Eugen RochkoOct 28, 2022
I got asked this by a few different journalists today, so I'm just going to share the numbers. 10,801 people signed up on different Mastodon servers today, and 22,139 since last week.
Show threadEugen RochkoOct 29, 2022
Update: 49,215 new users across different Mastodon servers since yesterday. Probably a lot of them are actually from yesterday. My crawler only runs once a day so I get a bit of a delayed view of things.
Show threadEugen RochkoOct 30, 2022
So, that total... By the end of day, it's more like 70,849... That's quite a lot for a single day, isn't it. Federated social media is better than commercial silos, and I'm happy that more people are learning about it.
Show threadtinybug
@Gargron what does federated socia media mean
Oct 30, 2022 at 2:35amWeb
Show threadUncle 6 🌁Oct 30, 2022
@tayloredin @Gargron I’ll take this one: federated means there are multiple Mastodon servers but they can share posts from server to server so you can follow someone who isn’t in your particular instance. Basically what if Twitter worked like email.
Show threadtinybugOct 30, 2022
@uncle6 @Gargron are you a teacher cause you should be because this explanation makes the most sense of all I’ve read. Thanks!
Show threadUncle 6 🌁Oct 30, 2022
@tayloredin worse: I have a career in IT ;)
Show threadtinybugOct 30, 2022
@uncle6 oh my god. I wish the company I worked for could afford IT that could do their job and also explain what was going on 😅.
Show threadMartin PuppeOct 30, 2022
@tayloredin @Gargron That means that you are free to pick where you want to create your Mastodon account. You picked mas.to, Eugen is at mastodon.social, I am at social.anoxinon.de. There are a lot more so-called instances that other people use. But all of them can talk to each others because the instances share a common protocol that tells them how to speak to each other. /1
Show threadtinybugOct 30, 2022
@martin @Gargron thanks! I sort of understand it but it’s still over my head a bit. BUT it’s not Twitter so I’m here. And I like your sheep 🐑.
Show threadMartin PuppeOct 30, 2022
@tayloredin @Gargron This is similar to email. You can pick Gmail but there are a lot of other providers to choose from. You can also install email software on your own server and use that. Or you could even write your own software and use that as long as your software follows the proper protocols for exchanging emails. /2
Show threadtinybugOct 30, 2022
@martin @Gargron so what’s the benefit of that versus a centralized situation? Just no algorithms boosting things based on useless stuff? Or? Explain to me like I’m 5 please
Show threadMartin PuppeOct 30, 2022

@tayloredin @Gargron A lot of people are worried what Elon Musk will do to Twitter and they can’t do a lot about it. They can leave, sure, but they will have to leave the people that they are following and that are following them behind.

If someone were to take mas.to in a direction that you don’t like you can just go to another instance and still talk to your friends.

Show threadtinybugOct 30, 2022
@martin @Gargron AH! Ok this makes sense. Thank you!
Show threadCarsten RaddatzOct 30, 2022
@tayloredin Mastodon is a platform that federates with others - much like email, where e.g. gmail can send to and receive from any other domain. There's no lock-in. Here's an explainer: fediverse.party/en/fediverse/