cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/1119656
The !android@lemmy.world community on this instance thrived for a while and reached almost 19k subscribers very rapidly and it was very active.
Recently the Reddit mods of r/Android created another community with a few hundred members on another different instance where they are mods and that one was then astroturfed on c/android by a person seemingly unrelated to that community’s mods.
Apparently some discussions then took place between owners of both communities and the mods of !android@lemmy.world community then unilaterally closed the community, thus, according to their own sticky notice, succumbing to the flawed reasoning that the Reddit mods are “more experienced” and therefore the rightful representatives of an Android community.
I find this behavior sad and it just shouldn’t be allowed here for two reasons:
- this sets the precedent for more Reddit mods to just come and claim “ownership” of communities by bullying existing ones into closing;
- does not respect the almost 19k subscribers who didn’t even have a say in this, and especially those who had already expressed that they joined !android@lemmy.world because they did NOT want to be moderated by the old Reddit mods.
!android@lemmy.world needs to be reopened now and the mods removed since they expressed that they no longer want to moderate a community on lemmy.world.
they made their decision
2 out of 19k people made the unilateral decision for those 19k to close the community in total disrespect of those users who were very active and kept the community alive. They also do NOT have the right to deprive this instance from the c/android community name, that is the SAME as community parking. They have the right to leave but they do NOT have the right to close it for everybody else.
Let me ask a different question - let’s say they had made a slightly different decision. Instead of moving to lemdr.id, let’s say the mods of !android@lemmy.world decided to bring on board all of the former r/Android mods. Instead of an announcement that it was being moved to a different location, it was announcing (and welcoming) all of their new mods.
Is there anything really different about that scenario?
It’s astonishing that you can’t see how 2 people closing down the community for 19k people on a whim is simply wrong and EXACTLY THE SAME as community name parking (I’d argue it’s even worse!). Community name parking is already NOT ALLOWED on lemmy.world.
So why not create your own? Or migrate to !android@lemmy.ml (already with 6k subs and very active), or !android@programming.dev (empty and dead). Why does it have to be the existing one?
Reddit was full of clone subs because of disagreeable mods. They had similar names (or at least recognizable names), but were run completely separate. You could also do that here, or start any name on (nearly) any instance you want.
