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Mastodon is the most stable social network I have used in a long time. Love it!
Everyone is okay. I haven’t even seen sinophobia yet
1989 Tianneman square protests
It’s here unfortunately, but unlike reddit, opposing opinions aren’t modded out.
Wait for it, Im joining soon.
But that’s just like, your opinion
That’s a lot of people that are realizing Silicon Valley is full of shit
Certainly full of detached CEO’s
Who are obsessed with endless growth ideas and introducing subscription models so that you end up with countless of subscriptions.
There’s only a certain number of people in the world, and only a subset of them have easy access to the internet, and only a subset of them have disposable income.
Yet infinite profits are the expectation somehow.
I’m doing my part!
I’m doing my part!
Service guarantees citizenship!
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Ribbit
The fediverse isn’t driven by profit, so growth for the sake of growth isn’t necessary. Word of mouth will let the fediverse platforms grow naturally and sustainably
It would be a mistake to not realise that they operate in the same virtual space as profit driven corporations though. They should still be professionally run with proper pr and marketing. Whether that is volunteer led, or alternative funding like Wikipedia or charging corporate clients etc.
Personally, I’d like corporate integration to fund the free part, but with no additional benefit. Just the same access that private users get for free. Otherwise it’s a slippery slope.
Hard to regulate though. How woukd you verify, who would verify? Could be like fair trade products, whereby there is a certifying body. User instances could decide to only federate with corporate instances that are registered with this non profit. They would pay for their access, like Reddit is asking from their apps, except actually reasonable costs. This could be disbursed to large instances with over X amounts of users to fund their computing needs.
Given the fediverse is a not for profit, any advertising campaigns would have to be fronted by someone who wants to pay for it. It’s not that we can’t do advertising campaigns, it’s just we can’t use the money people dontate to keep the servers running for marketing, because people expect that money to be used in making sure the server exists into the future - it would have to be a separate donation soley for marketing it, or maybe some rich person could decide to pay for marketing in full.
On top of that, we can’t let sign ups exceed to amount we get from donations - that would kill the server or force the server owner to shut down sign ups and, worst case if they happened way too fast- the owner remove some of the more recent signups, which would reflect badly on said owner.
In other words, if you want to advertise it, go ahead but don’t expect anyone else to contribute cash to help as marketing a open and donation based system like this could have its consequences.
Oh, I completely agree. What I mean is that a not for profit can still live in the commercial world of it wants.
Not for profits still need stuff. Like offices or servers or staff. How the funding comes about without compromising the mission is the question.
Look at cancer charities fund raising. Look at Wikipedia. Look at Firefox.
The funding model doesn’t have to be the same for every instance. Some could be just volunteer funded or donated by the admins as a cost of their hobby.
However, the broader community will not tolerate a social media space that is not professionally run with uptime and lack of errors and downtime. The only way the commercial ones die is if the free ones are better. Look at piracy. It’s not a cost problem in music versus movies versus games, it’s a service problem.
I’ll agree with you that a server needs moderation or administration staff in proportion to its size. Wether those staff are all volunteers or paid depends on the overall budget of the server.
But I don’t think office space really makes any sense For a decentralized platform like this one - the only place that makes sense is for the actual lead developers of the software that the platform runs. And even then with the WFH culture of today I think even that is not likely to exist.
As for server administration, the most I could really see is a regular online meeting to keep interests aligned as well as a staff audit log for the server owner to review. And Lemmy already keeps a public audit log anyway.
As for your last point I wholly agree with you. The whole point of federated systems like mastodon and Lemmy is to move away from the for profit system so we can avoid enshittification. It’s meant to be a method of spreading the cost across multiple smaller nonprofit organisations. And hopefully we can avoid it and therefore make the platform better.
That being said, the only thing that prevents a corporate entity from joining in is the instances and their federation policies themselves.
The only other way I see parts of the fediverse become for profit is if an existing non profit turns for profit, which is really only a big deal if it’s one of the larger instances. And as for how the rest of the fediverse deals with that. Well it’s again up to individual server owners, and the collective decision they may or may not make.
I’ve always said a social system that isn’t socialised is not a social system - I mean it’s in the name! And the fediverse is really one of the first major attempts at doing that. Wether it lasts or not we’re sure to learn a lot and if it fails, we can take those lessons and try again.
I don’t think there’s any advertising budget being spent on these fedi platforms, which makes it impressive they’ve grown so much from media exposure and word of mouth.
We growth with big corps big mistakes
Do they really? I prefer quality over quantity. We don’t really need a massive influx of users, just steady growth.
I say keep the flow coming, because the good shit eventually floats to the top.
The more people here, the more attractive it becomes to bigger-names, which will then bring their audience over.
But quantity drives quality. Many big names join platforms specifically for the outreach they provide. That’s by far the biggest reason that there’s still so many big names on Twitter and co that haven’t migrated.
Especially for the many people who need to make a living and thus need that outreach. The vast, vast majority of viewers will never pay for a picture they see on the internet or a streamer who makes them laugh. For a platform to be financially viable for creative types to make a living, they need a ton of viewers.
While generally true, moderator tools really aren’t there yet on Lemmy. Growth will need to be more measured until work on that front catches up. There are also massive gaps that need filling in terms of the potential for spam. Keeping spam in check was challenging enough on reddit with various tools at our disposal - it’ll be even more difficult here.
Advertising requires money. Its a slippery slope that’ll lead us down the same path as Reddit again. We’re better than that.
Can someone tell me what Mastodon is like please, I have social network fatigue and can’t be bothered to try another one? 😅
Microblogging Fediverse app, Lemmy/kbin is to Reddit as Mastodon is to Twitter
Thanks mate.
Also you don’t need a blue check mark to post relatively longer paragraphs.
I think the most enjoyable feature is that there is no algorithm in Fediverse. And decentralization means that if you host your own server for Pixelfed (instagram equivalent) for example, your data will go offline at the moment you disconnect your server from the internet.
Lemmy is great alternative for Reddit especially if you’re into tech.
What do you mean by “no algorithm”? There must be something controlling the order of “hot” vs “new”? Or do you mean the kind of algorithm that shows you suggested communities?
Yeah, there’s an “algorithm” here but rather than a black box of trade secrets and manipulation it’s entirely open source, and mathematically simple.
mastodon idk, it probably has a similar algo for its Explore page but I think the user feed is just made up of posts from people you follow in chrono order.
the user feed is just made up of posts from people you follow in chrono order.
You can also follow hashtags, block hashtags, and block words/phrases.
The Local Timeline shows posts from everyone on your instance. The Federated Timeline is a fire hose. It shows all posts in chronological order (as received by your instance).
mathematically simple
And, as far as I can see, neutral. Doesn’t put you in a bubble like other social networks do, because it’s not trying to milk you for engagement.
I think there’s a lot of value to the algorithm, but it needs to be based on real engagement rather than arbitrary bullshit that a soulless corporation wants to promote.
I subscribe to a lot of people, but not all of their content is worth seeing. Having it curated down to just the stuff that’s actually popular can be nice. It’s definitely tricky to make that work in a fair and useful way though.
Some people are building systems on top of Mastodon, for example https://fedistats.cc/trends In the end something like “plug in your own algorithm” would be great.
The nice thing is, if an instance wanted to put in the effort they could totally make an algorithm. We will have to grow a lot before it’s worth the bother to make a good one, but it’s totally possible.
And thanks to activityPub there is interoperability between services. I only have a Mastodon account, but I can follow people on pixelfed without problem. It moves the focus back onto communicating rather than being on the platform
It‘s like Twitter basically, but since it‘s also in the fediverse there is a bit of overlap where Mastodon people can comment on Lemmy/kbin stuff too anyway. Usually they have something like @LostCause and hashtags like #mastodon and so on in their comments, that‘s how I typically spot them.
So their growth is relevant for us, but you don‘t need to make an account there.
Can we post on their instances too? How?
Test @[email protected]
Testing @[email protected] x’D
Yes I want to know this too, ty.
I don’t think you can from Lemmy, but /kbin has a microblogging feature where it’s fully integrated.
Thank you, this makes sense. Can I view Mastodon posts from lemmy.world? I can’t recall seeing any but maybe it’s not obvious.
If a mastodon user mentions (@) a community, they’ll post there. They can also reply to comments on Lemmy and you’ll see it. Unfortunately I don’t think Lemmy has a way to see regular mastodon accounts/comments right now other than that.
Got it, thank you :)
@Lazylazycat as an example, hello! i’m replying from Mastodon on https://mastodon.social.
for some reason i can’t see your profile pictures (on lemmy accounts, kbin are fine apparently)
Oh hi! See on my Lemmy app you just look like any other user, that’s cool. I don’t have a profile pic but maybe you wouldn’t see it if I did?
@Lazylazycat i presume i would then if you did…
Just like twitter except what you see on your feed is reliant on what #’s or people you follow. So you essentially have more control over what you see and you wont get any posts from some rando like twitter does
It’s like twitter but without the bullshit. I’ve never used twitter so not interested in Mastodon, but I’m glad it’s out there.
Mastodon is hard to get into because at first you only really see what is coming from your own instance. You have to really look around and find the people and topics you want to see in your feed. It’s a much more carefully curated set of content than you get from Twitter, which just bombards you with hot takes and garbage all the time.
how did you make it to Fediverse-B without knowing about Fediverse-A?
I know of Mastodon but haven’t browsed it. I came to Lemmy first from Reddit.
It’s really interesting… i gave it a shot a few days back. You’ve to follow stuff or hashtags you’re interested in for things to show up… after that take it slow and follow more things… I’ve found some really good music playlists, art, programming discussions on there. There’s also an explore section which shows trending topics and posts. I can recommend it as the users are mature and in my experience not toxic.
It’s not like here at all. No shitposts. Only people who use their real name and work for some non profit sharing their highly intelligent news bulletins. I haven’t found any memes
Very cool, I am one of the 8800 😸
Mastodon is where the intelligent people are filtered to from Twitter. The idiots end up on Threads.
No matter how much FaceMeta disgusts me, at least Threads has some semblance of moderation to keep the MAGA fascists under control. I rather have to deal with idiots than with the far-right cesspool that Twitter is turning into.
Thankfully, we have Mastodon, so I don’t have to deal with either. They’re both blocked on my PiHole, so I just get a DNS error when I accidentally click on links.
Always a bit of a sobering experience in the rare instance that I end up in Twitter. The fact that some of them are willing to be so blatant about being a PoS is a little concerning to say the least.
When the owner themself doesn’t hide what kind of PoS they are, this is what you get. I have no love for Zuckerberg, but if I can criticize him based on what he does and how he does it and the effects his decisions have on society, any one with brains could without having to resort to low brow insults of measuring contests. That’s basically the difference, one service is managed by someone who, despite all his flaws, is an adult, the other isn’t.
BTW, I used neutral pronouns for the “chief twitt” and not for Zuck just to spite him and make the point that one doesn’t have to lower the level bellow a certain threshold to provoke, all considering how they hate “woke” stuff…
Good sugestion
take your meds
I’d love to use mastadon but I use twitter for sport/politics journalists and none of them are on mastadon.
Can’t you just use a rss reader to see their articles?
It’s not just articles though. A lot of commentary happens on twitter that never makes it to a long form article
There is quite a bunch of journalists on Mastodon though.
Yeh I still use reddit to repost sports twitter
Wow, two million users, congratulations Mastodon!
Threads is at 100 million, so if they federate they will still be completely drowned out.
I spent some time on Threads to see how it was and it’s a fucking cesspool of like-mongering and look at me oneupsmanship bullshit that was so fucking tiring to look at that I deleted the app after 4 days.
Your description of it reminds me of LinkedIn.
LinkedIn is the very bottom pit of hell of mainstream social media
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Threads has 100m phantom accounts. A lot of them are bots. Who knows how many of those are real users.
This is true, 100m is probably hyperbole. Still, I believe them to have significantly more than 2m active users.
Well, it would best to compare apples to apples, there are 8M total Mastodon accounts to 108M Threads accounts.
For active users if we assume the same active ratio (probably not, but I couldn’t find any data for Threads on that from a 1 minute search), then it would be 2 million to 27 million, which is small but it wouldn’t “completely” drown out Mastodon.
I want to know how many people posted or commented, not overall users.
Threads created a shadow account for every user on Instagram, so, I dunno. I’m guessing most of those are just dummy accounts that will remain forever inactive.
That number obviously doesn’t include those, because Instagram has over 2 BILLION users. It’s also easy to see how Threads can quickly get to 100M when that means you just have to convince 5% of your users to try your new platform that they don’t even have to sign up for.
Again, that’s billion with a B. Instagram is unfathomably huge. They only needed 0.1% of their users to rival all of Mastodon.
Good info. Thanks.
And our communities will remain strong. The people growing and caring for a free and open Internet will always be here as the minority to large corporations and lowest common denominators of society.
I believe it was the official mastodon blog that compared Meta advising xmpp the way they’ll abuse the fediverse but we will stand strong.
If i remember correctly, Threads just uses your pre-existing Instagram account so 108 million is a veeeery theoretical number. We will see how many users actually move to Threads and whether our instances don’t block Threads instances.
You still need to sign up to/log into Threads (via Instagram) to have a Threads account or be active on there though, so what makes it theoretical? If they counted all Instagram accounts as Threads accounts it’d instantly be in the billions surely.
According to some users, Threads made a bunch of bot accounts to reach 108 million users. However i don’t have proof, nor do i know why it’s 108 million bots (or copied profiles) instead of around 2 billions.
Is that 100m active users?
No way
Been on Mastodon since October 2022.
It’s a great platform.
This is great! But generally can’t see Mastadon overtaking any other major social platforms until it introduces an equivalent of For you feed from Twitter. The days of following specific people and hashtags is over, it’s tedious and I don’t give a shit about 3/4s of the feed.
2017-2020 Twitter was absolutely peak Twitter algorithm wise and thousands of users want that exact experience back, yet nobody will provide it.
Mastodon adding their version of Tweekdeck was what set me to completely abandon Twitter.
let’s gooo 👏🏼 the fediverse is getting bigger!
And I still don’t know how to use it, as in getting an interesting feed.
Hashtags are your friend. It also helps if you have some active posters for the tag. I get good content from following #sciencefiction #coffee and #python.
Ok. What’s next? There’s a tweet, there’s an icon that it has 16 comments, but I can’t read those. When I click on that icon I have the ui to write a comment.
Thats likely due to lack of algorithms with goal to keep you browsing forever. Twitter likely harvests all the data it can get from you when you browse twitter. They can also track your browsing habits using your IP and sites that have embed twitter content like share button or embed tweets.
Finding people to follow in Mastodon mostly happens by:
- Search topics using hashtags
- Randomly browsing local feeds of different instances
- Randomly browsing the federated feed
- Randomly browsing local feed
There are instances for different interests like game development, art, information security, foss etc so there’s a lot of places to dig for good content.
Ha, yeah. That’s what’s holding me back the most. Somehow it worked with Twitter.
Thats likely due to lack of algorithms with goal to keep you browsing forever. Twitter likely harvests all the data it can get from you when you browse twitter. They can also track your browsing habits using your IP (among many other things) and sites that have embed twitter content like share button or embed tweets.
Just look for the things that you are interested in. That’s how i accumulated many of my followed accounts over time as well as subscribed subreddits over time.
You can also look for users under the same name on Mastodon and (hopefully) find them.
Please note that if you find an account you also followed on twitter and it ends with @bird.makeup, it’s a bot mirroring tweets on Mastodon without mirroring your answers on Mastodon back to Twitter.
I also didn’t understand how to do this in Twitter. Tried twice, didn’t succeed. At least, now I don’t miss it.
Yay! I still don’t know how to use anything that looks like twitter tho
A great win for decentralization and censorship resistant networks!
