Technically can't they do that even now?

My problem was that I have to subscribe to an instance in order to see its posts. If I'm subscribed to !startrek@startrek.website, and they decide to shut off access to the Fediverse for whatever reason, all the content would be gone to me here on kbin, right? Also: I would need to subscribe to a new Star Trek community, because I could no longer connect with the old community? What do you mean by, "the content would remain available to both"? If they shut off the Fediverse, or blacklist my instance, wouldn't that mean I no longer have access to their content, even old content that I posted?

And yeah, when I say, "migrate," I mean, "getting people to subscribe to a different instance, because the one they were using turned evil/shut down/disconnected from the Fediverse, etc." Wouldn't those scenarios still mandate action by the users in order to find a new community, and thus equate to migration? Just because a new instance has the same number of users that can post there, doesn't mean there will be the same number of users actively posting there. They will still be using the old instance, and it will take work to get them to start posting to the new instance. That's my point. From my understanding, the Fediverse decentralizes user accounts, but it doesn't decentralize content, and that's where I'm running into my expectations/wishlist issues.

Wait, how? I thought the content stayed with the old instance?

If people migrate to !startrek@startrek.website, and use it for 10 years, then they go bad, I can start a new instance and pull in all 10 years of content from the other instance?

Isn't that still a consolidation of content/users, though? I thought the Fediverse was about decentralization, whereas I keep hearing that it's okay to centralize content/users on individual instances if it happens naturally. Wouldn't that just lead to situations where the mega instance could control the contents/users? Migrating users to an entirely new instance is hard, I mean just look at how hard it is to get people to leave Reddit. It just feels like either I'm missing something, or the Fediverse is just a new technical way to recreate a system that we already have and complain about. If a single instance has total control over the content and users (not the user accounts, just the fact that a huge number of users would be following that specific instance), then how is it decentralized?

See, that must be my confusion. I was thinking that each instance moderated the content that was being ingested by the server from whatever instances its users subscribed to. Like, if I subscribed to !startrek@startrek.website, then it would create a community here on kbin where the moderators of that magazine (I'd assume I would be assigned as the moderator if I were the first to subscribe to that source) would then moderate that magazine based on the kbin instance's rules. Like a: the instance pulls all the content from the external instance, but it's up to the instance's users to moderate the ingested content themselves, kind of deal. I'm learning that I have waaaaay too high expectations for the Fediverse given how young it still is.

Right, but what about how websites work? Each website has its own server, but it connects via registrars for the domain names, other computers/servers learn about those domain names via distributed DNS servers, etc. I'm looking for a solution where I can access a giant collection of people/content all while using whatever site I want to use that fits my desires (or one that I spin up on my own). Right now, I'd have to access the largest instance if I want to have a large community, but then that one instance has all of the power over the content and users that use it, right? So basically the Fediverse is essentially akin to using a third-party app to browse Reddit: the app (in this case, the instance) grabs content from the API of Reddit (in this case the API of the host instance), and pulls it into its own database. I don't see how this is very different from what we currently have, though I'm trying to learn more about it and not just be a dick saying, "I don't get it, it's stupid, bye losers". Decentralized content is what I'm looking for, not just decentralized user accounts. Is that not a goal of the Fediverse?

I can make a new website with a forum if Reddit goes "bad," too, but that doesn't change anything. All of the content and the users would be on that one specific instance. That's what people care about: content and a critical mass of users. There's a reason people are still using Reddit, and it's not because Reddit has wonderful ownership that cares about the users; it's because that's where the most people currently are. Migrating people from one site to another isn't easy, and that would be the exact same situation if a super popular instance were to go "bad," whether or not it's part of the Fediverse.

If we can decentralize users, we can surely decentralize content, can't we? I don't want content to be restricted to one instance, and that's my problem. I was looking to have the same community and its content to be on all instances at the same time, removing the power of one instance to shut out the Fediverse and control all access to the content. If !startrek@startrek.website decides to shut down all traffic to/from kbin, for example, then that would leave kbin users in the dark as it currently stands, right?

I was thinking more of a situation where we have community registrars, "DNS" like servers, etc. Still a distributed system sharing power, but far more structured than the email analogy that is always used. That said, it appears I had the wrong idea of the goals/functions of federation and the Fediverse in general. Oh well, at least I learned a bit more about it.

Nope, still trying to understand things. I want to get away from Reddit, but if this isn't made for users like me, then that's okay, it's not made for users like me. I don't blame kbin, nor want it to change what it is; I'm just trying to understand the Fediverse and all things related to it, that's all. Trying to find a good home for the future that isn't Reddit.

Doesn't that defeat the whole purpose of the Fediverse in the first place, though? Consolidation of users/power? If we're going to use a single instance for every topic, then why not just stick with Reddit?

I understand they are two different communities, I was just hoping it was a bug with Lemmy and kbin not talking to each other properly. The reason Reddit/Facebook/et al are so huge is because people want to have a single community to talk with, not 15 little communities all having their own discussions. I get the appeal of that, but if I wanted to join a small forum I'd go to startrekforum.com or something like that. We already have sites that offer small communities; what we needed was a replacement for Reddit. For the moment, it appears that Reddit is still the best way to be part of a large community, and that's sad for people like me that just want a large community without having to rely on one website to host that community. Oh well.