Because the US doesn’t have a federal identification card. At the state level you can use the id number of someone’s drivers license or state id for identifying them, which is marginally better since it changes with new id cards.

SSNs weren’t intended to be used for identification, but since there’s no other national option they effectively are.

Beehaw had been around for a few years before lemmy.world launched. They have a specific sort of space they want to create, so good for them for being able to maintain it.

The yield is small enough that it isn’t a threat to the soldiers launching it. Still, I wouldn’t want to be the one tasked with firing it.

Yeah, it’s quieter so there’s fewer overall responses even in “popular” posts, but it doesn’t feel like anything gets ignored. If a post is interesting, you’ll get at least a few replies even if it takes a few days.

That part is kinda nice - the lower turnover on the “front page” means you’ll have people reading and commenting on discussions for days. If you reply to a 1-day old post on Reddit the only person who might see/reply to you is the person you replied to.

As annoying as it is to lug a bag around and find room for it, I much prefer this to checking it. There’s the small but nonzero chance your bag doesn’t make it to your destination, plus the added time waiting at baggage return.