this post was submitted on 01 Apr 2024
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No, not at all. But by sheer number of submissions and comments the collective hive mind will tend towards topics that are relevant for the biggest population.
It's nothing malicious. People are simply less likely to upvote and engage with content that does not interest them or is not relevant for them. All natural of course. But the side effect is that minority topics are suppressed.
I would love to see some examples of these minority topics being down voted or suppressed since it seems to be deeply affecting international users' experience.
To me, it seems like you and the OP resent US users for simply existing in an online space without putting forth any solutions to the issue. Are you sure you're not trying to find ways to justify anti-US bias?
If you want the space to have more equal representation, why not produce high-quality content that appeals to your fellows rather than moaning about people who by your own admission mean no harm?
As @[email protected] already pointed out (thanks girl!), I never said they would get downvoted. It's just that if US news are upvoted and international news are not, then sorting by upvotes (which any reasonable algorithm will do), will inevitably lead to a reduced visibility of said international news.
Thanks to federation the frontpage itself is mostly non specific memes and tech/Linux content. But if you want a concrete example: here is a screenshot of [email protected]. the name of the community would suggest well, world news. The reality is ... Quite different:
The nine posts in the screenshot are about:
As i have just explained in my first paragraph this will not be enough. (And that's aside from the extra effort required to keep up said high quality work. Even if it would lead to equal representation, it's an uphill battle.)
Yes, I am sure. I am merely stating a fact. This dynamic develops in any online space with a clear majority group. For example, take the /r/de subreddit. It is the default subreddit for German speaking users on reddit. Austrian and Swiss users are explicitly invited. And yet, by sheer number of citizens the news about German politics dominate the submissions. I do no more resent Germans for up voting content that interest them on /r/de (for example myself) than I resent Americans upvoting content that interests them.
Similarly you can take any other instance that is specific to a group, be it defined via country (e.g. lemmy.ca) or shared interest/experience (e.g. lemmy.blahaj.zone) and you will find that minorities that are not part of that definition will inevitably be suppressed. But these country or interest specific instances do not claim to cover the world. In fact, OP was probably writing this post not due to the presence of US citizens on Lemmy, but due to the overwhelming presence of US citizens on an instance that claims to represent the world. Renaming [email protected] to [email protected] would go a long way.
Sure, petition to rename it. I don't think anyone would care, except the folks feeling suppressed by American exceptionalism.
Or, idk, start your own world news instance with super strict rules, zero US stuff. No one is stopping you. Isn't that the point of this platform?