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From Chicago. I made the plunge to Mastodon (and here) after the Reddit shenanigans and just seeing the repeated bad-faith policies by Twitter. I have been using redirector and libredirect for the last month or two to actively decide who I give my data to just as a fun experiment into best practices.

I think it's slowly starting to be clear that this type of setup will be the way forward for the more tech-savvy, privacy-focused users, and hopefully/eventually it hits the mainstream as well, but otherwise, it's just self-selecting into the type of people I want to be around, which will probably be better for my mental health anyways.

I'm into cycling, trading, sci-fi and FOSS. Currently reading The Expanse and taking a sabbatical year from work

Edit: Just want to encourage people to engage w/ and create content over the next few weeks. Activity and friendly faces are probably the most determining factor in whether someone becomes an active user or just browses for a few minutes

Howdy! I'm Evan, I'm from STL, and recently graduated from S&T with a BS in CS, going back for an MS. I'm a linguist, software engineer, musician, FOSS contributor, and Fediverse enthusiast. I build computers, run servers, write music, and get angry at the US/MO on the daily.

P.S.: call me scum, because I've only ever used Reddit via their official app, but at least I jumped ship!

Sup nerds. I'm Miah, I'm from Western Michigan. I'm a UNIX/Linux nerd, Right to Repair advocate, and transgender woman. I've been working on our cars by myself and would love to make some car nerd friends. My wife and I have 24 chickens, and a budding garden.

Hi there from Madison, WI! I am the developer of Voyager :)

Another former reddit user from the Twin Cities here. Enjoying learning about lemmy so far, still trying to figure out how it works! Big fan of disc golf, board games, books, and video games.

Hi y'all! I'm from Indiana. Nice to meet you all!

Osiyo (Cherokee) Oy li'one (Tzotzil: I'm here)

SW Kansas here, and my brain has decided to take a back seat to life, so throw in chronic pains, I'm just hunting for a new way to exist. Don't know what I'm doing yet, but I know I'm doing it, heh heh heh...What? I don't know. Do you know? No I do not, but would you like to know? Of course I would. Well tough luck there, pal.

Anyway, before the 'ol thinker decided to call it quits, I used to be quite the nerd. I dabbled in C, assembly, bash (Slackware user, so I better know bash, heh), calc, pari/gp, mathematics (Began aiming for number theory just before the brain gave out), native american languages, sharks, carnivorous plants, ferns, cooking, just to name the easiest.

Good morning, midwestern Lemmites! Actually a Hexbear refugee, I got banned when they found out I organize with Trotskyists. Don't worry though, my IRL organizing work creates enough personal irritation that I don't need to harass people who disagree with me in order to get it. I'm just here cuz its a leftish space of localish people, who post memes and stories I can comment on. I like Music, art, videogames, tech, books (history, social theory, sci fi)...well I actually have too many hobbies and interests to list. Thanks for letting me in your little instance!

My name's Tyler. I live in NE Kansas, about an hr from KCK-Proper.

I get really into things quickly and then forget about them just as fast; Usually just enough to break something, get frustrated, and grab something else. My home is a monument to my family's abandoned hobbies.

Hi everyone. I showed up here because I saw Seahorse at the Akron pride fest with his awesome flag, told some of my likeminded friends about it, and they found his post. I showed up to applaud him, and decided to just stick around.

I used to use Reddit, with a very carefully curated list of subreddits, which I used replace my Twitter constant stimulation requirement. I had to ditch Reddit the day they killed Apollo and won’t be returning unless they reverse that decision.

I’m happy to have found this place, it’s nice.

I’m from Akron Ohio, work (remotely) in tech (job based in San Francisco), and do not like cops, landlords, or the ruling class really.

I feel like I’d fit in here pretty well.

From a Wisconsin Exurb of the Twin Cities. I am an astronomer and instrumentation physicist, most of my day job is debugging software and electronics. But sometimes it is looking at galaxies and exoplanets. I am getting back into running after an injury and am currently reading about political economics.

Hey friends! Twin Cities chiming in. Classic story of jumping ship now that reddit has struck the iceberg. Hoping to find new communities here for scratching my artistic itches. I'm a drummer, DJ, designer, illustrator, who dabbles with music production. Let's get weird.

Hey y’all I’m Josh and I’m from Iowa but go to school for Music in SoDak. Getting booted off Reddit because I only use Apollo and this seems like a pretty solid alternative. Looking forward to building the communities with y’all!

Upon further investigation of this comment section I may be the only SoDakian in here lol. Surprised SoDakZack hasn’t jumped over from Reddit

Howdy! I'm Mike and I'm in South West Ohio. Im an Ex Sync user migrating like a lot of others.

One question.... before I go scrub my, ahem.... account on that nameless platform, is there an online banking system that will allow my to transfer my hard earned internet points to another platform? You know, kinda like a rollover from one 401k to another?

Not that I had any huge amount.

Anyway...... OH!!!

Hello! Crushed by the Reddit/Apollo debacle and looking for something less…corporate. Glad I found Lemmy!

I live in central Iowa and am a techno nerd - I like self hosting, docker, home labbin’, home automation, and home AV.

Greetings! My name is Matt and I live in Indianapolis. I'm migrating over from a single-user instance. You can also find me over at @[email protected]. Thanks!

Howdy! I live in Indiana, reddit exodus member and I'm looking for a new place to call my internet home.

hi from Peoria, IL. Been here about 6 months and just found the docs, lol. Thanks to all you admin types driving. Good times.

Lemmy docs

Hi there. Iowan leftist fleeing the mainstream platforms to help my mental health. Feeling disillusioned with national political action and wanting to focus my attention locally. I'm and avid gardener, war-gamer/mini painter, and forever D&D GM.

Hi!

Ohioan here... I too am a recent reddit refugee.... anyone else having digg deja vu?...

Likes: Nerdy things, Video Games, Animals, Ohio sports teams, Music, Traveling

Been on Mastodon for a few months (suck it twitter) and with Reddit's recent money grab figured I'd check out other parts of the fediverse.

Reddit escapee living in Central IL. Remote enterprise application developer in a fairly niche insurance category. Grew up here but spent many years in Chicago and then San Diego. Came back to raise a family here and have been back for about 17 years now. Good to be here in midwest.social!

FemmeGauche here. I'm a lefty millennial in Michigan who can use the internet but new to this decentralized stuff... just trying to find community while asshole billionaires wreck the easier-to-access stuff

Howdy all! I live in the St Louis metro east area. I'm also a reddit transplant and already really digging the community. I'm super excited to be here! I'm into woodworking, making lamps and other crafts. I'm also exploring producing a niche form of EDM music eventually. I'm a fan of general internet research and constantly learning new information.

Hello 30 year old central Missourian. Had a Reddit and Imgur account, left Reddit at the last purge of subs and users. Have been using Imgur exclusively since then. Not quite the same, except for it also slowly getting worse as they monetize it. I enjoyed woodworking, blacksmithing, leatherworking, ren-faires (shocker given those previous two), and cooking. Past tense as I now have a 1 year old and there's no time for anything besides work and parenting a baby/toddler with my spouse. Wasn't planning to interact much, as agreeing to a popular opinion isn't helpful and I don't have time for arguing something pointless, however a post below reminded me that I should, as engagement does help grow this new platform. An attempt will be made.

Hello, 9thSun here. Chicago resident. Boost for Reddit stopped working so I wanted to check out Lemmy. Hella into technologies.

Reddit refugee, Clevelander, home theater/surround audio nerd. Nice to be here.

Hi everyone!

I live in Chicago on the North Side and work in higher education. Been in the city on and off for about 10 years with a gap in the middle when I lived in Asia. I came to Chicago for grad school and really liked the city and the Midwest more generally.

I have been pretty active in the Fediverse for the past year on Mastodon, Pixelfed, and Bookwyrm and decided to give this a try! I'm also trying Kbin as well but really am not understanding the whole Threads + Microblogging. Feels kind of like a having a phone taped to a toaster. Am I the only one who feels that way?

Any good, active communities you might recommend? Any tips to make the most out of Lemmy?

I like reading a lot. I'm into fantasy, sci-fi, philosophy, and religion. I'm really interested in environment, ecology, and climate issues. Always looking for new things to explore in Chicago and the surrounding suburbs.

Here from West Michigan as well, long-time moderator on the other place in a cult-recovery sub, but I’ve been active across metal-working and woodworking communities. Big fan of forged in fire and have been dabbling. Love Michigan, spend a good amount of time in Chicago now as well. Really appreciate that for community exists, feels like the early days (which were the Best days) over in the other place. Looking forward to being a part of this community!

Hello from Kansas (burbs of Kansas City).

Like many, I came from reddit. Spent about 10 years there; about 5 just lurking, then about 5 years a little more engaged.

My hobby is hobbies. I think I just like learning and tinkering. My list of endeavors includes photography, diy audio, camping, cooking/smoking, woodworking, beer brewing, gardening, music (making and consuming), home diy, etc, etc.

Some lasted, some did not, others come and go.

So many times Ive had a nuanced question posed to a community of enthusiasts yield 1000% better results than several hours of searching and reading. I'm looking forward to exploring and interacting here.

Hi everyone, another Chicagolander here, this time from the western suburbs. I just moved over here from kbin.social, which has been broken quite a lot lately. Prior to that I was on reddit for an embarrassingly long time, bailing on it when the shit hit the fan last summer.

I'm also on Mastodon where I post very infrequently - I prefer the link aggregator with comments style services such as Lemmy over microblog things.

I'm a middle-aged immigrant dude who is into a lot of nerd shit like scifi, books, video games, electric vehicles, as well as photography and motorcycles. I also ride bicycles for fun and exercise when the weather doesn't suck.

Hello, I'm void. Lifelong Michigander; catch me weekly dancing at R1 GLC. Other interests include free software, metal and industrial concerts, bio implants, and fermented foods—both homebrew and vegan goodies.

Michigan guy here. Been a programmer all my life, but I'm dabbling in photography too these days.

I also create games for fun, so there's officially a crowd of us now.

Hello all, I'm a network engineer currently living in Grand Forks, ND, but from Sioux Falls, SD, and planning to move to Minneapolis in a few months.

I've been off Reddit since they killed 3rd party apps and figured I should finally replace it with something else.

Hello! I'm from Indiana outside of Chicago. This seems like a good group to join. Like most here, I work in tech. I like cooking/grilling, gaming, bad movies, and the outdoors. I am migrating from Reddit and looking for a place that reminds me of the early days of Reddit.

Southern Indiana, Hoosier native gamer and traveller.

Reddit abandoner

Hello! I'm a Wisconsinite soon moving to Minneapolis. Born and raised in western Wisconsin.

Hello! I'm Matt from northeast Ohio, another Reddit transplant looking for a new home. I'm mostly into photography, hiking , biking, and backpacking, and my homes of choice in the area are Cuyahoga Valley and Wayne NF

Hiya! Greetings from Florida, land of the loony. Glad to be here!

Fellow midwesterner here, trying to figure out all this new fangled technology. Trying to find a new home knowing that Reddit will soon be going on the stock market which means it'll become an advertising platform on behalf of Wall Street.

Hi all, just joined. I live a bit north of Milwaukee. I've enjoyed perusing the local communities to see what my neighbors are up to.

North burbs right on border of Chicago. Also a fellow reddit refugee. Can't believe how sad I was when baconreader stopped working, and my stubborn ass knew I'd walk away.

So happy to have found Lemmy, and a midwest instance to boot.

Still not sure how all this works, but it does more than fill the need of interesting screen time.

In to skateboarding, snowboarding, motorcycles, gaming.

Work as a systems programmer specializing in audio and video systems.

Been here one hour and totally prefer this to Reddit.

I'm a new Lemmy user, teacher, and cyclist from the St. Louis area. Hello everyone!

reddit refugee here, had been a 12+ year user that started on f7u12 and rage comics, growing up as reddit did… and i, like almost everyone else here, do not recognize it for what it used to be.

anyway! i’m not exactly midwest, as i’m from tennessee, but i am a huge fan of midwest emo (am football, mom jeans, pinegrove, desaparecidos) and i commiserate with the best of them.

i’m into photography, woodworking, building guitars, architecture, design, bicycling, and basketball. so far lemmy has been a huge breath of fresh air!

I'm yet another Reddit refugee - you might recognize my username from frequent comments in /r/athensohio, or less frequently /r/Ohio and /r/Columbus - and I made accounts at Beehaw, lemmy.world, and sh.itjust.works before discovering this instance. A whole instance of leftists in the Midwest?!?!!! 🎉 Very excited to have found you all.

My husband (42m) and I (41f) have been together just shy of 20 years and do small engine and outdoor equipment repair from our home garage; he turns the wrenches, I do the admin stuff, and we make small engine repair and enthusiast videos to encourage people to repair, not replace, which is something we're really passionate about.

We have a 16yo trans son, son and I are both bi, and we keep our pride flag up all year long because we've had repair customers mention that it helped them know we were a safe place to bring their equipment. 😕

We've got dogs and cats and live on a few acres outside Athens. Just 2 weeks ago, we received our newly-hatched chickens and guineas, so we're scrambling to get the coop and run done. I'm working on figuring out how to share the feed for the security camera I set up near their enclosure, so let me know if you'd like a link for the Poultry News Network when it goes live. 😂

Hello all, frequenter of the r/cleveland boards. Former dig migrator leaving reddit. It was slow at both at first. What works takes time and looking forward to helping build a new awesome repository of knowledge here!