With apps like Mlem on iOS, we are getting very close to an Apollo+Reddit experience. How can Reddit successfully monetize what are basically just forums? What makes it special anymore ?
The community and how it interacts has always been the only thing that made it special. It's like a car. You'll remember the places you went and the people you went there with. But when the car hits 200k and becomes more expensive to fix than buy a new one, you send it to the scrap yard.
Lemmy is turning into a promising framework for community. But it's still the community that makes it worth being here.
Mlem is basically Apollo for Lemmy. I’m enjoying Memmy too. Honestly the only value Reddit has is the user base. The diversity of apps and the lack of corporate ownership already make this space far more exciting than Reddit
To answer the title question: reddit is a part of the zeitgeist, and people use it fairly regularly. By serving everyone ads disguised as posts (and shutting down API access to ensure that all traffic is served ads) they can greatly increase their revenue. Most social media has this same model.