In another conversation about the server literature.cafe potentially defederating from the Hexbear server, I found this comment chain by @Janvier to be a worthwhile read. He makes the case for smaller servers to defederate from many large servers, and not only Hexbear, as a way for smaller communities to grow organically. It is an interesting and different vision of Lemmy; many smaller ‘islands’ that are only marginally connected, instead of one big platform that is tightly connected between the different servers.
This is an insanely educational thread. Janvier really knows a lot about the behaviors and health of online communities.