I installed the official Reddit app and went on it to see what the old place was looking like now. My inbox was filled with spam. The "home feed" shows subs I never subscribed to. There are so many ads. Between the ads and the the extra subs in the feed, it's hard to just scroll. I also noted a lot of spam in some of the subs. Maybe they are subs with no mods? I'm not sure what's up with that.
I think what people want is very specific, well curated, and active communities about uncommon interests. Things like a whole community that is just 30-35year old redheads wearing cat ears and cleaning their shower in yellow striped thigh highs or something equally as weird and specific.
Like i remember stumbling across a community on reddit that was all about sewing felt vaginas/butts into stuffed animals so people could take their relationship with their favorite plushie to the next level. The community was shockingly active and full of discussion.
Things like that take time and lots of active users to become a thing. Lemmy isnt quite there yet. Same with other kinds of niche interests that havent quite set up shop here yet (for example there are cannabis communities, but nothing specifically for bonsai cannabis)