I don't, because it's my escape from most of their bullshit.

Why would I tell them about "the fediverse"? Tell them that you use Lemmy or Mastodon or whatever. If they are interested then give them a link to a good instance. That's it.

I don't tell people about the Fediverse.

"It's like email. You can have an account on Gmail and still send emails to Outlook".

Edit: just saw that you mentioned email, so that's usually the easiest analogy.

About success stories, I don't have many, people I know IRL weren't interested in Reddit, so Lemmy is the same.

I just showed one of my friends the memes on it and they said tell me what this platform is

I like using a mall as a really basic analogy for the shared social space:

There are multiple entrances to the mall through various shops, but once you're inside, you can go visit wherever you want.

I just share posts/comments that others find useful

I don't. When people say, "Do you use r/?" I reply with, "I left it during the blackout." That usually ends it.

I'm not a weirdo, so I don't. My friends don't have to buy into my version of wasting time

Don't talk about the high concept of federation, talk about the community that the different services offer.

The classic misstake is to oversell and miss the point that the other party is focusing on.

Don't: "Lemmy is so awesome, it can't be shut down, it is federated, you can even run your own instance and have total control"

What the other party hears: "Lemmy is awesome, and you have to do a lot of stuff to join."

Do: "Hey, have you heard about Lemmy? It is a Reddit clone with a much calmer community, I have had a lot of interesting conversations over there"

This puts the focus on the community rather than the service, people join social networks for the interaction, not the tech.

Anyone I would tell about it is already on it. I don't usually meet people IRL that are at all interested in anything online.

I dont. Its honestly not great. I'd rather that effort went to preserving and repairing the existing tools of the free and open web -- the old protocols are extensible. Imagine if we had an RSS client with a "reblog" feature!

"Federation" adds overhead and honestly creates as many problems as it solves. It's not a selling point, its a price tag.

I usually wait till they complain about something related to one of the big corporate platforms, then throw out a "you know, the fediverse has an 'X' now, come join us!" Just replace X with reddit/tumbler/youtube/etc, whatever platform they were complaining about.

Alternatively, I'll share fediverse links in the process of showing memes to people.

Usually as loudly as possible while wildly gesticulating and showing huge quantities of bloodshot eyeball. Seems effective so far, will continue to report in.

What are these "people" to which you refer?

Subtly, not by pushing it on them directly. Instead, I share links to topics that might interest them. Show people the value.

I ask if they've heard of mastodon because most people with any ties to the internet have. Then I say there's a new wave of platforms that are all federated, kinda like how like someone could send an email from a user @aol.clm to a user @msn.com or whatever, which means there's no real way to centralize the platforms.

I generally don't.

So far I don't. I'm still learning the platform. So far I think what I imagined Lemmy to be ISN'T what I imagined it as. It COULD be that. It chooses not to. Not only is there a lack of organization, but also the policies of the platform basically PROHIBIT them from becoming moderated in a fair balanced way. Yes I see that modlog. It does nothing if the moderation team is also corrupt.

I'm not saying it currently is or isn't corrupt. Thats not the issue. The issue is, a lot of people come from reddit because their automod is now banning things due to bad AI. Even if you appeal, they claim a human looks at it, but that's not true.

Instead, I come to Lemmy, thinking that each instances mod team ONLY had control over their instance. If that mod bans you, I THOUGHT they'd only ban you from that instance. You take your account to a new instance. Their mods could then choose to accept your migration, or deny it. You find an instance where a human reviews your reason for being banned, and if you did anything wrong you'd be rejected there too. If that instance finds you did nothing wrong, they accept you.

This allows mods to keep power over their individual bubbles. Yet not have the ability to gain authoritarian control.

And yes, it ALSO means that users who do ban worthy offenses WOULDN'T be banned platform wide. And at first glance that sounds wrong. It means that yes, the far right would have a place to fester. But also every other instance would defederate from that one instance. So they would essentially be an echo chamber that the rest of lemmy would never see. It also means if you're on an instance that is turning into a place you don't agree with, you can migrate before that instance becomes defederated.

As it is now, this is just reddit, with more steps, and more confusing.

"Reddit rapes us because they control it, not us. This is like that but we control it, not them, libre software. They can get fucked!"

Yes, literally, it works for me. Most people don't give a shit beyond that, that's all they need to join. But, start with a chat app first. Also, this is a replacement but they only need to add an app, not replace yet.