• grid11@lemy.nl
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    1 hour ago

    Because most people haven’t gone far enough to even understand this question. The choices come prepackaged, that’s what in front of their eyes, so they assume that’s how it suppose to be, and take the easy ride

  • tfm@europe.pub
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    4 hours ago

    Because of network effects.

    Building a social network is hard. A typical chicken or egg problem. If you don’t have a user base, nobody is willing to join, and if nobody joins, you don’t have a user base.

    It usually requires a bunch of money to build a social network.

    The fediverse has a long time to go but I believe it will win sooner or later.

  • bambootstrap@lemmy.ca
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    4 hours ago

    The Fediverse is a confusing concept. I’m a giant nerd and even I don’t really understand how this is supposed to work. Centralized platforms provide a more straightforward user experience. And as others have said, that’s where the content is right now.

    • ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆@lemmy.ml
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      2 hours ago

      It’s no more confusing than using email, and everybody managed to figure that out. You don’t need to know how the nitty gritty of it works. The network effects is a far bigger issue, as you point out, centralized platforms simply have far more content on them.

    • SendPrudes@lemm.ee
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      5 hours ago

      Yeah and I wasn’t sure what it mean on account creation to commit to a server fully. I ended up getting a lot of supportive comments when I did ask.

  • venotic@kbin.melroy.org
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    4 hours ago

    Because they want to feel involved. They want to be with the in-crowd. If they come to the Fediverse, then they’ll think it’s weird and might scare them because it’s a new concept they can’t grasp. When really, I see the Fediverse as just a social media reset. But because it doesn’t have all of the enshittification that centralized social media has, they don’t dare bother.

  • melsaskca@lemmy.ca
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    3 hours ago

    Evolution of human behaviour is slow. Right now we are all enmeshed in the dawning discovery that the current way we run society is falling apart at the seams. Just enter the core of almost any city in North America and you’ll see what I mean (and not just N. America). It’ll take a while to set itself right, or it may all just burn in a raging nuclear fire launched by a pissed off oligarch who does not get his way.

    Definitely not forward progress towards a better day.

  • meaansel@lemmy.world
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    7 hours ago

    I asked someone on bluesky i follow what is mastodon lacking that they ultimately chose bluesky, and they said something along the lines “basic ease of use. The way it works is probably perfectly sensible to fediverse people, but I had an awful time there”

    They do indeed have (abandoned) mastodon account with posts, so they did try. I don’t know what they meant by it lacking basic ease of use, and I didn’t feel entitled to ask stranger for more explanation. But it wasn’t picking instance, since they already had an account on one of them.

    The only thing I personally noticed is off is following people on other instances if you’re not looking at them via your instance website Identity not being perfectly transferrable on mastodon. You can post a special “follow me there instead” post, but what if your instance went tyrant and wouldn’t let you post it? Or just went offline? I think cryptographic identity would be more robust for that, but it would also mean user having to store private key somewhere, which would be even less user-friendly

  • Alice@beehaw.org
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    5 hours ago

    I like to follow a couple reporters directly as opposed to subscribing to the local paper and wading through the fluff pieces, so that means using Bluesky.

    Back when I was still an artist for my super niche internet garbage, that meant using Tumblr, then after the Tumblr purge, Twitter. Then after Musk, cohost, then after cohost… I mean, I was done with art but I’d probably be on Bluesky for that too.

  • kobra@lemm.ee
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    9 hours ago
    1. Ease of use

    The combination of having to choose an instance and then start with an algorithm free blank slate is a tough ask. It literally takes time to sit down and setup your initial “feed”, which is probably a good thing, but not at all what attracts users whimsical curiosities nor what they’ve experienced over their entire existence with social media.

    • Jimius@lemmy.ml
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      7 hours ago

      This. And some people just want to post in front of a crowd. So far I like Lemmy because there’s more conversation going on. And less “Look at me!” posts.

  • VeganCheesecake@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    12 hours ago

    I don’t think the average user thinks much about the platform they’re on, and about who controls it. I think they go to wherever most of their family/friends are.

    Also, those platforms are firmly in the mainstream, the alternatives aren’t really - you’d have to actively go search for them. People just aren’t likely to do that, I don’t think.

  • phanto@lemmy.ca
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    13 hours ago

    In my IT program at school, the only people who have heard of the fediverse are the ones I’ve told.

  • davel [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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    10 hours ago

    I don’t think federation vs centralization is the primary differentiator. I think corporate vs non-profit/ad-free/donation-only/volunteerism is. Our marketing budget is goose egg. It’s all word-of-mouth.

      • Otter@lemmy.ca
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        8 hours ago

        I can also see some people being opposed to them spending the donation money on ads, since they’d be giving money to companies that may be in opposition to what we’re doing here (or ideological reasons around the advertising industry in general).

        Maybe if there was a separate pool of donations specifically for advertising, then people who want to support that can donate to it? Those who don’t can still donate to the projects themselves

  • eldavi@lemmy.ml
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    13 hours ago

    People follow the crowd and centralized media had considerably bigger crowds