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who is on Lemmy (the sociology of Lemmy)

I dont know if this has been asked before or if this may be a little goofy of a question but I didn't see anything relating to it and I'm kinda curious what the culture of Lemmy is like and what sort of common things people see. ive been paying attention to interactions but nothing is as good as just asking everyone.

135 comments

  • As a late gen x/"xennial" myself I've noticed there's proportionally more of us here than on other social media.

    Tends to be left of centre even without factoring in the communistanarchistsocialist nexus, but also wider political range.

    Tends to skew STEM.

    Loves cats as much as the rest of the internet but proportionally loves FOSS more.

    Strong rainbow presence.

  • More language diverse than Reddit, especially on language based instances. Shout out to the Germans who seem much more active than other languages (such as French or Spanish)

  • That’s a good question. From what I gather, Lemmy (and most of the Fediverse) is an alternative to something, with less focus on the money/advertising. So I would guess most people are looking for an alternative way to connect about common interests. And because it’s not the easiest path for social media, I would guess most people have a desire for agency/self-reliance.

    And because the whole Fediverse seems to be a different way of approaching social connecting, it takes a little more understanding of computer technology, so I would also guess most people have a least a higher than average affinity for computer technology. Linux and Programming Humor are larger communities.

    That said, I have enjoyed a somewhat active participation about woodworking, gardening, jokes, news, medical updates, etc. Like mentioned in another comment, the different instances will have somewhat different norms and practices.

  • well for me:

    • just passed 50 last month
    • been kicking around 'PCs' since the vic-20
    • buun using linux since Mandrake Helios (6.1)
    • have self hosted all sorts (including email for nearly 10 yrs, not any more other than a relay for my lemmy)
    • had a mastodon instance for about 2-3 years - but use mastodon.nz
    • spun up my instance of lemmy just as the exodus started
    • been into tinkering with electronics from childhood

    I guess that puts me in the the tech group that seems very common here

    other groups that seem well represented are the 'left' and lgbqt+

  • Since lemmy is decentralized, the demographics are going to vary greatly depending on the instance. You’d have to create a pretty generalized poll and then post to most of the major instances to get anything close to even a general read.

    • This is true.

    • at first I wasnt picturing how that would work exactly but then I realized you are a bit locked down into your own communities a bit unless you intentionally explore other areas or mainly look at the everything section

      • Not so much. One has the freedom to explore and subscribe and participate in communities across the lemmyverse (mostly) regardless of what one’s home instance is.

        However, one’s home instance often has quite the influence on one’s… perspective and one’s exposure— even one’s intended exposure.

        For example, one will probably have a notably different experience if one starts from Lemmy.world vs lemmy.ml (or even lemmygrad.ml) vs lemm.ee. Or, especially Beehaw.org. And that experience may color how one views how one experiences external communities.

        My point is that it’s mor complex and nuanced than you’re giving it credit for.

  • I am early 40s in the accounting industry. Married, no kids, don’t want em. Have cats. Live in the Midwest, a lefty, woman, vegetarian that hates labels (heh heh).

    Came to lemmy shortly before the Reddit API fuckaroo after seeing all the posts about the fediverse. Given that I had dropped all social media except Reddit in the prior 2 years due to a combo of crazy people, algorithms and targeted advertising, I was primed for fleeing. I’m tech savvy but not a tech nerd. Open source, Linux, self-hosting, etc all interest me but without having a direct background in tech, I find it difficult to prioritize learning more about it all.

    If I wasn’t so entranced by other people’s thoughts and opinions in text form (never generally been a fan of videos/photos as an information medium), I would have cut all ties. This space can honestly be a little too “damn the man” for me, as I like rules and order, but I also feel the frustration of the public and tend to feel somewhat impotent about it. Hence, I think this is about the best fit I’ll find to still be able to connect with the thoughts of people I don’t know and experiences I don’t have.

  • 41, software dev, kids, marriage, punk/metal/hiphop, center to left politically, video games, Halloween enthusiast, scale RC trucks, Rams fan, love nerdy things, comics, ninja turtles, X-Men, Legos, theme parks, a good poop.

  • I'm an Aussie in my early-mid 30s. I've been living in the USA for the past 11 years. I've been a software developer, mostly focusing on web development, since the late 90s personally and since the mid 2000s professionally. I was an early Digg user, moved to Reddit during the Digg exodus, then moved to Lemmy during the Reddit exodus.

    I believe that people on the internet should own their platform, for example run their own blog or e-commerce site, participate in decentralized services like Lemmy, etc. Opera Unite was something I found very interesting in terms of allowing people to easily run their own decentralized stuff, and I'm kinda sad it never took off. I self-host things like email and DNS.

    I'm a big believer in open-source software and released my first piece of OSS in 2005.

    I love listening to people that are passionate about something and get excited when talking about it. Doesn't really matter what it is or if it's a topic I'm interested in.

  • You'll find a lot of FOSS developers on here. This is a general community and all that, but there is a large Linux and open source software interest here. Some people simply don't understand things like the scope of FOSS software in terms of both users and developers, so that can create some tension at times. There are a lot of experts and radical thinkers in this space. You may or may not find help on super niche questions, but say something wrong or poorly, and you're likely to find the experts soon thereafter. For instance, I am confident enough to ask advanced course computer science questions and get useful answers here. I find this place useful for second sourcing info from AI that I find plausible but sketchy. Like I got into fermentation but have no interest in the whole commercialized nonsense hobby junk. Almost all sources are poisoned by commercial interests and misguided nonsense. Just asking here gets lots of people with practical knowledge on fundamental techniques from long before it was some commercialized hobby.

    The group behind the fediverse is very diverse and that diversity is reflected in the user space here in Lemmy.

  • In my 40s, do software development for a living.

    • Same

      • I'm imagine people in tech are inherently over-represented on niche social platforms. Although, I do find that lemmy tends to have a political aspect to it as well that makes it attractive to people who might not care about stuff like open source.

  • I don't want to post a small bio of myself for privacy purposes but you could read through my post history to learn some things about me.

  • Gen Z weeb from FL living in CA for a couple years now, almost went the IT route and finished trade school but ended up just working a part time service job to have more free time at the cost of being poorer lol

  • Late 30s woman in Australia. Work in tech adjacent field. Progressive leftie.

    Used Reddit for news, memes and funnies. Here for the same. Sometimes get involved in discussion but more often than not get too angry and have to put the phone down. Feel like you can have better discussions here than the old place, but I've noticed an uptick in right wing nut jobs and incels.

    Absence of low effort 'this' and copypastas style responses is great. But I'm seeing a bit of that coming over too.

  • A piece of tasteless Moroccan filth who despises his country so much and spends time finding as many interesting communities to fit into and discuss about as possible to escape the horrors known as reality.

135 comments