At least on the communities i follow. Every so often I come across a thread where i recognize most of the users there even in the big communities with over 30k members and I haven’t even been on lemmy that long.
The reason for that is Lemmy Social Score, aka karma. Most of the people on the internet are looking for a validation from online randos and this prevents them from posting unpopular points of view. Hide score from the users and you will see way more posts and comments.
Personally I think it’s because Lemmy users tend to lean towards an older/more mature audience; and that crowd tends to comment less often in general.
but then there’s no sorting to it all and it functions on bumps like 4chan. not necessarily a better system.
the real reason is that 90% of users on any social media site only lurk. the users that post tend to post a lot. these are just natural things that work out that way due to human nature. confidence and extroversion are some of the last things to make it to niche social media.
Call me old fashion but the best system was and is good old forum. Posts and comments are order by posting date. No points, no bumps, just a regular timeline.
As for the lurkers, I still believe that removing Lemmy Social Score would cause more people to engage.
most forums had bump rules. any new comment jumped a post back to the top, like 4chan.
