A good start is having your ducks in a row for when conditions inevitably and suddenly lead to people jumping ship en masse to whatever Next Thing is waiting.

A good start is having your ducks in a row for when conditions inevitably and suddenly lead to people jumping ship en masse to whatever Next Thing is waiting. Lemmy was already built and deployed in several instances, but the reddit API controversy showed it wasn't quite ready. But now maybe it's closer? Lemmy and other larger alternatives still leave some important problems unsolved, but the point is that "build it and they will come" still rings true if you have the patience to wait for the next inevitable misstep from the current major players.