The core issue here is instances disappearing, and That goes into the discussion of the structure of the fediverse right now vs. the fediverse in the future
A dozen big instances feel better now, and I personally wouldn’t make a community on a smaller instance unless I know it is likely to stay up. If it was run by an existing organization for example.
Long term though, I trust existing organizations to set up stable instances that won’t be shut down easily. If a government, school, game company etc. makes an instance it’s not likely to go down. Having lots of instances will look more normal then.
Ultimately we don’t need to do anything differently, I recommend new people join a big instance and then make a new account once they know what instance they like.
note to everyone: please don’t downvote good faith questions
OP asked a pretty reasonable open ended question. There are other people who may be thinking the same, and reading the discussions here might change their minds. Save downvoting for rule breaking / content that’s bad for the community
I have a few friends and family on Signal. Pretty much everyone uses other services too (including myself) but Signal is installed on a few
I talk to some friends / family on Signal exclusively. They either already cared about it, or they’re close enough that they trust my recommendation / still don’t care but want to put in the effort
I talk to some friends / family on Signal only when we want to have a more private conversation
Some people won’t ever be convinced, I talk to them on other services or in person when privacy is important. I set up boundaries to protect myself, and people usually respect that.
This way I protect myself while respecting other people’s choices.
For you I’d recommend focussing on the second option. When you need to talk privately, ask the person to install it and give a short explanation for why it’s better. If they do, then great it’s installed and it’ll get used once in a while. Maybe they will see other people and build up the network. If they don’t install it, then suggest an alternative like talking in person
There’s not much to do really. On the web, you’ll see a little pencil icon near the community name, which lets you change things (ex. Sidebar text, images, settings).
It’s up to you how you want to do things. I’d recommend adding a description to the sidebar for what you want to see in the community, and any relevant rules. People in your community will need to follow those rules, as well as the rules for the lemmy.world instance (ex. Think local laws vs. national laws), so you don’t need to cover everything.
No shame in copying rules from other places, such as the Reddit equivalent, when you’re not sure.
Day to day, you’ll see reported content in the mod page (little shield icon up top) and if you want to remove a post you need to open the comments and then find the button for it.
@xylinna I’m happy to help out while the community is cleaned up again (if you guys want more help), but I probably won’t stick around since I think Jimbabwe can handle it :)