Ok, but what if the instance I choose just ends suddenly?
Do I understand it correctly that on each one I have to create a new account and re-subscribe to all the communities etc,?
That’s correct though account migration is planned for some point in the future, or at least noted as a desirable feature by the Devs. Maybe even linking accounts across instances?
Having to resubscribe to all your communities is annoying but I imagine third party apps could streamline that process when they get released/refined.
Aside from what Coelacanth said, those instances are no more likely to shut down than lemmy.world (I can’t recall a Lemmy instance that’s not for personal use ever shutting down); they’ve functioned just fine for years and have even been upgraded for the surge of users too
Lemmy.fmhy.ml shutdown and hasnt come back yet. My understanding is that it won’t be back, but that was the instance I signed up for initially to spread the server load
well this just happened with vlemmy.net, i was affected by this and had to manually resubscribe to 50 communities and recreate one, because of this someone made a tool to download your data off of lemmy and upload it to another instance https://github.com/CMahaff/lasim
There is no ‘main’ website. It’s all connected. People just started joining that because it’s big and overloaded it, and now it’s having federation and stability issues.
Federation means you can search for your community on your instance and it will fetch all the information if you want to subscribe. I am writing this comment with my account on feddit.de. I just switched to the „all“ feed, which shows all content from all servers feddit federated with. If I am looking up a new community to join like [email protected] feddit will copy the posts for mento be able to interact with them. My reactions will be synched back.
Fair point. Tye small one’s Re being hugged to death and aren’t letting any more people in, so people are gravitating towards the juggernauts, and the juggernauts are collapsing under their weight. 
When I first joined, I never got a confirmation that my account had been accepted. After a few minutes, I just typed the username and password I used during registration and I was able to log in.
When I applied, I never got a notification that it got approved, but I could post and comment on that instance. So you might have been in a similar situation as me or the admins are still dealing with a large influx of people
I started on lemmy.ml but it was unusable for the past few days. Today I managed to get into programming.dev pretty quickly and it has been smooth sailing.
Ha, I applied to two smaller instances and have heard nothing but radio silence. The smaller instances are of no help if they don’t let anyone in.
Use and recommend lemm.ee, lemmy.one, and vlemmy.net to others; all great
I run https://thelemmy.club - people are always welcome here :)
Where my VLemmy peeps at?!? 🙌
Me!
Yeah, boooyyyyyy! 🙌🙌🙌🙌
👋
Up high… 🙌
🙌
Yo!
Boo yaa! 👊
Aussie.zone
Ok, but what if the instance I choose just ends suddenly? Do I understand it correctly that on each one I have to create a new account and re-subscribe to all the communities etc,?
That’s correct though account migration is planned for some point in the future, or at least noted as a desirable feature by the Devs. Maybe even linking accounts across instances?
Having to resubscribe to all your communities is annoying but I imagine third party apps could streamline that process when they get released/refined.
Aside from what Coelacanth said, those instances are no more likely to shut down than lemmy.world (I can’t recall a Lemmy instance that’s not for personal use ever shutting down); they’ve functioned just fine for years and have even been upgraded for the surge of users too
Lemmy.fmhy.ml shutdown and hasnt come back yet. My understanding is that it won’t be back, but that was the instance I signed up for initially to spread the server load
well this just happened with vlemmy.net, i was affected by this and had to manually resubscribe to 50 communities and recreate one, because of this someone made a tool to download your data off of lemmy and upload it to another instance https://github.com/CMahaff/lasim
But isn’t this the main website? Why can’t I use it?
There is no ‘main’ website. It’s all connected. People just started joining that because it’s big and overloaded it, and now it’s having federation and stability issues.
I am new here so sorry for asking this, but am I expected to join the same communities on 75 different Lemmy clones?
Federation means you can search for your community on your instance and it will fetch all the information if you want to subscribe. I am writing this comment with my account on feddit.de. I just switched to the „all“ feed, which shows all content from all servers feddit federated with. If I am looking up a new community to join like [email protected] feddit will copy the posts for mento be able to interact with them. My reactions will be synched back.
I just created two communities: Sudoku, and Nonograms, in Lemmy World. Can you see them?
Fair point. Tye small one’s Re being hugged to death and aren’t letting any more people in, so people are gravitating towards the juggernauts, and the juggernauts are collapsing under their weight. 
Next couple weeks should be interesting
Removed by mod
My instance (civilloquy.com) has open sign-ups. ;)
When I first joined, I never got a confirmation that my account had been accepted. After a few minutes, I just typed the username and password I used during registration and I was able to log in.
deleted by creator
When I applied, I never got a notification that it got approved, but I could post and comment on that instance. So you might have been in a similar situation as me or the admins are still dealing with a large influx of people
Oh wow you’re totally right. I was just able to log into one that I had never heard from! Thank you, good call!
try mine.
I don’t want to be locked in with a stelletje Nederlanders zoals ik.
IDK what you meant by “locked with” but there is feddit.uk too.
Good for you. I’d been trying that for months with no success. Finally .world let me in last week.
I started on lemmy.ml but it was unusable for the past few days. Today I managed to get into programming.dev pretty quickly and it has been smooth sailing.