 months ago, that obviously didn’t happen. I’ve always been more of a lurker on most sites anyway, so I guess it’s no surprise that I’d end up being a lurker here too.
I was definitely more active on Reddit, since it had the niche subs I wanted to discuss on. Lemmy has more “generic” content, since it doesn’t have the user base to grow those niche communities.
Not yet! A lot of my interests aren’t as easy to find on Lemmy yet, but I’m definitely on here more than Reddit. I’m not really a community leader type but I can definitely be in the hype squad.
Yeah, folks are super reasonable compared to other social media sites, for the most part. The occassional nutter isn’t propped up by some PR company bot net to drive engagement so they just end up downvoted into oblivion.
I have read so many thoughtful comments on this thread that made me say to myself “Yes, that. Exactly that’s the reason I mostly rarely bothered formulating a comment or opinion on Reddit.” The whole atmosphere on Lemmy seems so much more mature, considerate and genuinely interesting to read. I really hope we can maintain this as Lemmy is (hopefully) growing.
I’ve seen it fairly often by now; many people seem to enjoy posts with moderately long comment sections. I believe this is what contributes to a more wholesome experience.
Similar to how groups meet a natural breaking point when they grow too big and people cannot know each other anymore, I imagine huge comment sections create a sense of being meaningless and unheard. This discourages sensitive voices, and may appeal more to people who don’t care anyways, which isn’t exactly a great attitude for social encounters.
I can further imagine large comment sections create FOMO for the reader, and can overall be more stressful, which leads to aggression.
Just guesses and impressions. No idea if true. Also no clue how to foster that environment in a growing network.
That is probably a part of why I do comment more here, I would see comment sections on reddit sometimes already with hundreds of comments and just felt like I was trying to slip into a convo that had already been well established or whatever, here I feel more likely to comment because the sections will be sparser and my comments will actually get replies from the users in the thread.
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