I’m sorry to hear that, that’s a shame. My experiences are more with gaming communities from the early 2000s, so perhaps my view isn’t universally applicable to other hobbies, professions, and such.
Nah, I’m happy to hear there are still some thriving out there. Gives me hope for the future. I’ve just noticed that I’m corralled towards Reddit any time I seek out the sorts of discussions that used to happen on forums.
Yeah I can definitely say for a while that was the case for me as well. It’s honestly why I like Lemmy, since by the nature of federation it can both be self-contained and owned by the people actually using it, but still kept around even if the specific instance doesn’t last forever.