Implying that consolidation gives them much more leverage to do whatever they like with more detrimental outcomes for the industry and users.

Matrix or Jitsi with Lemmy or any popular forum software would be my suggestion. More secure and private but require some technical knowledge.

Interesting. Thanks for the clear explanation. So in the beginning, it must have been like screaming into the void. I see that “Auto add” is off for lemmy.world. Is that also part of why I couldn’t find those communities?