I was initially optimistic about Lemmy but it doesn’t seem to have caught on much, certainly not enough to truly compete with the likes of Reddit. Also, it doesn’t seem to have caught on except for topics involving technology. Even as someone really proactive trying to branch out into forums, it is next to impossible to find forums analogous to the forums of the 2000s/early 2010s. Has it truly died out? Is there any way to replicate it?
The one thing I can think of is to have a foundation built firmly on open source principles, which works on its UI and marketing to the point where network effects can truly take off. Most open source alternatives really do not focus enough on UI and general appeal to make this work.
I’m happy to be proven wrong; if I’m just not looking in the right places, please do link them!
Apart from niche forum who are still active but slowly dying, there’s not so much anymore, since social media came. Reddit was the right mix of forum and social media. Lemmy could be too. But it less easy to understand and use than a classical forum for common people. And there’s not this “organized” topic forum thing. (Reddit too).
But with social media become less comfortable to use, less interesting, perhaps forum alike will rise again.
Actually, if you just want to feel some “old” web, what it still active is “webrings” stuff. Basically, people make their own little website, with just html/CSS, and they are part of a webring, where you can surf between each website inside of it. And it tend to have this 2000’s web vibe.
Here’s one for example, but there’s lot a different webrings, with different theme sometimes. And it can be hard to find. https://ring.recurse.com/