I for one have stopped posting any content to lemmy.ml communities.
I was rejected when I first tried to sign up (when I was entirely new to lemmy) and they’re turning at least one user away now
Who knows? Lemmy gave very little feedback messages then. I found a good instance to stick with.
Edit: it would have been around when I made this account (i.e. couple days before blackout protest and maybe they wanted to encourage signups at the several others that had recently popped up.
Ah, they do it now? When I signed up there (~3y ago) there was no such thing.
Anyway, it’s still a problem because most users interacting with .ml content are from other instances.
3 years ago were there any other instances with traction? Agreed on your second point.
Lemmygrad.ml is 5 years old, and hexbear.net is 4 years old.