As someone who uses discord for a variety of fun, professional and hobby-related projects I think the real answer is it depends. I've seen multiple servers wher

As someone who uses discord for a variety of fun, professional and hobby-related projects I think the real answer is it depends. I've seen multiple servers where extra channels/topics can actually encourage people to talk more vs having a general channel. It also makes it easier to catch up on things if you aren't checking a channel every day. I actually see this as a feature of discord, not a problem. That being said, I have also seen multiple servers with dead channels that should probably be merged or pruned. Some people go crazy and make a bucket for stuff that just doesn't get talked about. I know it can suck to see a small community spread thing. I do dislike how centralised discord is, and would prefer an open source competitor had gotten traction. But for me, the community _is_ the value, not the technology. Discoverability is huge. Source: Admin of a Discord with 4k people, lightly active mod on several discords with 2k people and generally active user of the platform.