WhiteTiger

The entire reason I started using RES was to filter out any comment that had the words “and my axe”, “this guy’s dead wife”, “fun at parties”, “poop knife”, etc.

Everything at reddit devolved into pushing political ideals. That’s what happens when nobody can respect that others are allowed to have different opinions.

You’re describing an internet that doesn’t exist anymore and hasn’t for decades.

99.9% of people just use gmail, and before that 99.9% used hotmail, etc. There’s always been ‘the one’ that effectively everyone is on.

Redditor is a thing though, and most people came from reddit. However, thinking about it, Youtuber and Tiktoker are reserved for the creators, not the users. As for the rest…

Facebooker

Whatsapper

Instagrammer

Yeah I’m fine with fediverse user.

Assuming the numbers are accurate, we already hit critical mass for perpetuity of content and activity (around 80k active users) so things should just get better from here.

I mean, there’s a reason that Linux is used by less than 3% of the market, and the same will likely be true here. The fediverse is not the answer for over 97% of people, and that’s a problem.

The first step is completely different from anything else you’ve ever done

“Pick an instance to sign up for”

This does not compute. What is an instance? Why do I have to pick? Which one should I pick? Compared to

“Create an account at reddit.com” makes sense and is something everyone has done before.

It doesn’t matter how simple the answers to those questions are, the fact that the very first step requires multiple explanations is huge, and will always be a barrier to entry.