I created a Cara account the other day, and it hadn't that much traction. The recommendation view is still default instead the "following" one (most people don't bother changing their defaults). The platform I had the most success is Pixelfed, which is an open source insta clone, but federated. It also relies on donations, but because of federation, no single server has to incur the charges that cara currently has, it gets split between different servers/owners. It doesn't take a stance against AI, because even if it did, another instance/server might have different rules, so it's not possible to says "no ai". But for me, it has worked. I've amassed more than 500 followers there, which is more than Cara's 20. It also interoperates with Mastodon's million users.
