I’d even say that this illustrates the success even more…
lemm.ee shuts down, iirc, because it took too much time and effort to run the instance. Not really a sign of inactivity.
the platform keeps going! The whole idea of a federated network works, as a single instance going down doesn’t impact other ones. As it happened before, see e.g. feddit.de.
So Lemmy as a whole is alive and healthy - and successful.
Yes, in many ways lemm.ee shutting down is a great example of the intention of a federated network at work, but it is also somewhat of a cautionary tale when it comes to centralisation. Ideally the load would be spread as such that any single instance shutting down would be reasonably painless to adjust for. There were already too many users and communities on .ee, really. Imagine what a disaster .world shutting down would be in the current state of things.
Honestly I wonder, hypothetically, if .world shutting down right now would actually be better for the fediverse.
If it continues to be seen as the “default instance” it just becomes a bigger point of failure. And arguably more pernicious, becomes the cultural equivalent of a reddit.
Then I start to think crazy thoughts like what if private capital took an interest in a giant instance. Idk, I’m being way too paranoid I know I know
I’d even say that this illustrates the success even more…
So Lemmy as a whole is alive and healthy - and successful.
Yes, in many ways lemm.ee shutting down is a great example of the intention of a federated network at work, but it is also somewhat of a cautionary tale when it comes to centralisation. Ideally the load would be spread as such that any single instance shutting down would be reasonably painless to adjust for. There were already too many users and communities on .ee, really. Imagine what a disaster .world shutting down would be in the current state of things.
I think it is typical human behavior to congregate to large groups.
Especially to the 2 big groups in the area.
Honestly I wonder, hypothetically, if .world shutting down right now would actually be better for the fediverse.
If it continues to be seen as the “default instance” it just becomes a bigger point of failure. And arguably more pernicious, becomes the cultural equivalent of a reddit.
Then I start to think crazy thoughts like what if private capital took an interest in a giant instance. Idk, I’m being way too paranoid I know I know
Could happen. Imagine the hosting costs of .world exploding if it becomes too big a target.
I think it only costs lw $300 a month to host their instance.
What if they need to hire to fight spam? What if they need to pay for legal?
Just saying, it can get complicated real quick.
Not exactly cheap for a project without intrinsic funding. From what I can tell, all funding they have is donations.