No, that’s not how that works.

Users can generate their own keys, and you know it’s the same user as long as they have the same key, even if they’re on different servers.

No certificate authority is required for this kind of use case.

Your own rock, in this economy?

It’s federated, so the local user count is completely irrelevant.

Especially when OP even specifically said that you would see the SAME content, just with different sorting.

Lemmy has Hot, Active, and Top sort modes, all of which are different indicators of engagement.

Also, for whatever reason I actually do have ONE single post originating from kbin, from 3 months ago:
https://lemmy.megumin.org/post/128103

I’m guessing this is the first one I tried subscribing to… so for whatever reason I managed to receive that one post, but then no subsequent posts, comments, or votes.

All of my Lemmy subscriptions seem to be working fine.

Mine is definitely more than just “a bit” broken. I have 20+ communities subscribed for over 2 months and 0 posts. No issues with any Lemmy communities.

Way too long to actually be useful for converting anyone.

… exactly?

Someone pointed out an advantage of smaller instances and you were the one that said small instances have a problem (lack of communities), and I’m the one pointing out that your supposed problem does not, in fact, exist.

TL;DR small instance good

You can join any community on any instance from any other instance, as long as the admin hasn’t blocked it.

Local communities are totally irrelevant when deciding which instance should host your account.

https://lemmy.world/post/1293336