Peter FrederickNov 5, 2022
James Lloyd 🧬

I updated my blog post about what Mastodon is and how it works based on my recent experience.

Please share with any friends/colleagues who are still using the Bird Site.

#twitterMigration #ScienceMastodon

https://www.badgrammargoodsyntax.com/staying-productive/2022/10/31/an-ad-free-open-source-twitter-alternative-mastodon

An ad-free*, open source Twitter alternative: Mastodon — Bad Grammar, Good Syntax

With Twitter being the de facto online “town-square” for political (and scientific) discussions, a major issue is that we as users have little to no say in how it is run and who runs it. But what is the alternative to a billionaire owned online town-square? Well, Mastodon is a perfectly cromulent

Bad Grammar, Good Syntax
Nov 5, 2022 at 9:13pmWeb
Show threadPeter FrederickNov 5, 2022
@jamespblloyd Excellent. Thank you. Have read it and tweeted it so people can gain more understanding. đź‘Ť
Show threadGene RegulationNov 11, 2022
@jamespblloyd Found your post on Twitter but will reply here. Great blog post. Of course we are learning a lot of new things during these few days. Here is one thought. You make an interesting point, "Once a lot of Scientists, especially the bigger influencers... sign-up". This assumes (a) that the influencer status automatically transfers to another platform and (b) that fediverse needs influencers. Both assumptions are not trivial & may not necessarily hold. It's a different culture here...
Show threadGene RegulationNov 11, 2022
@jamespblloyd In fact, the culture which required influencers was perhaps one of the elements of why Twitter was at times quite toxic. As far as I understand fediverse, it's more about individual people having equally heard voices, which is a bit different from the culture of influencers on Twitter
Show threadJames Lloyd 🧬Nov 11, 2022

@generegulation Yes I agree, the culture here is different and I like that aspect. Whether that will last over time, or if people will naturally flock to some trend setters/influencers I am not sure, but certainly nice to take a break from that right now.

When I wrote that I was assuming it would take some big names to convince scientists that Mastodon is worth trying, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. Not sure about others, but some celebs like Stephen Fry and Neil Gaimen did move over.

Show threadAaron GalbraithNov 11, 2022

@jamespblloyd

Thanks! Already passed it on.