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Mastodon – an open source alternative to Twitter

mastodon.social

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Re: Mastodon – an open source alternative to Twitter

#51

Post by sprokolopolis »

yogthos wrote: post #39
glenstein wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are describing a completely different platform from the one I visit and post to every day. For one, it's not barren; it's quite active. One of the distinguishing features of mastodon compared to other decentralized platforms is that people use it. In fact one of the complaints about the federated feed is that it updates so fast it's hard to keep up with. As for the people there, the people I talk to are intereste…

That mirrors my experience as well. I also find that the 500 char limit makes for much more interesting conversations than Twitter. I've discussed books, games, and programming on Mastodon, and I wouldn't have bothered having these discussions trying to fit my thoughts into 140 chars.

I totally agree that the higher character limit contributes to better and deeper conversations. This was one thing excited my about Google+ when it first came out. People could write essays, explain long processes and they didn't have to worry about a character limit.

Re: Mastodon – an open source alternative to Twitter

#52

Post by yogthos »

sprokolopolis wrote: post #51
yogthos wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That mirrors my experience as well. I also find that the 500 char limit makes for much more interesting conversations than Twitter. I've discussed books, games, and programming on Mastodon, and I wouldn't have bothered having these discussions trying to fit my thoughts into 140 chars.

I totally agree that the higher character limit contributes to better and deeper conversations. This was one thing excited my about Google+ when it first came out. People could write essays, explain long processes and they didn't have to worry about a character limit.

I also like how you can make part of the post hidden by default, so you can have a summary and then people click to expand if they're interested. I see that used a lot in my timeline. It's kind of best of both worlds where everybody isn't posting walls of text.

Re: Mastodon – an open source alternative to Twitter

#54

Post by cyberpunk0 »

not_max wrote: post #22

I am a huge advocate for Mastodon. It is worth remembering that nearly all of the value for the users of a social network comes from other users. Most of Twitter's defining features -- retweets, hashtags, and @ mentions -- were invented not by Twitter's employees, but by its users: https://qz.com/135149/the-first-ever-hashtag-reply-and-retwe... As a result, building services like this in a distributed way a la email…

Talking about mentioning people and retweets (ie forwarding) like they are grand monolithic features just blows them up to insane proportions. These aren't anything new or special, if you list them as core "features" then you have a terrible product with more marketing bullshit than quality

Re: Mastodon – an open source alternative to Twitter

#55

Post by carlchenet »

The wanna be Mastodon users could use reading my blog post The Importance of Choosing the Correct Mastodon Instance https://carlchenet.com/the-importance-of-choosing-the-correc...

There are some ideological and technical points to consider before choosing your instance.

Re: Mastodon – an open source alternative to Twitter

#56

Post by marchenko »

baxuz wrote: post #32

Honestly, it's a barren wasteland, worse than Google+. As far as I've seen it's mainly used as a replacement for imageboards. Most of the server topics are either a variant of /b/, or a gathering place for SJWs, furries and lolicons.

I'm really enjoying Mastodon. It feels like it's geared more toward conversation than counting coup. I have asked several tech and programming questions, and gotten fast and comprehensive responses. For those interested in science, tech, privacy, history and philosophy of software development, and econ, and willing to tolerate t h e a e s t h e t i c and Tuxedo Mask memes, it's a cool spot.

Re: Mastodon – an open source alternative to Twitter

#57

Post by aqsalose »

ColinWright wrote: post #21

For people who want to know more, I wrote this: http://www.solipsys.co.uk/new/ThinkingAboutMastodon.html?HN_... Submitted it here ... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14626958 ... but it got very little attention. In fact, checking my logs only about 20 people even clicked through. Perhaps people are genuinely not interested. Attention fatigue?? Who knows? Edit: I should add that I'm here: https://mathstodon.xyz/…

I believe it's quite random whether a link trends on HN or not, even if other links about same topic had got a quite large number of upvotes in past. Cool visualizations and engaging title helps, but isn't a guarantee. Maybe also the time of the day makes a difference (though I have no idea what would be the best timezone to optimize for popularity).

Re: Mastodon – an open source alternative to Twitter

#58

Post by aqsalose »

tscs37 wrote: post #9

I'm a mastodon user, so I might be a bit biased, but I find it a lot better than twitter. Different servers can also carter to different cultures or groups so you can find your own niche there.

Counterpoint: True, there are many "niche" instances available, but on the other hand, finding the one that aligns with your interests may be difficult.

Re: Mastodon – an open source alternative to Twitter

#59

Post by aqsalose »

glenstein wrote: post #34
baxuz wrote: post #32

Honestly, it's a barren wasteland, worse than Google+. As far as I've seen it's mainly used as a replacement for imageboards. Most of the server topics are either a variant of /b/, or a gathering place for SJWs, furries and lolicons.

You are describing a completely different platform from the one I visit and post to every day. For one, it's not barren; it's quite active. One of the distinguishing features of mastodon compared to other decentralized platforms is that people use it. In fact one of the complaints about the federated feed is that it updates so fast it's hard to keep up with. As for the people there, the people I talk to are intereste…

Because of the federated nature of mastodon, experience on one instance might be quite different than another.

If the instances that are not "barren wasteland" are difficult to find, it's a problem.

Re: Mastodon – an open source alternative to Twitter

#60

Post by yogthos »

aqsalose wrote: post #58
tscs37 wrote: post #9

I'm a mastodon user, so I might be a bit biased, but I find it a lot better than twitter. Different servers can also carter to different cultures or groups so you can find your own niche there.

Counterpoint: True, there are many "niche" instances available, but on the other hand, finding the one that aligns with your interests may be difficult.

That's why there's a wizard that helps you start that's https://instances.social that's linked from https://joinmastodon.org/
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