The Threadiverse is definitely not ready for “normies”. Even if we ignore the extremism, the on-boarding, UX, service provision stability, topical coverage is not at the point where normies can join.

I’ve told people about the Fediverse as a concept, but I haven’t suggested anyone try it, as I don’t think it’s ready.

I will note that I personally think the federated model isn’t inherently too complex, it just needs better UI/UX and the network needs to be larger (e.g. 1 M MAU, 50 K DAU with coverage of at least 5 major langauges).

I am not really sure there is any magical solution to dealing with extremism. Better mod tools, a development focus on automated admin work will help, but I don’t think it will solve the root cause. IMO it’s not technical problem, it’s a social issue that’s also present in mainstream corporate network (albeit it can be more subtle there).