People love Nix because of the OS configuration based around a single config file. Essentially, you define your system configuration in this file, including installed programs, then you rebuild your system based on that configuration.
The beauty here is that you can easily move this file to another machine running NixOS and reproduce your configuration there. You can also roll back changes by simply rebooting and choosing the last known good build and you're back in business.
I would look into Tailscale. This would probably be the easiest to setup.
I used to host a ton of stuff, now I just host my WordPress site on Linode.
I have toyed with the idea of selfhosting a Lemmy server, but that's a project for another day.
I think the majority of those people just don't care and are against change.
I can say that to the non-technical person, Lemmy would be a bit confusing due to having to pick a server. However, once you get past that point, Lemmy is a perfectly viable alternative to Reddit, as long as the user base remains active.