It's kinda hard to get a feel for which community you should post somethings in. I'd say this is particularly true of discussion topics/text posts (that end up never posted). Anyone else or Is it just a me problem? If not, what could be done about it?

Edit 1: For context {not the subject intended for discussion in this thread], to further the thread, I wanted to add to the current discussion, (mostly) in news threads about the potential military conflict between the US and Nato over Greenland. In my perception, a common thought in these threads is that no rational country or military would defend itself against the overwhelming power of the US, despite numerous countries and insurgencies have fought against the US at a terrible disadvantage. A post of this could have taken many forms, e.g. a list of wiki articles to conflicts, a meme, an open ended question/discussion text post. But finding a place to post any possible iteration of such a post in a Lemmy community where there's a reasonable amount of activity would take going over a large amount of community rules, etc.

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[–] Rentlar@lemmy.ca 16 points 10 hours ago* (last edited 10 hours ago) (2 children)

!actual_discussion@lemmy.ca

If it's not topic specific, try this one?

I get it, even with link posts and memes sometimes I'm not sure if I'm posting it in the right places, or if I have to trade off potential traction with how closely related it is.

A solution I've employed sometimes is to post to two spots:

first in the niche community where it feels a best fit, even if it shows like 12 subscribers...
then crosspost to a more popular one for visibility with a link in body text to the other one, to help other people discover the niche community.

That way you don't feel forced to only participate in the popular instances and communities.

E.g. !boardgames@sopuli.xyz then !games@lemmy.world

E.g.2: !vancouver@lemmy.ca then !canada@lemmy.ca

E.g.3: !rant@lemmy.sdf.org then !goodoffmychest@lemmy.world

[–] dumples@piefed.social 5 points 8 hours ago

I love the cross posting feature. It's helpful to spread the love

[–] TipsyMcGee@lemmy.dbzer0.com 8 points 9 hours ago

Thanks for the suggestions, that seems like a strategy with many positives for Lemmy in general and smaller communities in particular.

That way you don’t feel forced to only participate in the popular instances and communities.

I feel very seen by this reply because I think this is at the heart of it for me.

[–] 5714@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

What is a reasonable amount of activity in your context?

[–] planish@sh.itjust.works 2 points 7 hours ago

I'll chime in that posting to a community with about 12 subscribers is not very fun. But then that's why we have vigorous cross-posting.

[–] Skavau@piefed.social 16 points 10 hours ago (2 children)

What are you trying to post?

[–] TipsyMcGee@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 points 10 hours ago

I added a little context to the main post just to bring a clear example of what inspired this post. But I would also say that I don't really know of any real catch all community that's populated, text focused and "catch all".

[–] Auster@thebrainbin.org 5 points 10 hours ago

To the OP:
Personally, if I want to post something, I search for communities that sound like good fits, then go by elimination if I find multiple.
But with as broad of a suggestion that it is, I second Skavau's question. Could you give an example of what you'd like to post so we can give some ideas?

[–] mesamunefire@piefed.social 7 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

I personally look at feeds like: https://piefed.social/feeds

when im looking at general topics. For example:

Makes it easy to say, go down a step and find ALL fediverse related communities.

[–] astro_ray@piefed.social 1 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

I think feeds are only available on piefed instances

[–] mesamunefire@piefed.social 1 points 7 hours ago

Oh right...forgot. woops

[–] pruwybn@discuss.tchncs.de 8 points 10 hours ago* (last edited 10 hours ago)

Check out !lemmy411@lemmy.ca - you can make a post asking about what kind of content or discussions you're looking for and people may be able to point you in the right direction.

Some discussion communities I follow that aren't about a specific topic:

!nostupidquestions@lemmy.world

!asklemmy@lemmy.world

!showerthoughts@lemmy.world

edit: I also know of !casualconversation@piefed.social although I don't follow it.

[–] adhd_traco@piefed.social 5 points 9 hours ago (1 children)

For what you're describing in your edit:

https://piefed.social/c/politicaldiscussion@lemmy.world

and maybe

https://piefed.social/c/military@lemmy.world

Just searching across instances for the most general keywords of what you want to post. In this case: "military", "politic", "relations" and reading the rules/description of the communities.

Also, I'd say it's pretty healthy for lemmy to post in communities without much/any activity yet. You'd be one of the first/few to breath life into them to grow.

[–] pruwybn@discuss.tchncs.de 2 points 3 hours ago* (last edited 3 hours ago)

FYI if you format the community links like !politicaldiscussion@lemmy.world it will link people to the community on their own instance.

[–] ambitiousslab@feddit.uk 6 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

I get you. I can never think of anything that would be interesting to post or ask in the more discussion-oriented communities, let alone choose a specific one to post in. I definitely find comments easier, as well as posting to more niche communities. I feel the scope is usually better defined there.

Would you say it's about not knowing if your post would be accepted in the community, or just finding the best place for it? If it's the latter, AskLemmy could be good for general questions, or failing that, any of the casual chat communities such as !chat@beehaw.org.

As long as your post meets the rules of the community/instance, I feel it's better to post somewhere than not at all - people can always crosspost it elsewhere if they like.

[–] TipsyMcGee@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 points 10 hours ago

I get you. I can never think of anything that would be interesting to post or ask in the more discussion-oriented communities, let alone choose a specific one to post in. I definitely find comments easier, as well as posting to more niche communities. I feel the scope is usually better defined there.

I tend to feel the same way (and by no means am I saying the world is missing out on my would be posts). It's easier to join a discussion that's already going or go off a prompt. What really started this train of thought is that I felt that what I wanted to discuss became too off-topic to the thread that prompted it.

Would you say it’s about not knowing if your post would be accepted in the community, or just finding the best place for it? If it’s the latter, AskLemmy could be good for general questions, or failing that, any of the casual chat communities such as !chat@beehaw.org.

Thank you for those tips. I'm sure this problem could be broken down in to many parts, I think the base task of identifying where a post will meet the format requirement would be the first threshold -- and I think that's often hard. Then there's the whole thing of getting the whole vibe of a community, etc.

As long as your post meets the rules of the community/instance, I feel it’s better to post somewhere than not at all - people can always crosspost it elsewhere if they like.

I support this sentiment, it's sensible for growing the platform.

[–] INeedMana@piefed.zip 3 points 9 hours ago* (last edited 9 hours ago)

The feature to move posts between communities is planned and also AFAIK Piefed's feature of bundling together comments across all cross-posts is also coming to Lemmy sometime. Those, I think, could ease your worries a bit

But apart from that, my 2¢: save your markdown and "just do it" - unironically. It is true that many bad posts get deleted. But if you are coming with a real thought to discuss

it's probable it won't be deleted even if it bends some community rules
even if it does get deleted from a community, that does not put you in the same bag as those offenders

IMO, being absolutely-fucking-right-all-the-time-where-to-post is not a prerequisite to being here. After all (IMO) we are all here just people, we are all here just to connect, not perfectly sort posts into communities. The way threadiverse is, the communities are and will be and (IMO) should be in constant flux. With time, or rather posts, you will start to get the unwritten feel of communities. What gets downvoted where, what gets more reaction where, etc. But there is no way not even to know it beforehand, there is no way to codify it.

Also, on a more philosophical note, when you are interacting with a community, you are taking part in defining it. ATM you might be a small drop in the ocean, or the first signal of change. Maybe it needs to get more thoughts than links? Or maybe the discussants need to split off into another community? Neither you nor me, nor current community posters know that. Time will tell, communities will flux

Let the thought flow

[–] cibbecker@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 10 hours ago* (last edited 10 hours ago) (1 children)

Did you already find communities that match your interests well, in general? Or are you missing only specific kinds of communities? I was kind of lost at discovering what's out there at first, now with a set of nice communities, it's much more clear where to post.

[–] TipsyMcGee@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 10 hours ago

I have found many communities to subscribe to, but I can't say I have gotten into visiting them individually a lot. By default, my instance's stock front-end loads the top posts from all communities on all federated instances, and that's mainly how I've been getting into the action.

Of course, I want to promote growth and activity in smaller communities, but there are also a lot of those minuscule ones that get drowned out on your front page if you don't make the rounds and visit each.

[–] Grail@multiverse.soulism.net 3 points 9 hours ago

I would recommend !politics@lemmy.world or one of the anarchist discussion communities such as !anarchism@lemmy.dbzer0.com or !soulism@multiverse.soulism.net

[–] 6nk06@sh.itjust.works 4 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

We used to say RTFM or Lurk more in the good old days.

[–] TipsyMcGee@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 9 hours ago (1 children)

Yeah, fair enough, but in the good old days boards used to have clear structures for topics, off topic sections etc. Lemmy is a bit messy at times..

[–] frongt@lemmy.zip 3 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

Lemmy is equally well structured by topics! An instance is the equivalent of a board, a community is the equivalent of the forum, a post is the equivalent of a thread/topic.

[–] TipsyMcGee@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 8 hours ago

I have to disagree with you here. Nominally, what you're saying is kinda true, but the old school boards I'm thinking of would have a directory like structure with (usually) clear labels and with little overlap -- most of the time having a shared theme for the entire message board. Notably, these boards were not federated with multiple versions of each branch of the structure living side by side. In terms of "what goes where", even very broad scope traditionalist message boards were/are a lot easier to follow. That doesn't mean your're wrong that one has to learn to understand the platform as it is, it's a fair point.