The fediverse is all about doing things your own way while maintaining compatibility with other fediverse servers. Unlike homogeneous services such as Twitter/X, each fediverse server type has a different purpose. This can be to facilitate discussions, publish longform articles, showcase images, or share your communal love of music. Alternatively, it can be to cram thousands of users into a virtual room and let them scream at each other.
Before you set up your instance, you need to decide what type of community you want to build and how your users will interact with each other. If you’re building around a common interest, what special features does each instance type have that differentiates it from the rest?
An instance geared towards longform threaded discussions doesn’t cut it if most of your users are there to show off pictures, while a rigid appearance will frustrate those who crave expression.