I just don't get how Lemmy is going to act as a proper replacement for Reddit.
I understand the basic concept of Lemmy and the Fediverse, and people are touting the concept of it being federated and not centrally controlled, but it is an absolute mess and nobody seems to have an idea about what to do with it.
How are communities going to grow if there isn't at least some form of central management. Other than there being an underlying framework that connects the servers, they're all just doing what they want.
Outside of the underlying framework, there's no 'guidelines' or consistency. The servers have random names, and the main Lemmy.ml is telling people to register elsewhere.
How is this going to bring in a wider audience if people are being directed to lemmy.fmhy.ml, sopuli.xyz, or sh.itjust.works?
What is the purpose of the Fediverse when forums for niche interests already exist on the internet?
Does it make sense to have something like a 'sports' server that has communities for soccer, NFL, basketball, MMA? But then how do you get a consistent naming scheme that lets people know it's part of the fediverse?
Maybe Lemmy could work as a replacement, but it seems like it needs a 'flagship' server with a group of people maintaining it to set an example. Then other servers that cover more specific areas, such as sports, can be set up and potentially work closely with that flagship group.
If this doesn't happen, then I can't see how this doesn't just fizzle out.
P.S. I've also compared two different Lemmy servers and looked at the same post in a community, and there are different numbers of comments on each where they haven't synced up...
I also wanted to post this to the main Lemmy community, but as I had to register via a different server, I'm not able to access that community from the server I'm using for some reason...
I think with the influx from reddit, which gathers a lot of technical users (which I think are also among the first users to migrate), I can see lemmy getting a lot more contributors in the coming days/weeks.
Among the features I'd love to see happen, some would also address your concerns about the lack of centralization :
I think communities "fusing" like you mentioned would be a good idea, but I still think one server needs to stand out from the rest as a place for people to join.
Most people in this thread seem to be content with Lemmy not being Reddit though, and I just don't think they realise how quiet it's going to be if new users trying to leave Reddit aren't snapped up ASAP.
Personally, if I go to a community and there are 5 posts a day with only a few comments, then that seems utterly pointless and I won't be coming back. I imagine some people will give me shit for that and say that I should be the change I want to see, while also being the exact same and likely giving up on Lemmy after a few weeks.
I don't think a "main" instance is something we want. If one instance completely takes over the whole federation, we will have another reddit debacle in a few years.
While Decentralization is not a silver bullet against monopoly (just look at what gmail did to e-mails), centralization seems to always kill independence once platforms reach a critical mass