It is probably due to a number of people stopping using their alts after some instance hopping.
Also a few people who came to see how it was, and weren’t attracted enough to become regular visitors.
Curious to see at which number we’ll stabilize.
Next peak will probably happen after either major features release (e.g. exhaustive mod tools allowing reluctant communities to move from Reddit) or the next Reddit fuck up (e.g. removing old.reddit)
Stats on each server: https://lemmy.fediverse.observer/list
When you’re talking about an Internet forum, yes, more people makes things better.
The magic of reddit is being able to find a community for the most obscure niche interest ever. You can’t do that with just a few thousand tech-savvy nerds like us here.
It sure made reddit better. You guys can’t go 5 min without bitching about “reddit culture” stinkin’ up the place. Guess what, more people ruined reddit. More people does not make a community better. Better people make a community better. As for the niche stuff, it’ll find a home. It may not be here, but it will find its place. Not everything on the internet needs to end up on a handful of sites.
Every community is going to attract good and bad people. With more people there’s going to be more good people AND more bad people.