Fediverse

• I'm under 30 (Under 20 too) X
• Tech enthusiast/comp sci student ✔️
• Linux User ✔️

The youth have an innate pressure to follow trends and their peers. They need and crave social acceptance while still lacking the means to be independent and "go their own way", so it's not viable to expect younger users to form the bulk of pioneering users of an unproven platform like the fediverse.

Older user will generally be more confident and independent, especially when the craving for social approval is not as powerful as it was in younger users.

Hasnt internet started like that?

30 years or older. Check.

Tech enthusiast/ worker.... check.

Linux users. Check.

Dammit

I think it’s because we remember a time when there wasn’t a lot of stability and centralized content. So the absolute shit show that is going on right now and the resurgence of decentralized content is really refreshing. Plus it’s pretty amazing that the forums we came up using can now talk to one another! Now if we could only bring back XMPP 😂

• check
• check
• check

I am 45 and you can say a tech enthusiast. I've never worked in tech but I have always wanted to but never took that chance. I feel like I'm too old to start now.

I'm 28, Linux user, tech worker, pretty much called me out

From what I see on Local we are

Trans Old Young Gay Straight Nerds Furries Porno addicts

This is the big downside to the Reddit implosion. I liked that Reddit had finally attracted normal people. If I want to know what a 30 year old dweeby white guy thinks about stuff, I’ll ask myself.

It takes a while for stuff like this to catch on outside of this specific demographic.

People who don’t care as much about tech aren’t going to bother to figure out the fediverse right now. It’s way too confusing, but Instagram/twitter/threads/reddit is right there.

Once a few apps get going on iOS and Android, and once it becomes way easier to join a server, then we’ll see normal people start trickling in.

I'd rather agree about mastadon, but not about Lemmy. I've seen people from (I assume) ~20 up to 40+. For example, I'm around 27 and I have few friends who were using Lemmy for almost a year now, they're in their early 20s.

But yes it's mostly nerds.

No. Next question

I'm definitely coming up on 40, but I am not a tech nerd at all. I think Linux is wizard magic.

Older tech nerdsn are the pioneers of new and open technologies like fediverse and smolnet, because they are smart enough and care enough about technological principles/philosophies to use them. As the services grow they begin to reach a phase where it attracts reactionary people who are looking actively for alternatives to mainstream services ru n by corporations. This tends to be fanatical people who think capitalism/global economic system bad, or the very vocally queer. Then if it manages to grow even further, say from an exodus of users from a competing service, the normal people finally come and attract more normal people with far more varying discussion interest besides conputer technogy, spewing debates on political/economic ideas, and being gay.

43 here. IT consultant. Have been on every social media platform since Myspace all the way back to Usenet if you want to consider that social media which is what is basically was. On the major platforms these days, I mostly lurk and DM with fam and friends along with small Discord groups. Since joining the fediverse, and more specifically Lemmy, I've been much more active commenting and posting then I've been in years. I actively encourage friends and fam to join, but the fact is the fediverse is young and isn't as user friendly. It has to reach a critical mass of ease of use and user adoption which is what's being driven up right now like all other platforms before it. The more people join, the more it will be streamlined, feeding back to usability so more people discover and join, etc. etc. This is how all platforms evolved except in the case of the fediverse, it isn't controlled by a single entity which has its pluses and minuses. I don't expect MetaThreadBook, Reddit, Twitter, et al to go anywhere anytime soon, but diversification and competition is always good. If we can reach critical mass with the fediverse, it will provide a good check against these monopolistic entities and hopefully result in better overall communities and interactions.

Saw a couple polls over on Mastodon about just this thing and it was very much skewed to people 35+. It's no a platform the youths are on, but that can change as the fediverse gets some traction and works on that on-boarding experience.

Younger people may be more affected by social pressure, to be on the already popular apps.

I'm over 30, but I'm tech stupid compared to everyone else here, but I can follow, and understand the jist ftmp of the conversation. Not my area of expertise. I grown up with the internet though obviously so I do know my way around.

If anything i'm probably just more open to new experiences than the average person, and I like learning stuff.

But in general I agree with your observations, and it seems natural for early adopters of a platform.

30yr+, tech enthusiast, linux user... these are all the same thing XD