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How do we deal with similar communities on different Lemmy instances?

Say what you will about reddit, at least an established subreddit was the place to gather on the topic, ie r/technology etc.

With Lemmy, doesn't it follow that similar communities on different instances will simply dilute the userbase, for example [email protected] and [email protected]. How do we best use lemmy as a (small c) community when a topic can be split amongst many (large C) Communities?

This is an earnest question, in no way am I suggesting lemmy is inferior to reddit. I'm quite enjoying myself here.

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  • It would be really nice if communities could be connected right at instance level.

    So if you have c/abc on instance 1 and c/abc on instance 2, and you subscribe to either of them, it would, by default, subscribe you to both (assuming that both instances agree to such a cooperation).

    Something could also be arranged within communities, especially when it comes to posting. Such as, when posting, to be able to select multiple coms to post to, but it would still be just one post you could edit or delete, and have all the comments in one place.

    On Reddit I would sometimes struggle with which sub to post to, and I don't like posting to multiple ones or crossposting if I can avoid it.

    • At that point why not just agree within both communities to all migrate into a single community on whatever instance?

      • They may also not be exactly the same just with a significant overlap.

        But yea why not. It's just a suggestion for an option that should exist imo.

    • For subscriptions, I would personally favor a "discovery" mode. When you sub c/abc on Instance 1, it tells you about c/abc on Instances 2 and 3 with the option to sub to them individually.

      I like the idea of a single post that gets tagged to the communities it should appear in. Moderators would probably want the option to block or control something like that though, considering the risk of spam.

      • I think this would reduce spam if anything. If someone does misuse it, then only one post needs to be reported as spam instead of every sub/com needing to deal with it individually.

        Also, a user who is subbed to multiple coms, would only see the post once instead of multiple times.

        And for actual spammers it's never a problem to make a hundred identical posts anyway.

    • I'm not so sure I agree with that use case. Consider these made-up communities on not-made-up instances:

      I think the first two would be great for general questions. But since mander.xyz has a focus on science and nature, it would be more appropriate for science and nature questions.

      • Well than only the coms on lemmy and beehaw would choose to be connected by default, and the one on mander wouldn't. Maybe instead they'd choose to connect to c/technology or c/science on other subs.

        In general the names of the communities can often be misleading and confusing. Same was the case on Reddit where sometimes two subs can have the exact opposite uses (famously trees and marijuanaenthusiasts (sp.?), and worldpolitics and anime-titties) and it might be better to assign tags/topics.

        Then also attach tags and topics to instances themselves so people can choose their home instance with more confidence.

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