Did you try these searches while logged in or anonymously? Lemmy (and probably other platforms) don't allow searches for remote objects unless you're logged in, this prevents abuse of server resources. The fact that you're getting replies and you can see them and reply to them means it's probably all working fine.
I do think there could be some features added to help avoid full defederation. Like if instance admins could set a default list of banned instances, and the users could choose to unban those instances for themselves. Of course defederation could still be necessary sometimes like for illegal content, software bugs, or malicious attacks.
that's how it always goes, people wanna complain in the comments so they pretend it's the worst problem in the world, then you ask them to spend $1 to fund development and fix it in the software they use every day and you get nothing lol
Because if I didn't use Discord then I would be the only one in the community. Discord has a massive userbase especially with gamers. You give them a Discord link and there's a decent chance you'll see them join and post a message. Give them any other link and they'll never make an account, they probably won't even click the link to see it.
I provide links for Discord, Lemmy, Kbin, Mastodon, Steam group, and GitHub. I see lots of people come in on Discord, but 0 on the others except for myself lol.
Only the few actual contributors use the GitHub, don't think I've ever seen a non-programmer submit a bug report on my GitHub or use the discussions or leave any comments on releases or anything.
I'm also on Moddb and NexusMods, got a few comments on Moddb, none on Nexusmods yet.
I also have Twitch and YouTube of course, I get small numbers of people commenting on those.
Nobody has even asked for any other type of community, Discord is just want they want. If I just wanted to talk to myself then I wouldn't bother creating a community/forum at all.
for anyone else reading, you get to it by clicking the "..." button in the bottom right corner. It doesn't mix the results very well, so I think it's best to sort by Top Today or Top 12 Hours to keep the list short
would be nice if the communities page could show the date of the most recent post or something
but I guess anything with 0 users per month is obviously dead, unless it's like an infrequently used announcements community