On the bright side, it's THE time to cultivate close friendships and to seek like-minded people. The entire phenomenon of popular attention hugging a community to death does not exist any longer. You can now have OG members persisting with notions for a long time and building a shared mythos with a small group of friends, because information is now more accessible than ever.
Obviously, most people aren't part of these communities. The people that are "drifting" alone are given to wasting their time on charismatic attention-seekers that talk a big game (twitch/e-celebs) but deliver nothing of value. So there's also room in the market for charismatic folk with some technical expertise to rally people to their cause, but only very briefly. This is because the number of people half-committing and then jumping ship is likely the highest it's ever been. Also, platforms have now resorted to paying people to stay on their platform (youtube / tiktok / sponsorships / twitch boosting streamers / etc.) to combat occasional ennui, ironically exacerbating the issue.
It's a really bad time to try and get the attention of someone more famous / notable than you, though. Sure, you can go on $platform and talk to them, but it's really not the same when they have a gorillion other messages. Same goes for people in large communities that are a "guy" there, known for something. Extremely high-return investments but you're likely going to fail.
Some people try to start youtube channels / info streams and then entice people to join their forum / server. While this does seem to work, it only brings in quality people AFTER the community is fully formed and rigorous laws are in place. The initial stragglers are usually the recently excommunicated looking to try their hand at the same shit somewhere else.
If you really put some effort into a topic and blog about it, you're likely to get some high-quality responses even if you only pose a question to someone that's partly interested. I've found this to be a really great way to separate the folks that are actually interested from those that aren't. You'll usually get people around your own level this way and IME this is the best approach.
It takes a lot of effort to make people clock in regularly to your online circle, and it's better to establish digital / irl face-to-face contact after a good interaction. It builds trust and because we're wired to judge people from their facial reactions rather than text, it also sobers conversation / tempers over potentially divisive topics. Works well with cerebral / "deep" people. Doesn't work with people that only come online to blow steam / enact a persona, so it's a good filter.
TL;DR: Touch grass (digitally), make friends (digitally)