With startrek.website we’d hoped creating a Star Trek themed instance might encourage other ex-moderators to start topic-specific instances too, and it would kick off a flourishing of myriad communities run by devoted moderators, a Lemmyverse so diverse and inspiring that not even Reddit could further justify it’s own existence in the presence of such an obviously superior system.
Instead it turned out “Star Trek and Linux” was enough to satisfy nearly everyone’s tastes (both subtle and gross).
I always laughed when someone called us a “janitor” after we banned them. Like you understand in this analogy you are the trash being taken out, right?
Cory Doctorow has a book, “Walkaway” that is basically exploring the politics of FOSS on a societal scale. It’s pretty nerdy obv but I enjoyed it and it doesn’t overly glamourize any political system the way you’d typically see in political fiction.
I use it. It’s great. I’ve tried Linux many times over the past decade but it never stuck until Zorin. If you’re coming from Windows it’s a very friendly (and polished) way of being welcomed to Linux while also showing off Linux’s strengths, things that are often hidden to the user unless they want to explore the terminal.
For Mac users who are Linux-curious I would recommend Ubuntu because it’s much similar, whereas Zorin seems clearly designed with people who liked Windows 10 but not Windows 11.
Reddit also gets a little bit worse every spike, too. There are few mods remaining on Reddit who are doing anything more interesting for their communities than basic spam removal. Automod does all the work when all the largest subs just repost the same content and fake stories anyway.
It’s not like going to implode or anything anytime soon but the quality (from my perspective at least) has totally flatlined since June because why would anyone in their right mind invest creative energy into cultivating a unique community? I think that eventually a Lemmy community will pop up that simply couldn’t exist on Reddit and will serve to illustrate why I believe this model is better.