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Mastodon gained 70k users after Musk’s Twitter takeover

theguardian.com

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Re: Mastodon gained 70k users after Musk’s Twitter takeover

#271

Post by WorldMaker »

nsxwolf wrote: post #265
Kye wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not even fart. The developer didn't know that was a meaning in the US when he changed the name to that. It's the sound a Mastodon makes. This is 100% people projecting their own assumptions and judging based on that, not anything to do with the project. It's not even a meaning I considered back when he made the change, and it's one of the meanings in the version of English I speak. Folks tell on themselves when…

It’s ridiculous. Names matter. This is almost as bad as Soylent, or Coq.

This seems an interesting over-reaction to me. Toot is an onomatopoeia that's as old if not older than the English language. It is enshrined in ancient, common aphorisms such as "tooting one's own horn". It's a childish word certainly, and it is childishly used sometimes for farting jokes in addition to horn noises and trumpeting sounds, which I can understand feels "ridiculous" as in silly (to which I retort once again: it's fun, let people have fun, people can be children on the internet and be silly sometimes) but I can't understand "ridiculous" as you put it in the same context of "bad" much less do I find it comparable to your other examples.

Soylent is a "Torment Nexus" style name, which is bizarre (and yeah, probably bad). (The "Torment Nexus" meme is: Scifi writer: I have described the Torment Nexus as a warning. Do not build the Torment Nexus. Company: The Torment Nexus sounds like a great idea. We are just about to ship our MVP of the Torment Nexus!)

Coq unfortunately sounds like genitalia to an English audience, and there are tons of hang-ups (for good and dumb reasons) about referring to genitalia in polite company. It's very different level of cultural hang up than "silly euphemism for a fart". Also, for the record, it's a tool from a French team and named a French word that has nothing to do with the English genitalia word that it sounds like. (It is related to the English poultry homonym and why English even has such a homonym.) Not all programming needs to be Anglophilic or consult with English speakers first before naming all their tools.

Re: Mastodon gained 70k users after Musk’s Twitter takeover

#272

Post by beanjuiceII »

Gigachad wrote: post #249
VectorLock wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you eat an elephant? A bite at a time.

This is the same thing we saw happen to GitHub/gitlab when Microsoft acquired it. Didn’t mean much long term.

yep just have to wait out until all the current thing people forget about it

Re: Mastodon gained 70k users after Musk’s Twitter takeover

#273

Post by Moru »

WorldMaker wrote: post #271
nsxwolf wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s ridiculous. Names matter. This is almost as bad as Soylent, or Coq.

This seems an interesting over-reaction to me. Toot is an onomatopoeia that's as old if not older than the English language. It is enshrined in ancient, common aphorisms such as "tooting one's own horn". It's a childish word certainly, and it is childishly used sometimes for farting jokes in addition to horn noises and trumpeting sounds, which I can understand feels "ridiculous" as in silly (to which I retort once ag…

Yes, there are loads of brand names that didn't work in other languages. Look up the car Toyota Fit / Jazz for example, that one was very nearly called something slightly different.

Re: Mastodon gained 70k users after Musk’s Twitter takeover

#274

Post by Pxtl »

the_third_wave wrote: post #222
Pxtl wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Twitter's main value proposition is that there are VIPs and lesser Internet Famous people to follow on there. There are far better platforms for conversations, but most of those don't give you access to journalists, creators, politicians, etc right down to your local community. A huge number of those VIPs have blue checkmarks.

> A huge number of those VIPs have blue checkmarks. The problem does not lie with the verified identity identified by the blue checkmark but with the fact that many if not most of those "Blue Checks" are hell-bent on "following the narrative" wherever that may lead us. It lies with their vacuous virtue signalling and their "let them eat cake" discourse. They will fly the flags needed to show they are loyal, they will…

Bud literally nobody was talking about any of that. And why is it wrong for people to jump on a bandwagon when the bandwagon is stuff like "trans rights are good" and "invading Ukraine is bad".

Re: Mastodon gained 70k users after Musk’s Twitter takeover

#275

Post by camjohnson26 »

mardifoufs wrote: post #188
camjohnson26 wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A big chunk of the $TSLAQ community moved to Discord, but the experience is very different. For context these are the people who took early bets against Tesla and have been calling out its unethical practices. A lot of people are understandably nervous about continuing that research on a platform owned by its CEO.

Different in a good or bad way?

Not great, the signal to noise ratio is off because everyone’s posts have equal weight, where on Twitter since you choose who to follow you can curate your own feed. On Twitter it feels like the important posts rise to the top so it’s great way of keeping track of news, but With Discord it’s much easier to miss important posts.

Also threads are harder to follow, and since channels aren’t public by default and don’t have a web address you can’t bookmark threads to reference later.

Re: Mastodon gained 70k users after Musk’s Twitter takeover

#276

Post by TheHappyOddish »

Kadin wrote: post #149
VectorLock wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you looked at Mastodon? Have you not noticed they're called "Toots?"

Personally I hate the "toot" nomenclature. That's something you teach a toddler to say instead of "fart". "Posts" forever and always.

I don't know if you recall, but we all thought "tweet" was ridiculous and cringe-worthy back in the day too.
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