Voline

Tip for the new folk:
Often Mastodon’s features work the way they do because it was first populated by people who had been harassed on FB and the Birdsite.

For instance (not sorry), you cannot search Masto for a simple term. Only #hashtags. Say you’re having a private conversation about iguanas. Anti-iguana trolls will not be able to search for “iguanas”, find your conversation, and drop into it to say, “Iguana luvers suck!”

#TwitterMigration #Twitter

Nov 6, 2022 at 4:22pmWeb
Show threadVolineNov 6, 2022
But if you are wanting to connect with new iguana fanciers on Mastodon, slipping an #iguanas hashtag somewhere into your posts will allow people to search for and find them.
Show threadAlex0007Nov 6, 2022

@Voline really? so bad-behaving people are only able to search by "iguana" and not "#iguana"?

Missing search not a good thing IMO

Show threadMichael VealeNov 6, 2022
@Voline it adds friction, but there is no technical barrier to determined trolls to search toots they have federated or obtained through a relay, it's just not surfaced to the UX of vanilla mastodon instances. hopefully that friction is enough to significantly reduce the kind of harassment you describe.
Show threadVolineNov 6, 2022
@mikarv
Let's hope they're lazy.
Show threadDan KillamNov 6, 2022
@Voline exactly. it's like a speed limit. in the moment, it might be annoying. but it makes everything safer and in the long run more enjoyable and usable
Show threadJuan LuisNov 6, 2022

@Voline This doesn't make sense. Anti-iguanas trolls will find the hashtags anyway. Plus, even if Mastodon-the-network doesn't have full text search across instances, there are no technical blockers for someone with a lot of CPU and disk space to build it, making said protection moot.

Let's not fantasize anti-features.

Show threadVolineNov 7, 2022
@astrojuanlu
It's a protection against drive-by intruders on your conversation who may be just searching around. But, yes I suppose if someone wanted to go full mad genius on the non-hashtaged iguana community, I suppose they could.
Show threadChris HansonNov 7, 2022
The flipside of this is that if you do want to be having a more “public” discussion about iguanas, you should hashtag it, that way anyone who wants to join iguana-don will find it! (And everyone wins, because iguanas are awesome.)
Show threadMooroMilitiaNov 7, 2022
@HollyBaleen Did you know this? Maybe you won't be harassed here...?
Show threadJens AbrahamssonNov 8, 2022
@Voline Wow! That makes perfect sense! Thanks for spreading the word!
Show threadCarolinailyNov 9, 2022
@Voline so how do we search?
Show threadVolineNov 9, 2022
@Carolinaily
For hashtags or individual users.