You make some good points, but you're making the same mistake you're accusing your audience of making: you don't understand why people are on the platform they are on.

I can't speak for everyone, so I'll just speak for myself: I'm not on Lemmy and Mastodon because I want them to become the next Facebook--even if it were some kind of libre utopia free of commercial interests.

I'm here because these weirdos are my weirdos and they like the same weird things I like. It's a small enough sandbox that I can still recognize people here and there. These people have similar interests to me, and they post long, insightful rants about stuff that my family and other friends would not care about. The network effect is working in my favor.

The fediverse community feels more like home to me than the big social platforms. This feels more like it's my community. If Lemmy gets as big as Reddit, I'll probably go somewhere else.

I don't use Linux because I want it to dominate the world. I don't care if others use Linux or not. I use Linux because my computer finally feels like it's mine again. I do what I want with it and I don't have to worry about AI running or spying happening on it without my knowledge. As a bonus, it runs smoother.

The tradeoff is there are a few rough edges, and I have to learn some new things. But I enjoy learning. Lots of people don't enjoy having to learn new things to just veg out with IG or YouTube. I get that. So, then don't. Veg out with Windows, if that's your thing. We can all do our own thing at the same time.

Choice is a good thing. Small communites are good. Decentralized is good because then big bullies can't come in and take your community away. Small size and fragmentation are features, not bugs.

If Taylor Swift wants to set up her own Mastodon instance, she can. If she wants to cross-post between that and X, she can. I won't be seeking out her content and it will be trivial for me to stay in my bubble without Taylor algorithmically popping up inside of it like she is on IG, FB, and X.