It seems the fediverse is continuing and growing again. Line go up is probably good!
https://fediverse.observer/stats&months=50
Total users are huge now.
There are many websites out there that pull data from the fediverse. So take that with a grain of salt. But anecdotally I am seeing a small rise in people using the various platforms as each get more mature and servers somewhat stabilize.
PieFed is working on that. Seeing the pace of development of Lemmy, I highly doubt that it ever will.
There are quite a number of challenges to overcome though. e.g. if you suddenly had tend to hundreds of people "following" you, how would that make you feel?
On the Threadiverse we tend to prefer to remain anonymous - as a quick glance at usernames can attest - while on the Fediverse the set of expectations are different.