Thanks for the answers, @schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de! Because I access the communities from lemmy.ml, I was not sure if it easily will work with other instaces if I just use the link and subscribe. And I thought there might be a feature - that I miss - which automatically integrates the old and new contents.
And yes, I have seen the “locked” label. Still you could subscribe and read the content. That’s what’s confusing me. - If I don’t subscribe anymore, I will still find old topics by the search, right? So some question still remain, and it would be nice if people could answer what will happen to outdated communities/instances. - I guess they will stay online as long as their host servers are online? So in the future, we might have several communities with the same name, some “dead” some active?
Interessant. Danke!