From what i can gather, it could be beneficial to, for example, have an instance which would become the main place to get videogame content on Lemmy. Most communities would be for specific games or AAA companies, but it could also have c/general for asking questions or topics which are non specific to any community, or c/meta, which would work as a place to discuss the state of the instance.
Overall, nothing that different from the actual status quo, but this way, we could consider instances as hubs for certain topics, which would then specialize with the /c/s within said instance. Instead of having 7 c/technology across instances, we could have @Tech.no and subdivide it into c/topic1, c/topic2, etc. (was supposed to come up with smthing but came empty handed shut up i dont browse that sub) .
What im mostly seeing here is that popular instances themselves are not different from reddit. The most popular instances on lemmy are beehaw.org and lemmy.ml, which have the same m.o, if you will, of reddit. Which is good, theyre popular for a reason, but in a way, theyre competing with each other. Not financially, but there will be overlap between certain /c/s.
Of course im not asking if its possible. Its just a matter of running the server and having the right infrastructure. My question is if you think its feasible to decentralize lemmy from the main instances, or even a good idea in the first place. Maybe you think its ok the way things currently are? Or maybe what i said is supposed to be the goal and im just late to the party? What are your thoughts?
Themed instances definitely make sense, but I suppose this needs to happen quickly, before one of the larger, general purpose instances makes the communities the instance would cover. Discoverability is definitely better on a larger instance, especially since the default setting seems to be to only show local communities (we need a snappier term than “communities”!).
I’ve noticed a few instances set up designed for communities and not users, but it feels like that’s a difficult way to try to build a community. Something like mander.xyz seems like it’s got a better chance.
Edit to mention that it’d be useful if you could “forward” users to the right place if they end up in an out of date (or typoed?) community. E.g. how in reddit you see CSS/a pinned post saying “you’re looking for x here”.