In recent days I have seen these two arguments repeated quite commonly. From reddits side it was all about how “noones using Lemmy anyway”
While from Lemmy it was “how numbers have been exploding”
My question is, why do numbers of users matter so much to anyone really? Isnt activity what matters more?
On two questions here I gotten just as much engagement if not more than anything I did on reddit combined
Numbers matter because activity is directly proportional to user count. A lot of mainstream users won’t join a platform until it already has a critical mass. They don’t want to be early adopters or trail blazers. They want to go where their friends and good conversations are.
We’ve got to set the table for them. With a lot of users there will be more buzz and more social gravity to pull people here. We’re the first drunk uncle on the dance floor at the wedding that gets the party started. A dance floor with a few drunk uncles is fun for the uncles but until a couple nieces and a grandma join in then there’s not a party.
People have been burned by so many hot new social networks that they’re wary. They don’t believe that they can have a good network that’s not full of ads and selling their info.
But the time is now, the DJ has put on Montel Jordan’s “This is How We Do It” and it’s up to us, the drunk uncles of the fediverse, to get everyone onto the dance floor.