@bes @vinzv One thing that I think is a real benefit from the #bifurcation is that GS users now generally understand #federation. (IMO, hiding the "@servername" part in order to stick within Twitter's 140 character limit was a near-fatal mistake in the original SN.) In the old days, #Identi.ca users were not really aware of people using other federated instances. These days, almost the first thing you encounter is different instances with different looks, different character-lengths, different interfaces, and different rules.

On the other hand, many users were #lost to both networks. They left and never returned.