OpenStars

Oh no... but yeah that does make sense, sadly:-(.

Take this with a grain of salt bc small sample size, but I've also heard from South or Latin Americans that simply saying "American" = USA. It's just that rest, I don't know why.

Language might be one reason, and Hollywood and other cultural exports, but also I think people there identify more with like a Global South than as part of the American continent.

So to me it's one of those things that you would think increase welcomingness and inclusivity, but for whatever reason in practice kinda somehow does the opposite (or not opposite, but just has the negative effect of sounding awkward without much of any positive benefit).

But I'd be happy to be proven wrong if that's actually the way it is. If you find out, please let us all know, maybe with a post about it!? :-D

But still regional more so than like "American"?

I'm not sure whether to say congratulations or I'm sorry (for circumstances leading up to that), I guess bc both are true at the same time. Either way it's rough, but also awesome that you have friends to hang with then:-).

Sorry, I dunno where the word blocking came from in my reply - fat fingering I guess:-).

TikTok is well known for honing in on your preferences - which is both great and perhaps dangerous at the same time, be careful? Like Google, they may start charging money to get what you currently receive now for free.

That's really odd that your YouTube is showing generic stuff - for most people it shows the same content, so you must be stopping their trackers somehow.:-)

Omg Texas is amazing and I think probably the only state that has one of every type of terrain - mountains, watery stuff, deserts even, and plains. (I don't know if that's strictly speaking true, but it certainly feels like it!:-)

Ohio.

Fuck no. Three people got shot across the street from where I was at - I didn't stick around long enough to find out if any of them lived through that ordeal or not.

Sorry if that's depressing - it's life in America, sadly. The opioid epidemic + pandemic seems to have hit that state pretty hard too.

Edit: I am sure that not all areas in that state are that way - the major cities have some issues though, especially for someone who doesn't know the area, like where it's safe to go or not go.

I found several awesome ones at https://imgur.com/gallery/icons-of-middle-earth-fXKvg (that could be used for inspiration?):

Or there's always the one va-:

Whatever you do, don't use this one (b/c then it would not be as funny when I use it in comments:-P):

I mean... it probably depends on how that statement is phrased. Texas is like a whole other country, and I almost appended some language to reflect that in the title (in retrospect I probably should have: "your "foreign neighbor" to the north!"). On the other hand, the sheer number of American flags present in the state reveals a fierce pride of not only Texas but also of being American. Despite how many times they've voted to try to break away from the USA (I'm not joking there - they really do that, every few years).

Then again, I don't know what subset of Texans frequent that community - probably not the Guns and God kind, but rather those who would enjoy that picture, e.g. from the Austin area being more liberal.

Still, the post legit does not match the content, which is all 100% about the region of "Texas", and this post merely mentions it in the OP text (and not in an entirely flattering light - not so bad, but not like praising it either).

Well, it's their choice to not like it, but we reached out to them all the same to try to be welcoming:-).

Most people, it would seem, are children. Or at least act like it, unable (or unwilling) to see past the nose on their own face.

Something like half of my posts have more downvotes than upvotes, and I have earned a distinction of having some of the most heavily-downvoted posts in some communities histories (oops, that's no longer true, um... yay?). Then I'll frequently have the highest-upvoted comment (or even more often 2nd or maybe 3rd, among very large posts even) within very many posts. Go figure. Either way I'm just being me, seeing what I see and liking what I like, and sharing it occasionally if I have an inkling of a thought that others might enjoy it (often I'm wrong:-).

So people are fickle, especially en mass. I can't say to ignore them bc you do as you please, but I can say do your art for YOU. People a decade from now may enjoy it, but that too will be irrelevant, if you are finding fulfillment in the doing.:-)

If it helps to share my perspective: I almost left the Fediverse entirely after Kbin.social fell apart and my only options were to either move to Lemmy, return to Reddit, or go literally nowhere (online I mean, so I would e.g. read books and play games irl, basically touch grass, but avoid social media entirely - it's not nearly as difficult as people say, I've done it a good fraction of my life actually, bc I know I have an addictive personality and especially a corporate run one would feed into that).

So I decided to give Lemmy a try, despite knowing it was run by tankies. And while I suck at posting content that people enjoy, I tried in my own way to make people feel more welcomed by commenting on existing posts, to make them more lively.

Though when I commented in ChapoTrapHouse@hexbear.net that at least Biden had lowered gasoline prices, and while that was not everything it also was not nothing, and did help the poorest people who need that, I got replies for WEEKS and WEEKS afterwards. And then again for a similar comment made in lemmygrad.ml (my instances apparently at the time had defederated from neither). It was very toxic, and I don't need that shit in my life. Literally nothing - as in no social media - would have been preferable.

But then I noticed that nearly all of the toxicity that I saw at the time was coming from the big 3 tankie instances. Since leaning that, my experiences on the Fediverse have greatly improved!

Note this has nothing to do with "politics" and everything to do with CONSENT to receive their bullshit, alternative-fact takes shoved down my throat (continuing for WEEKS and WEEKS at a time - who does that!? outside of those instances I mean). And to be fair, if that's how they want to be then okay then, you do you, except: it would have been nice to have been warned?

A LARGE part of what is turning people away from the Fediverse is its toxicity. And the lack of features such as proper labeling of communities isn't helping any. The desktop web UI shows the sidebar, which would have explained to me that ChapoTrapHouse is all about dunking onto liberals - OOOOHHHH, so maybe I don't want to make a comment there that isn't 100% trashing Biden? Good to know, thanks! - but the mobile web UI does not do that, e.g. for posts found via All, and neither does a good many apps such as Voyager.

It's not ready for a mainstream audience yet, technologically speaking. Hence most hobbiests remain on Reddit, or else literally eschew social media altogether. That's better than the alternative - apparently - i.e. coming here and getting "dunked on", like the above commentor talking about being so heavily downvoted. We are not very welcoming here, hence people don't want to come here. I know that 100% of the people I've recommended to try it have not liked it. It's going to take some work to clean ourselves up if we want hobbiests to feel like Lemmy is worthwhile for them. (And frankly I expect it will never happen, but I am putting my hopes into PieFed, or Sublinks if it revives, bc PieFed already has features that make it welcoming, like showing the sidebar text below every single post - mind you its Notifications feature is barely functional so it is not ready for a mainstream audience either, but the fact that such welcoming features are already present is heartwarming! ❤️💕:-)