Matt BlazeDec 20, 2022

About a month ago, I observed that two main things I found lacking here vs. Twitter were accounts from professional creatives (artists, etc) and discussion of breaking news.

The creatives have definitely started to arrive. But the breaking news has been much slower. However, it also seems like breaking news is starting to disappear from Twitter.

I wonder what will fill that gap. Perhaps it will be here, eventually.

Show threadMatt BlazeDec 20, 2022
Up until very recently, if there was something important going on anywhere in the world, it was virtually certain to be in my Twitter feed. Not just RTs of media reports, but discussion, etc. That just doesn't seem to be true any more over there. And it's not here yet.
Show threadMatt BlazeDec 20, 2022
I suspect this has much less to do with software features, and algorithms and more to do with culture and who's come over here.
Show threadMatt BlazeDec 20, 2022
A bunch of people telling me I’m “wrong” to want, or would be “better off without” real-time access to breaking news and firsthand accounts. Maybe that’s true for you. But please don’t presume to speak for me. Not everyone wants or needs the same things.
Show threadMatt BlazeDec 20, 2022

The implication, explicitly stated or otherwise, is that if I want those things, I don’t belong here; I should go elsewhere.

I’m staying. Deal with it.

Show threadMatt BlazeDec 21, 2022
As for news, I’m honestly baffled at people who think they can prevent it from being discussed. News is, pretty much by definition, timely information that people are interested in. That’s a huge fraction of what people like to discuss. Trying to stop that in a large-scale communication system isn’t just kind of weird, it’s futile.
Show threadMarc JacobsDec 21, 2022

@mattblaze My only objection to news on here or the other site is repetition. I follow multiple journalists and subscribe to multiple newspapers. It’s a cost of who I follow though - I get to see 30+ takes on Biden meeting Zelenskyy, many with similar info.

I could probably figure a way to cull this, or separate a news-reading persona, but I don’t bother. On me. Not Mastodon.

That said, I was reading my parents’ NYT in grade 6, so I love the news.

Show threadThe Owl of Minerva
@trollball @mattblaze
Story. Like a lot of parents I was worried about when my son would learn to read. Fast forward to when he was seven and got a hold of our New York Times and asked me what oral sex was. (This was the time of the Clinton/Lewinsky scandal.)
Dec 22, 2022 at 4:59pmWeb