or even be a top result when you search google? like reddit posts

  • fireweed
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    16 hours ago

    No, not unless the “choose an instance” problem at sign-up is resolved.

    • claimsou
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      15 hours ago

      That. This is such a barrier to most people. Just make it default to one….

      • Thorry@feddit.org
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        12 hours ago

        Well that would lump all users into one instance. Costs of that instance would be huge, leaving the owner to seek out ways of monetizing the whole thing. Downtime and disruptions would then also impact a large part of the user base. And if the instance goes belly up, those users are shit out of luck. It would also place a lot of power in the hands of that instance.

        Basically what you describe are the exact things the fediverse is meant to fix. Otherwise you are just creating a new single large social media, with all the same issues. The whole point is to have people be distributed over lots of instances or even run their own instance.

        The point however is valid, this is an issue that deserves some thought. But it’s a hard problem to solve.

        This is true for more aspects of Lemmy in my opinion. For lots of things it’s too similar to other larger social media, where I feel better choices exist. Or it’s similar to one kind of social media, where it could use aspects of other kinds of social media. We are seeing some of that being fixed now with Lemmy being able to integrate with other parts of the threadiverse.

        • hoshikarakitaridia
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          12 hours ago

          Then choose one at random. Or make a register page that lets you search for one using tags.

          I genuinely don’t think this is hard, it just takes someone putting the time in.

          • Schal330
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            10 hours ago

            Have a “sorting hat” that will assign people to an instance based on their interests could be good.

            • fireweed
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              2 hours ago

              Not even interests per se, but rather qualities of the instances like:

              • do you want nsfw blocked?
              • do you want downvotes enabled?
              • do you want more or less defederation from potentially objectionable instances?
              • etc

              Basically all the features that invalidate the “just pick an instance, bro, it doesn’t really matter” argument.