What was your motivation for seeking out non-mainstream platforms? Why did you choose this platform?

The Reddit API-pocalypse. I'm boycotting them until they re-enable third-party app support. If that's never, so be it.

To clarify, if Reddit ever did allow third-party apps again, I would re-evaluate my stance. If I were to re-evaluate my stance today, however, I would choose to to return due to all of the moderators and most of the posts being bots.

Reddit went to shit, and Lemmy is a lot like reddit was back in 2010 or so.

I speak loudly against immorality because of my neurodivergence, interests and character and it was all okay until I started talking too much about Western imperialism and Israel in the wrong places at the wrong times... so I ended up being banned4lyfe. 🤷‍♂️😬

I'm not going that far but I chose to not use Reddit through their first party app.

A lot of youtubers I watch in tech spaces had their mastodon listed for social media, and after looking into it I found the concept of the fediverse neat, so I decided to try out a couple of platforms, and see if it's any better than the cesspit that is mainstream social networks

Plenty of things that brought me from reddit to Lemmy.

:the algorithm deciding what subreddits you see instead of upvotes

:removal of r/all

:the kind of racist and misogynist shit that kept propping up

:Especially true in Indian subreddits, a kind of action, reaction whiplash. One subreddit says something, gets backlash on other, and this cycle.

:subreddit pollution, again an Indian subreddit problem, where you get 5 different subreddits for same topic, and all of them are getting astro turfed by politics

: and the fact all of these subreddits were being shoved down my throat. Look, there's few Indian subreddits I like to visit, but why does the algorithm keep shoving down the bad ones? And how bad you may ask? I was called out for spreading propaganda for pulling statistical figures from UNs official sources.

:also bots. Plenty of bots. Karma farmers who tell fake stories, which was easier to spot before reddit doubled down on making accounts private.

And that's it. Reddit has gotten so bad I don't even feel like scrolling r/popular or r/all anymore. And atleast for me, it's a quality problem.

I'm in various FGC circles, and when Twitter had... I don't even remember which of its many controversies, it was a few years ago, but something or other resulted in fgc.network being launched and I immediately signed on to the idea of a federated alternative that no CEO can destroy.

At the time I also did peek around some of the other parts of Fedi, uploaded some of my Splatoon stuff to PeerTube but it was a complete ghost town. My first impression of Lemmy was that it wasn't there yet, not enough critical mass.

Then Reddit had its API debacle, and I decided to commit to trying Kbin for a while, for at least as long as the blackout lasts. My impression was still that it wasn't ready to replace Reddit, that it unfortunately can't replace the kinds of niche hobby and fandom communities I used Reddit for, but I thought Kbin's software felt like it had more potential, and I would stick with it. Then the Reddit admins turned sour, the sub I moderated that participated in the blackout had our mod team threatened by the admins, and I knew I was just never going back to Reddit.

Same here that's the thing that finally got me to completely leave. I think my quality of life has been better for it.

I'm very interested in the underlying protocol: ActivityPub. It seems like the future of the open web. I'm not so sure that lemmy or mastodon will be the breakaway hit some think it might, but I'm happy to explore what they have to offer.

I'm of the opinion that for ActivityPub to really take off it will need something novel, that isn't a clone of an existing social network. It's a tall order because there are only so many ways you can configure a purely text or even multimedia based platform, but I have faith we'll eventually get there. I've personally been tinkering with the idea of a friend-finding platform that would help people make meatspace or cyberspace friends.

Updooting a Luigi post apparently got me perma banned for "inciting violence" or something stupid.

Never been interested in being bubbled and having an algo rammed down my throat - I deliberately go places online that aren’t necessarily for me. I like to see how others live and think. Hate the omnipresence of advertising. Heard about Mastodon, did some reading, ended-up here…

They killed RIF, so here I am.

The APIcalypse

Reddit admin and mod corruption.

Reddit is just AI garbage these days and the culture there has been shit for long.

It's not much better here, but still

I started to dislike meta and musk more and more.

Switched to Mastodon when Musk took over Twitter in 2022. Switched to Lemmy when Reddit banned 3rd party apps in 2023.

I was interested in decentralized platforms before. Technically Diaspora was my first "fediverse" social network, but it lacked content so I didn't use it much.

A few factors:

1. Reddit became insuferable with all the "twitter-refugees" and political bots during the last US-Elections.
2. The Buy European movement thought me what lemmy was in the first place.
3. Before dropping reddit for good, I was using it along side lemmy because lemmy is quite slow compared to reddit. Than reddit did one change that made me delete the app: they made it so that you could put your profile as private. So you could no longer see if it was a grnuine misguided peraon ot just some bot /shit stirrer.

They can re-enable whatever they want. I don't trust corporate social media anymore.

I wanted to try and find a smaller community and move to something with less of an algorithm

Either getting ignored or getting all the assholes in one comment section.

i came for the ideological reason of being able to host one's own communication server.

i stayed for the great community

Got annoyed with Reddit and the social media megacorps in general. I can actually sometimes remember and recognize usernames here. Reminds me of old school forums.

Persona age-verification bullshit on reddit

I was part of the Great Reddit Emigration of 2023.

This. I came after seeing a post about lemmy on reddit, but at it's core my move was less about reddit specifically and more about wanting to escape algorithms generally.

Edit to add: I also want to see places outside my comfort zone. How am I meant to learn and grow, if my beliefs are never challenged?

yeah yeah reddit but looking back it all started when google plus imploded

The API. At that point, I deleted my account and created an account here. Unfortunately, at this point I'm debating going back, especially since you need a login to use old.reddit. As much as I want Lemmy to succeed, there just isn't enough here for me. I was on Reddit for the niche interests like Dota, CS, 3D Printing, military hardware, and Virtual Reality, and none of that is really present here. That said, no way am I downloading their official app. All their new UIs are unusable.

Might I ask, how do access reddit outside of the official app?

I haven't used any social media before, I'm just interested in anything that's open source or decentralized. So when I heard about Lemmy, I thought I should give it a try and so far I'm loving it!

Got banned from reddit for being anti russia

Got banned from reddit for the 5th time

I came here after leaving reddit, when they shut off third party app access. I had already been wanting to leave to another platform, and many people were mentioning Lemmy and the Fediverse as an alternative. The idea of independent federated instances really appealed to me, and losing RIF was my final straw.

I also left Twitter for Mastodon around the same time, although I'm much more active here than on Mastodon.

I'm so glad I did it, because I've had a much better experience here. Even though we have bots, spammers, and some bad mods, it's nothing compared to the shithole that is reddit.

Use redlib if you're going to use reddit, don't give them positive traffic, or worse, your data and content. For example: https://redlib.privadency.com

While I totally acknowledge and agree that there are missing niche interests (although I'm pretty sure the 3D printing communities here are popular), the only way they'll grow is if people with niche interests start contributing. More content (especially OC) generally means more people, and more people means more content for you to consume. Be the change, and all that.

I made a joke about punching Nazis.

I got thrown off Reddit.

Im transfem on the internet, I can't trust mainstream platforms and i like the idea of federated platforms, so I ended up here

You can just use the website, particularly with old.reddit, but u/CorrectAlias@piefed.blahaj.zone suggested redlib, which also looks really promising.

Got my 15 years Reddit account banned for sharing a UN documented proof of Israel committing genocide in gaza, in a pro Palestine sub.

This made me 100% sure that shithole of site is moderated by Israeli PR agents to control the narrative.

The reason they banned me was “supporting terrorism” lol.

Got banned from reddit for probably insulting the wrong person.

They have “auto ban filter” for any anti Zionist content, they directly work with pro Israel agencies. Its not even mods of personal preference, the site itself have ties with pro Israeli agencies.

Like many others, I tried out the Fediverse when Reddit nuked third-party apps.

I hadn't used Reddit's third-party apps in some years, but the debacle just showed to everyone that Reddit is a for-profit company, and they'll always put profits ahead of users' interests.

Because it seemed cool. reddit had been taking over by crazy people and normies who were happy to go along with the crazy.

Now it's getting worse day by day, as the crazies take over here as well. they are getting impossible to avoid.

i am looking for a place for reasonable thoughtful people to exist and collaborate and share ideas... that is rapidly becoming impossible in the current social environment.

Too bad the API is shut down. I'd love to see the average time between someone's first comment on r/jewsofconscience and their last comment on reddit.

Probably hiding these shennanigans was one motivation for closing the API.

reddit in 2010 wasn't fully of ideological extremists.

it was mostly nerdy nice people.

People,and less bots

Welcome to the club, same happend to me

I wouldn't go back if they re-enabled it, this place is better now, and isn't supporting a user hostile mega corp.

This + enshittifying itself through tracking and "recommendations".

Yeah - the whole thing about the internet for me at the turn of the last century was to discover cool and interesting new stuff, to see things from other perspectives and learn… then one year September didn’t end / became eternal and a generation later here we are. Surfers drowning in algorithms and adverts.

The longest month

I moved over the day that RIF stopped working