The dead internet theory is barely a theory.

As we know the internet is a shadow of a shell of it's former self. But the decay came in two stages, first everyone around us forced us all into these small enclosed mass social media platforms and essentially forced people who were NEVER supposed to mix and intermingle to do just that.
Eventually people started making bots, and flooding the web with said bots... And now with AI and the likes it's gotten way worse. Nobody knows who is human and who is fake anymore, and with the bizzareness of the modern web, we have to try to decipher if the people we talk to and meet are Humans or bots.

Dark Forest web.

there is a theory that ties well with the dead internet theory... essentially the surface web as we know it, is like the dark forest, there ARE other humans out there but they are all hiding in cozynet.
An alternate analogy could be that there is that the surface web has become twisted, akin to the darkweb but at least with a filter. And I can explain this, look on X, there were people trying to solicit Child Porn, and I bet somewhere on X there are some MFers trying to solicit drugs. Look on YouTube, recently there has been a wave of people/bots soliciting videos of animal abuse, gore and child pornography. Look on reddit, there are subreddits where you can find some of the most disguting things, and the people ON reddit, well we know about the redditor stereotype for a good reason. Look on tiktok, people will film themselves doing crimes and egg others on to do it too.
Look around everywhere, you got crypto on the clearnet, and even the fucking 67 kid did a pump and dump rugpull scam recently.
And hell, AI just makes it easier to generate gore, CP, and other illegal content.
This is all shit is what we have been told happens on the dark web on onion routers and such, not on the surface web.

the growing desire for the oldweb to return.

Games like hypnospace, and the multiple failed attempts at old web revival prove there is a desire amongst most to try and fix things.
I will say this, I was a part of the yesterweb, and the yesterweb missed the point by trying to make all other old web rivival groups come together under their own banner, and actively trying to take in twitter refugees who wanted to make webcore. They were turning their group into a mass online social network, the very thing that destroyed the modern web in the first place, and which also helped bring about the demise of the Yesterweb group as a whole. That and the fact they became politically one-sided. If any of those people were on the actual old net they will learn two things, one; they won't be able to survive the amount of people calling everyone slurs, and two; they would have to build their own spaces away from the others, because there are groups of people that just can't mix, and if they do disaster strikes.

how to prevent a schism, overcrowding, and viable safespaces.

The people as I said want things to go back to how they were, and it can go back to how it was. You shouldn't try to ban everyone together under one group, because eventually cultural and political differences may cause a schism... And this is why on the old web people were splintered into their own Forums, groups, IRC servers, and rarely often interacted en masse like they do now. Because you don't want the people who like quake to be forced to interact with sonic the hedgehog foot inflation fetish people. And you don't want the folks on somethingawful to interact too much with the deviantart crowd... and let's not talk about the MUGEN factions and groups!! that's why everything had it's own site and board. Everything was in it's rightful place, People like the modern redditor was tucked in his own spot online with people like him, having little to no threat of coming into other more sane subreddits and fuck up the vibe of r/[LocalTownHere] with hornyposting and midwitism.
therefore, in order to prevent a schism, people have to make find their own forums again, find their own websites, or make their own forums or their own websites.

The modern web is a containment board, leave it and treat it as such.

If you look at it as it is, and as it should be, X/Twitter has become the new /pol/ and reddit has become kind of the new /b/ to a smaller more gross extent... they are containment boards meant for containing the most deranged MFers, so when you leave Modern Mass Online Social Medias, don't take these weirdos with you, forget about them and leave them to rot.

HOW TO EXODUS.

what's been established thus far

People cannot intermingle, cultural, political, and lifestyle differences can cause infighting, hate, and schisms; this is usually used to feed Media giants who try to turn everyone against eachother (For example look up a game called we are what we behold).
Splintering is okay, You may call it echochambers, but everyone, left and right, male and female naturally go to their own echochambers anyways. Why do you think people of both sides tried to make safespaces out of X when it was never meant to be like that? We naturally go to our own people, and our own groups.

What I must tell you.

Forums, BBS, IRC and servers all are locally human moderated, therefore when you find a BBS, a Forum, A IRC server you like, then you don't have to worry about the wrong people coming and ruining your day... And AI driven bots can be banned as well.

ALL OF THIS ARCHITECTURE IS STILL HERE.

You can make your own website with Geocities.ws, Neocities, or even Nekoweb. they allow you to host your own creations, art, photos, blog, what have you with unparraleled customizability, You can even make your own forums with other sites and bring your friends.

The truth is out... you can just leave.

you don't have to put up with the dead web's bullshit anymore.

To put it simply, don't try to band everyone online together to try and bring everyone, just take you and your friends and maybe even family to the real internet.
The architecture is still here. it may seem small but that's kind of how the web was back then anyways.
Join a forum.
Make a website.
Go to spacehey or a myspace clone.
Go on a image board and do whatever.
use Wiby.Me, Marginalia, Kagi, surf the whole web, not just reddit and X,

In fact, ditch X, it's a hate mongering cesspool made to turn people against each other... it strives off of outrage and meaningless drama.
Ditch Reddit, it's just plain hell.
Ditch tiktok, there's nothing there for anyone.
Ditch youtube, Caddicarus barely posts and when he does he's usually sucking off crash bandicootch, Jontron also rarely posts and is a shell of his former self, SMG4 is literally ending (Or has ended if you are reading this post 2025), and everything else is comentary channels speaking about crap that doesn't really matter to anyone, and AI generated slop, and youtube itself is essentially undergoing a adpocalypse mixed with elsagate on a larger scale, and coppa, and an AI moderation armageddon all roled into one...
Ditch Facebook and Instagram too.

DITCH ALL OF THE MODERN WEB. There is nothing for you there anymore.

it's dead, jim. Move on.