This site is currently struggling to handle the amount of new users. I have already upgraded the server, but it will go down regardless if half of Reddit tries to join.
However Lemmy is federated software, meaning you can interact seamlessly with communities on other instances like beehaw.org or lemmy.one. The documentation explains in more detail how this works. Use the instance list to find one where you can register. Then use the Community Browser to find interesting communities. Paste the community url into the search field to follow it.
You can help other Reddit refugees by inviting them to the same Lemmy instance where you joined. This way we can spread the load across many different servers. And users with similar interests will end up together on the same instances. Others on the same instance can also automatically see posts from all the communities that you follow.
Edit: If you moderate a large subreddit, do not link your users directly to lemmy.ml in your announcements. That way the server will only go down sooner.
@[email protected] It might be a good idea to default the Communities page to All instead of Local, to help push users into discovering other instances and promote them.
I agree because this way, new users will learn what and how to use other instances. Plus, it also helps with finding more content, especially if the user picked an instance without many people which makes there be less communities and content they can check out on first glance.
I disagree because it makes the more narrowly focused topic or theme based instances more daluted, makes everything blur together more, I also see it as a detrament to the smaller intances because they will now there local comunity will have less traffic
Perhaps the default should be a per-instance setting and/or a user preference.
I would agree with a per user or per instance
I think a client that might select a server for you by default (hopefully a trusted one of course) would make things way more easy to understand for the average user. Then making it easier to add or view communities on other instances.