My experience of the #fediverse :

Year 1 (2023):
It feels a little lonely as 99% of my friends stayed on Big Tech platforms.

Year 2 (2024):
I start a blog - #TheFutureIsFederated - to explain the fediverse to "normies"... and I make a lot of new (techie) friends.

Year 3 (2025):
My techie friends encourage me to start self-hosting with #YunoHost... and I do! (GoToSocial, PeerTube, NextCloud...) I LOVE it.

Year 4 (2026):
I plan to buy a Heltec to try out off-grid mesh radio communication 💁‍♀️