Like, idk how else to put it. It's obvious that some sort of federated structure makes so much more sense for a site that's already made of thousands of overlapping communities that don't need to get along very well. Subreddit bans are rare, but so (in theory) is defederation. Reddit is by far the least-insane community among the Big Corporate Social media sites, and I think this fractured nature is a big part of why. (That and the downvote). Given the presence of libertarians and tech bros on the site, it's a shock to me that it isn't already in the works.