Some people on Mastodon or other microblogging fediverse basically using their account for image only gallery.

It definitely nice to see Misskey.design or Mastoart.social post on Pixelfed.

They don’t have proper “trending” page, that’s why it seems barren.

At least on Pixelfed.social, there are a lot of active photographers, both casuals and professional posting their work there.

And also classic Facebook Social Games , Discord reaction, Facebook Groups, Facebook Photo Gallery, and some Japanese social media clone (that I forgot its name)

Trending section often unusable and basically only rewards the majority (a.k.a Western fediverse).

If you host instance for non-English language for local communities, trending will quickly populated with Western/US-centric conversation and news.

Usage levels is depends on different community.

At least in Indonesia and other SEA countries, WhatsApp stories has widespread usage. All of my family (especially older ones) are regularly share things there, even just saying “Good Morning” or their daily activities.

Here’s an idea: Some people enjoy sharing things for close friends and family with a single post. Also helps building lost connection. There are already private Pixelfed instance for close family only.

SMS and email only works for single or small group interaction.