How is the size of Lemmy's userbase changing? Is it growing or shrinking? How diverse is it? What do the current trendlines look like as we approach a year since Rexxit?

I feel like I used to see graphs on this sub fairly regularly, but haven't seen one recently. There was also some ambiguity in the numbers as commenting and voting were added to the active user totals. Now that most (all?) instances have switched to 0.19, do we have a better idea of where things stand?

Aside from sticking around and posting, commenting, and voting, is there anything users should be doing to help grow the platform? (!lemmygrow would be a good name for a sublemmy, if anyone wanted to organize something)

In any case, thanks to everyone who has helped grow Lemmy to its current size!

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[–] Danterious@lemmy.dbzer0.com 20 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (3 children)

If you scroll down it does give historical trends on comments, posts, monthly active users, etc.

What I meant is why do the graphs look so janky.

For example:

What happened in October 2023 that made so many users join?

and

What happened in February 2024 that made so many people stop posting?

Edit: March -> February

[–] seaQueue@lemmy.world 18 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Sept/Oct '23 was the Boost lemmy mobile client release. A lot of people signed up and many of them bounced off shortly after.

[–] chiisana@lemmy.chiisana.net 9 points 8 months ago

0.19 counts active users differently; prior to 0.19, the count is only if the user posted, after 0.19, all interactions results in the user being counted as an active user. This inflated the active users hugely as all lurkers are counted.

The active users is dwindling. You can see the steep drop off prior to the change and a slow but continued decline after the update.

I do not know the reason for the number of posts falling off, but that doesn’t look healthy either to be honest.

[–] sin_free_for_00_days@sopuli.xyz 4 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Thanks for the post. Something on my browser only shows the pie charts and doesn't let me scroll down.

[–] dave@feddit.uk 4 points 8 months ago

The graphs are all interactive (touch to show labels, etc.). That can interfere with scrolling—try dragging at the edge or one of the pie chart titles. Fwiw, it scrolls ok on mobile safari…