But on the other hand, I’m not sure that it gains much to actively shut down a small community either. Like, I’d guess that most people on this community are probably also able to find !games@sh.itjust.works or similar. I just subscribe to both, and if someone posts something here, I’ll see the post.
To me the main issue is new joiners. Once in a while, you see someone new to Lemmy who doesn’t know how to find communities. They register on feddit.uk, look at the local communities, see that it’s inactive, and question whether Lemmy is active as a whole.
It certainly depends on the clients used, but in my experience searching for communities Lemmy-wide is as, or perhaps even more, discoverable/straightforward than looking through local communities. So most new users will hopefully find their way to other servers’ communities (and I expect this UX to be reinforced by most clients where promoting decentralisation is part of their philosophy).
Of course some users will still stumble upon an inactive community first and be confused. However, I don’t know if stumbling upon locked communities instead would be a big improvement (and would certainly be a detriment to the existing occasional poster who now has an additional barrier to posting).
A reference to one or more related communities in the description would be a great idea though, regardless of level of activity; it’d be a fallback for inactive communities, but also a curated way to find more places in that field.
stumbling upon locked communities instead would be a big improvement (and would certainly be a detriment to the existing occasional poster who now has an additional barrier to posting).
Locked communities should indeed have a redirection pinned post
To me the main issue is new joiners. Once in a while, you see someone new to Lemmy who doesn’t know how to find communities. They register on feddit.uk, look at the local communities, see that it’s inactive, and question whether Lemmy is active as a whole.
Temporarily locking it with a pinned post to !games@sh.itjust.works might prevent that
It certainly depends on the clients used, but in my experience searching for communities Lemmy-wide is as, or perhaps even more, discoverable/straightforward than looking through local communities. So most new users will hopefully find their way to other servers’ communities (and I expect this UX to be reinforced by most clients where promoting decentralisation is part of their philosophy).
Of course some users will still stumble upon an inactive community first and be confused. However, I don’t know if stumbling upon locked communities instead would be a big improvement (and would certainly be a detriment to the existing occasional poster who now has an additional barrier to posting).
A reference to one or more related communities in the description would be a great idea though, regardless of level of activity; it’d be a fallback for inactive communities, but also a curated way to find more places in that field.
Locked communities should indeed have a redirection pinned post
!casualconversation@lemmy.world has one