The problem to federation is that there is at least some complexity to subscribing to other communities - at least right now. I love it here, but I have to be honest, it is a bit difficult to navigate for most.
But perhaps we’re missing the point? What if we should be trying to sell the local aspect harder?
There is a demand for hyper-local networks as evidenced by Nextdoor. Couple this with an increase in people wanting to have a better digital commons - one not controlled by a single corporation.
For my instance tucson.social, I’m going to get some signs printed and do some local advertising. Pretty sure if I sneak some signs around the U of A campus, but mostly in public spaces where it’s legal and proper.
I think that the local nature of all of this makes advertising a bit more effective and locally relevant. I don’t want to sell it as a “reddit” but as another “place” that will exist whether or not reddit does (due to the non-profit or whatever other org we construct) to talk about our city.
At the same time I do this, I want to reach out to important community members to see if they might be interested in donating once I have a formal non-profit. I’d make sure to emphasize the utility such a site might have to local businesses once advertising is possible.
I have no idea if this will all work, but it’s something I’m trying to do anyways. I just believe communities should be local, and that the online representation of them is as close to a mirror of the local one as possible. I also want to foster conversations that help people grow and connect.
So maybe, one of the admins here sees this, because I’d really like to join forces in a more meaningful way and hopefully gain the ability to deliver a meaningful experience to all sorts of communities. My immediate skills are technical, and perhaps if I follow along and learn your tips along the way, I can have the best possible chance of making this happen - and constructing the blueprints for others to follow.
I’m also open to other wisdom from the beehaw community! Have you done local marketing and advertising? I could use some tips. Have you formed a non-profit before? I’d definitely like to hear from you! Are you in Tucson and want to get more deeply involved? - dm me!
The only thing I’d prefer not to hear is how difficult it is. I’m fully aware that I’ve chosen to go all in on terrible odds. I don’t really care anymore. lol
My personal opinion is that federation doesn’t have to take any particular form, and the shape of the fediverse - or, rather, your particular fediverse or your pocket of federated space - depends on how communities decide to federate, informed by various factors including software implementation, community culture and values, moderation policies, etc. It could look like a lot of different things, and there’s not really any “correct” policy with respect to federation; it’s all subjective and values-based.
Now, as a manner of my preference, I do like envisioning the fediverse as a ball-and-stick model. I don’t really like the idea of having ‘main’ or ‘central’ instances where everyone congregates, with smaller communities left on the fringe. To me, the kind of fediverse (or section of it) that I would most like to participate in is one where people are scattered across a diverse variety of instances - a wide range of stances on how they wish to federate: instances who federate with nobody and exist as isolated nodes, instances who federate with everybody and act like bridges or hubs, instances who federate with certain instances based on similar interests or values, constellations of instances which only touch in certain parts, etc. Each of varying size and user composition.
A lot of Mastodon, Calckey, Pleroma, etc. instances and a couple of Lemmy instances have already gotten to work on creating instances which are closely related to particular regions or locales. There’s pnw.zone for the US Pacific Northwest, I follow the founder of alaskan.social (for Alaskans, obviously), mastodon.com.pl for Poland, calckey.nz for New Zealand, mastodon.ph for Filipinos, lemmy.pt for Portugal and Portuguese speakers, baraza.africa (Lemmy) for Africans and the African diaspora, etc. etc. On that aspect of your post, I’m highly supportive, and I think you should definitely give it a shot and seek out like-minded people in and around Tucson.
The fediverse may not/probably won’t fully embrace the form of a locally-focused web (I know for some, local politics suck and they seek the internet as an escape from that), but something like that can and should exist in parallel with the interest-based and general purpose instances which already exist, and I would like to see things be further enmeshed through that.
Yeah I like that no matter what email provider I use my experience doesn’t depend on the amount of people on that instance. But with lemmy everyone still tries to engage in local conversations more I think. There’s some sort of “well this is my instance and I’m going to help it get bigger” mentality going on.
I certainly think that if the fediverse succeeds it will end up looking like that indeed. I suppose I was thinking less of “best” in the sense of how the whole fediverse is structured, but more how Beehaw itself, and it’s goals might interact with local communities in a deeper way. Maybe a sort of additional federation of non-profits eventually - all focused on community intervention by owning their own social networks using the frameworks described in the sticky’s here.
I just agree with the community model described, and think there could be something there when combined with locally focused instances.