Sister instances would be my preferred option, it could mean we build the communities, but never have to sacrifice this instances culture by getting too large on a single instance.

Adding another view would be the way to go for sister instances to connect in a deeper way than the rest of the fediverse but still maintain some semblance of separateness.

It puts me in mind of the EU bloc, a supranational organisation, where the culture and way of life of the participating States is maintained, but many benefits of the closer connectedness are granted.

I'd be keen for a more descriptive view label than 'curated'. Maybe it could become an extra field that admins launching sister instances are able to fill in themselves. I guess this is something we'd have to approach lemmy developers about.

Giving them the ability to have a uniquely descriptive name could be fun though. In our case it could be Australasian Allied Instances (AAI), or Australasian Union of Federating Servers (AFUS), or my personal favourite "Warboss Gorgritch's Waargh on the Fediverse".

and, my mind is mush, i'm going to bed...