Following the spirit of spreading across the Fediverse (and because my main instance is down so many times, because diverse reasons) I'm intrigued about the joining instance process, because I honestly don't know what criteria to have in order to join another one if I ever want to do it.
That made me curious of how you decided to join?
I firstly join to lemmy.fmhy.ml thanks to Spez and a Reddit post from FMHY subreddit, then the tragedy occurred, then I joined to lemmy.world which is/was my main one because I pictured it like a good home, then lemmy.fmhy.net revived and I am with them too, but seems like they are in a bit of trouble with the server, finally now I am in lemm.ee, but only because I just wanted another backup, not because I searched for it especially (also it was mentioned in a comment about smaller instances and one user from here throw a joke to not join here because it sucks so that way the server would be more stable, so yeah, I joined).
To be clear I am not in search for yet another instance (that sounds like a good instance name to be fair), I just want to know how the deciding process is for you, is it just random? Is it because of personal tastes?
I couldn't care less about NSFW stuff, I don't search for it specifically, but my day won't be ruined if I see a tit.
I like gaming, tech, Linux, SBC gaming, emulation, macOS, Android stuff etc (yeah how original) should I look for an instance dedicated to that if I ever want to join yet another one? Because I see topics like this in almost any instance.
I read you lemmings!
EDIT: BTW the migration process has been easier for me thanks to LASIM, so I wouldn't be scared if I ever want/have to migrate again.
I made this account a long time ago, the landscape was different. The three biggest (federated) instances were this, lemmygrad.ml and Wolfballs (alt-right, run by a right-libertarian but dominated by shameless racists and neo-nazis, most instances defederated from them).
Since Lemmygrad was often preemptively defederated from other instances, I wanted a stable well-connected instance that wouldn't die after a few months (learned that lesson the hard way on PeerTube) and am a socialist tech-expert. So the choice was simple. No regrets, and I wouldn't change it now.
I did have an alt on the former GTIO instance (civil debate only, no political-oriented bans) because I did want to see the garbage being posted by Wolfballs losers on there and practice deconstructing the flaws and refuting. I also had an alt on an instance that wasn't federated at the time. They were all appropriate choices given the landscape then and now, and I've had the foresight and fortune to almost never have an instance I use block one I wish to interact with. But unfortunately many so-called general instances have made dubious defederation choices which do make me worry that I may need to start making alts just to continue interacting with some communities in the future.