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10 days after 3rd party reddit app shutdown, Lemmy's top 10 instances combine for a thriving userbase of 234,000
(lemmy.world)
Current breakdown at the time of this post sorted by the number of monthly active users:
- lemmy.world: 101,013 total users / 27,472 active users
- lemmy.ml: 41,972 total users / 4,905 active users
- beehaw.org: 12,270 total users / 4,178 active users
- sh.itjust.works: 17,509 total users / 3,381 active users
- feddit.de: 8,675 total users / 2,935 active users
- lemm.ee: 10,348 total users / 2,751 active users
- lemmynsfw.com: 22,967 total users / 2,310 active users
- lemmy.fmhy.ml: 8,777 total users / 1,704 active users
- lemmy.ca: 5,072 total users / 1,656 active users
- programming.dev: 5,058 total users / 1,242 active users
The impacts on Reddit are going to be more long term than anything. The technically literate base that attracted people to Reddit is gone. Right now, attaching Reddit to the end of a search is a good idea to get the answers you want. All the open source people are gone now, Google results are already hurting. The most attractive part of Reddit is already starting to disappear. It'll be a slow decline as users can't find the content they want.
Objectively, Reddit will do well as it's just a generational change. TikTok and Instagram got all and about zilch to offer if one is looking for factual statements or level-headed discussion of topics and they are doing phenomenally. Instant gratification is way more marketable and exploitable, so it's best for Reddit to take the small loss in engagement from the technical crowd and be just another meme spewing zombie consumer pleaser.
The people who really suffer are the ones that were relying on the niche knowledge some subreddits provided or who were using them as a learning/studying aid. AKA the folks that left and the lurkers that relied upon them.
In a way it's a return to form. The technical comminuty side of reddit was just a modern message board. Lemmy will return the power to the communities instead of relying on one company.