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Exploring Mastodon

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Re: Exploring Mastodon

#201

Post by colin_jack »

tapoxi wrote: post #33
nr2x wrote: post #10

The fact that one has to pick from many different places to set up an account is a massive barrier to entry. Let alone the complexity of moving an account from one host to another is also woefully complex, so if you choose wrong, you’re in for more pain. I don’t see this platform being able to benefit from the Twitter exodus. I’m putting my hopes on blue sky/AT which appears to solve the above pain points: https://bl…

Mastodon just doubled its active user count to around one million; it's already benefited. It doesn't need to replace Twitter to succeed, just provide value to its userbase.

I think it’d be better to judge it once those users have had a little time to try it. I signed up but couldn’t find anyone to follow, found the lack discoverability baffling, and ultimately bounced off.

Re: Exploring Mastodon

#202

Post by vidarh »

dredmorbius wrote: post #190
jszymborski wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are three timelines: - Home Timeline: The people you follow - Local Timeline: The people on your instance - Fed Timeline: The people on the fediverse You take your pick. Be as siloed as you want. On the fed timeline, block people and instances, or just let the unfiltered hive mind flow over you. When you want something quieter, go to the local or home timelines.

Keep in mind that your local view of the Federated timeline is instance dependent . The Federated timeline is best described as "all content from other instances by profiles followed by accounts on your own instance". If you're running, say, a single-user instance, the "Federated" and "Home" timelines will be identical. If you're on a large instance, the Federated timeline will be fairly comprehensive (and tends to c…

There's the added complication of relays: For smaller instances in particular, relays can fill in the federated timeline.

Re: Exploring Mastodon

#203

Post by rchaud »

cyborgx7 wrote: post #18
chris_st wrote: post #12

I'm on a discord server with a lot of non-nerds, and various ones are interested in Mastodon, due to Twitter issues. It's amazing to see how much trouble they're having... "Do I have to create a log in on every Mastodon?" ("No, and it's pretty much impossible"), "Can I follow someone on another server?" ("Yes, but it's incredibly hard -- try to follow them on whatever server you're on, maybe someone else is following…

People just have lost the ability to comprehend the concept of federation because everything in the current internet is walled gardens. There is nothing Mastodon can do to "fix this" without giving up on federation. But people understand how federation works. They see it happen everyday with e-mail. You just need to tell them it works like that and they'll get it.

It doesn't work like email. Email for people is setting up an account on Gmail. "It just works", so to speak.

Even Hotmail was able to sign up millions of users with 1996 levels of tech-savviness.

It's only 'like email' if the people you're talking to have set up their own IMAP and POP servers.

Re: Exploring Mastodon

#204

Post by rchaud »

giantrobot wrote: post #88
cyborgx7 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People just have lost the ability to comprehend the concept of federation because everything in the current internet is walled gardens. There is nothing Mastodon can do to "fix this" without giving up on federation. But people understand how federation works. They see it happen everyday with e-mail. You just need to tell them it works like that and they'll get it.

> People just have lost the ability to comprehend the concept of federation because everything in the current internet is walled gardens. Non-technical users have never understood these things. They browse the web by accident and sending e-mail is incomprehensible magic. Most people don't care at all how such things work, they only care when they don't work.

It's much worse now, partially due to the fact that young people's first computing device is a phone, instead of a family computer.

Here's a story about an engineering professor lamenting that their first-year students do not understand folder structures, because they have been using Google Docs for a decade, and don't use use anything besides the search bar.

https://www.theverge.com/22684730/students-file-folder-direc...

Re: Exploring Mastodon

#205

Post by dredmorbius »

vidarh wrote: post #202
dredmorbius wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Keep in mind that your local view of the Federated timeline is instance dependent . The Federated timeline is best described as "all content from other instances by profiles followed by accounts on your own instance". If you're running, say, a single-user instance, the "Federated" and "Home" timelines will be identical. If you're on a large instance, the Federated timeline will be fairly comprehensive (and tends to c…

There's the added complication of relays: For smaller instances in particular, relays can fill in the federated timeline.

Right, though I'm familiar with that only in theory.

Are there relay instances / pointers on how that works?

Re: Exploring Mastodon

#206

Post by rchaud »

nr2x wrote: post #89
OscarCunningham wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don’t see this platform being able to benefit from the Twitter exodus. What you might say is 'I don't think Mastodon is going to replace Twitter', but I don't think you can argue that Mastodon won't benefit from the Twitter exodus because it has already gained a million users. Looking at the charts on https://the-federation.info/mastodon you can see that in May there was an influx of about 500 thousand new users…

Ok, in that case I’ll clarify: I don’t think the vast majority of Twitter users will benefit from Mastodon.

assuming Twitter stays exactly as it is, I'd agree.

But it's clear with the planned changes that they're turning paid blue check accounts into the equivalent of the ads you see at the top of your Google search, placed above 'organic' results.

Re: Exploring Mastodon

#207

Post by nr2x »

rchaud wrote: post #206
nr2x wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, in that case I’ll clarify: I don’t think the vast majority of Twitter users will benefit from Mastodon.

assuming Twitter stays exactly as it is, I'd agree. But it's clear with the planned changes that they're turning paid blue check accounts into the equivalent of the ads you see at the top of your Google search, placed above 'organic' results.

To also clarify I do think Twitter is a dead man walking, so something will take over. Hopefully AT will deliver.

Re: Exploring Mastodon

#208

Post by nr2x »

toofy wrote: post #107
nr2x wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I own a domain I can host my email anywhere. I own the name, and every possible address. Mastodon does not have nearly the same level of portability and ownership. This is why I think AT is more promising.

> Mastodon does not have nearly the same level of portability and ownership. how so? its just a protocol, just like email. which concerns do you have that it is not as portable as email?

I can move my email host and my mail keeps coming to me. Mastodon you need to set up some weird redirects from one server to another. It’s the difference between forwarding your Hotmail to your new gmail vs just swapping your provider and keeping your domain the same.

Re: Exploring Mastodon

#209

Post by rchaud »

tootie wrote: post #85
nr2x wrote: post #10

The fact that one has to pick from many different places to set up an account is a massive barrier to entry. Let alone the complexity of moving an account from one host to another is also woefully complex, so if you choose wrong, you’re in for more pain. I don’t see this platform being able to benefit from the Twitter exodus. I’m putting my hopes on blue sky/AT which appears to solve the above pain points: https://bl…

Barrier to entry is just one problem. The main one is reach. 99% of the value of Twitter is its reach. Posting messages is easy. I'm sure a thousand entrepreneurs have figured out how to collect 140-character messages, follow and reply. But they will collect dust unless they get seen by 100M people. That means having that many users on one platform, one platform for content creators to promote, and a single place for…

> 99% of the value of Twitter is its reach.

For marketers, politicians and others that use Twitter as a megaphone for their personal brand.

Everybody else just wants to see funny memes, cat pictures and occasionally have the small topic conversations that make Twitter occasionally worth it.

Re: Exploring Mastodon

#210

Post by cyborgx7 »

rchaud wrote: post #203
cyborgx7 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People just have lost the ability to comprehend the concept of federation because everything in the current internet is walled gardens. There is nothing Mastodon can do to "fix this" without giving up on federation. But people understand how federation works. They see it happen everyday with e-mail. You just need to tell them it works like that and they'll get it.

It doesn't work like email. Email for people is setting up an account on Gmail. "It just works", so to speak. Even Hotmail was able to sign up millions of users with 1996 levels of tech-savviness. It's only 'like email' if the people you're talking to have set up their own IMAP and POP servers.

What are you talking about? You don't need to host your own Mastodon server. You can sign up with one of the many open instances, just like gmail and hotmail let you do for e-mail.
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