this post was submitted on 04 Dec 2023
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World was already the biggest by far when I first started lurking back in July, and it's just getting more dominant. Before, there was quite some diversity in the distribution of generic communities, but nowadays the vast majority of posts that reach the top are from over there.

I really can't see any specific virtue that it has; uptime is not the best (or so I've heard), the moderation is quite lacking (which is demonstrated by the fact that Beehaw defederated them), they make some unpopular moderation choices (like blocking !piracy@lemmy.dbzer0.com), and overall the atmosphere is a lot less... nice than those of smaller instances.

I also feel like it goes against the idea of the Fediverse that one instance has control over most of the platform. Especially on Lemmy, where communities mean that building community within an instance makes so much more sense than elsewhere, and upvotes are federated near perfectly regardless the size of your instance, decentralisation makes a lot of sense. It really just doesn't make sense to me that Lemmy World is where people are going.

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[–] TrickDacy@lemmy.world 15 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Yeah. I continue to be confused by the names of some of them. Wtf is a blaja or whatever

[–] grue@lemmy.world 29 points 1 year ago (2 children)

It's an Ikea stuffed shark that's become a mascot for trans people because it happens to be pink and blue. lemmy.blahaj.zone is an instance for LGBTQ folks.

(I'm aware of this mainly because !196@lemmy.blahaj.zone often has content near the top of "all", but I sometimes hesitate to comment on it because I don't want to intrude.)

[–] Omega_Haxors@lemmy.ml 0 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

196 is its most popular community which sucks because their mods are rabid anti-communists, it's a really bad look for the instance.

[–] UndercoverUlrikHD@programming.dev 8 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Blåhaj is the Swedish word for "blue shark" (blå haj). It's the name of an IKEA plushie of a blue shark.

[–] themeatbridge@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That just raises further questions!

[–] UndercoverUlrikHD@programming.dev 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Other people that replied already explained that the colours of the plushie resembles the one the trans community uses, so it ended being a representation/icon or something of the trans community. I believe the owner of the instance is transgender, so there's the connection.

[–] themeatbridge@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

I know, I just like that line.

[–] thedirtyknapkin@lemmy.world 6 points 1 year ago

blahaj is a trans rights icon sort of.