Could I just do it? Not right now. My programing experience is python scripts and embedded systems and I have no knowledge of anything sysadmin or infrastructure.
People are always complaining about whats around and we have lots of smart techy people here, so why not?
It’s easy enough to just set up a Mastodon/Lemmy/Pixelfed instance, and people have already done so. You could do it yourself with your own moderation policies if that’s something you’re worried about.
The big problem is how to get people to use your platform. Artists want to go where people are and people want to go where artists are.
If 2023 is anything to go by, it takes a really, really big thing to actually materially move people from one platform to another. Looking at Bluesky, people don’t really care about features either.
I don’t consider any of those gallery sites, the closest would be pixelfed.
The network effect is always the big problem. With twitter and FA, people are always looking for a better option. FA always wins. Bluesky seems to be winning vs mastodon as it is a singular thing as opposed to a collection of things. Other than a code, the process has little “friction.” The only thing that comes to mind to help startup would be automated systems to pull new content wherever it was posted. Think postybirb, but built in.