gggeekJan 17, 2023
Naunihal Singh

TLDR: Mastodon is very white, male, status quo, global north, and designed in a way to limit its potential for use in social movements.

Mastodon feels very different from Twitter, deliberately. It is truly like Live Journal. It is about people who are happy with their social circle and who think of virality and discoverability as a problem. They just want to communicate with the people they know, and limit other things. Ironically, it is more like a private gathering than a public space.

Dec 28, 2022 at 3:50pmWeb
Show threadNaunihal SinghDec 28, 2022

In this episode of #OnTheMedia where a senior Mastodon community member says basically that they limited things that caused virality because they thought that was one of the worst things about Twitter, and then kinda shrugs when he says something like "Of course, that means that Mastodon couldn't have supported social movements like #MeToo or #BlackLivesMatter." He also concedes that Black Twitter folk have been made to feel unwelcome, but ... eh.

https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/otm/episodes/on-the-media-mastodon-may-take-twitters-weary

Mastodon: The Platform Taking Twitter's Worn and Weary | On the Media | WNYC Studios

What happens when you slow down socializing?

WNYC Studios
Show threadNaunihal SinghDec 28, 2022
Basically he was smug and entirely uninterested in the use of social media for social change, and was happy to jetison it all. He compared Mastodon to his private BB with guitar nerds where anything you wrote was read by 100 people and that was fine.
Show threadNaunihal SinghDec 28, 2022
Mastodon does have a history of being Queer friendly (one app even asked me if I wanted to join an instance which was for Furries) but that gets used as a shield when people point out how unfriendly these spaces are to lots of other people. Heck, I saw parts of Black Twitter return to Twitter and say they would rather deal with the Nazis where they had community than stick around on Mastodon. It also does have decentralized moderation which makes it easier to ban Nazis.
Show threadNaunihal SinghDec 28, 2022
What it lacks is the ability to Quote Tweet, that is to add your own comments to what somebody may have said, which is often used in social mobilizing. It also doesn't have full text search. This was all done intentionally. But as a result, it's much harder to reach out of your networks to other people. I used Twitter to follow multiple social movements, as well as to learn about people in other countries. Mastodon isn't useful for any of that. And it doesn't want to be.
Show threadNaunihal SinghDec 28, 2022

So I'm here. But even though my friends are awesome, I don't have any new ones I've made on Mastodon (unlike Twitter), and it is overall pretty boring and unlike Twitter it makes building a network feel like work. At the same time, it is of much less use for work. I have almost no Africa network, I have little interaction with journalists, and because the network is more closed, I learn less.

Whatever. It's fine but it's not a substitute for Twitter at all.

Show threadNaunihal SinghDec 28, 2022
The social science server looks interesting and maybe I should go over there. That would be different and better in some ways.
Show threadPamela OliverDec 28, 2022
@naunihal I'm on sciences.social and would be interested in discussing the pluses and minuses of different servers. Appreciate this thread.
Show threadJay UlfelderDec 28, 2022
@pamelaoliver @naunihal I'm on one of the random large instances. Almost all the accounts I follow are on other servers, but I was able to reconstruct a lot of the network I regularly use on Twitter pretty quickly over here, so it hasn't seemed to matter much where I'm housed. Almost never look at local or federated timelines, just the 'home' one and a work-specific list.
Show threadNaunihal SinghDec 28, 2022
@jayulfelder @pamelaoliver I had only an overlap of 200 people and even though I asked the software to autofollow them, it worked only for around 160. Apparently there are problems following across instances? Not sure ...
Show threadPamela OliverDec 28, 2022
@naunihal @jayulfelder I'm pretty sure the network experience is different on a small server. I could auto follow a list. But I think it takes more active work to expand outside your own silo starting from a smaller instance.
Show threadNaunihal SinghDec 28, 2022
@pamelaoliver @jayulfelder This is why I'm on mastodon.social! I thought it would make things easier ...
Show threadPamela OliverDec 28, 2022
@naunihal @jayulfelder because I'm only on the one server I can't really compare. My mathematician DIL days there is a theorem about why it shouldn't matter but I'm still dubious. I want to talk to her more about it.
Show threadPamela OliverDec 28, 2022
@naunihal @jayulfelder Here is one copy of the decision tree I've been looking at https://www.reddit.com/r/Mastodon/comments/zqstn1/what_makes_up_my_timeline/
what makes up my timeline?

Posted in r/Mastodon by u/irkli • 157 points and 34 comments

reddit
Show threadnoodlejetski Dec 29, 2022
@naunihal well, yes and no. some smaller instances have been discussing defederating from it in the not-so-distant past because of how big it is and how little moderation work has been put into it. I'm not sure how much has changed since then and if the defederation went through for some of them, but that could be one of the possible reasons. using the flagship instance has definitely got its pros and cons.
Show threadacmJan 16, 2023
@naunihal It is easier to find some random chatty posters to get some interesting content into your feed. But the Local feed can become valuable if it's populated with people whose general activity interests you. I ended up in a geographical silo, which gives me shared sports-chat during games and a place to ramble about local issues. When I was on masto . cloud, the Local feed was gibberish.
Show threadDr. Ruchira S. DattaDec 30, 2022
@pamelaoliver @naunihal @jayulfelder I'm on a very small instance, btw.
Show threadSeanDec 29, 2022
@naunihal @jayulfelder @pamelaoliver I’ve heard that some of the more socially progressive instances have defederated from mastodon.social so it’s possible that’s the issue you’ve encountered with some follows not working.
Show threadPamela OliverDec 29, 2022
@complexmath @naunihal @jayulfelder interesting.
Show threadChristian Gebhard 📊Dec 29, 2022

@naunihal

Some users choose to manually approve every single new follower (You can post toots to followers only, so they might want to have a curated follower list?).
So you might have sent a follow request to the 40 "missing" people from your list and they might accept you sooner or later. I'd check again later to see if you are >160 followings then.

@jayulfelder @pamelaoliver

Show threadMalcDec 28, 2022
@naunihal Mr. S.... There's a big 'Yet' behind many of your observations. To take just one, Mastodon is far better architected to create a true African community, free of whatever biased + oddities that come from having execs in San Francisco as opposed to, say, Lagos. That of course hasn't happened... Yet.
China offers many insights as to the perils of "the wrong" government oversight, but the Chinese firewall also conceals a lot of day-to-day dialog from Twitter researchers!
Show threadRobert StewartDec 29, 2022
@naunihal a thank you for this thread. You've crystallized so many of my own swirling thoughts during this process.
Show threadpruDec 29, 2022
@naunihal This is such a smart distillation of what I've found really limiting so far with this experience; you really articulated it exactly. I like so much about the tool/platform, but what I view as the major limitation seems like the biggest feature to a lot of hardliners here.
Show threadneatcheeDec 29, 2022

@naunihal I strongly encourage this. You are correct that Mastodon is not trying to be Twitter, and seeks to fulfill a different role.

Big servers are a black hole of endless voices with little to no organization. Ever since I switched to smaller instances (first a game dev one, then my own with ~150 accounts now) my experience has improved and I've discovered more things because I can actually parse the local and public timelines that are generated by my server neighbors.

Show threadneatcheeDec 29, 2022

@naunihal IMO Mastodon works best when it is approached with the mentality of "what if me and several hundred other people all ran our own newspaper with comments?"

I think that the activism angle will get better with time as the social graph develops. By nature of how the platform works, it is least effective at spreading content when the user-to-follow-tree-depth ratio is high, as happens after big user influxes, and that's been non-stop for months now

Show threadpanguDec 29, 2022
@naunihal good you‘re here. Maybe give your peeps some time to migrate. Surely its not identical to other networks. I see huge potential. Check out this collection of curated account lists: https://github.com/nathanlesage/academics-on-mastodon
GitHub - nathanlesage/academics-on-mastodon: A list of various lists consisting of academics on Mastodon

A list of various lists consisting of academics on Mastodon - nathanlesage/academics-on-mastodon

GitHub
Show threadCaptain Pudding  ⚓️Dec 29, 2022
@naunihal Thanks for pointing that out. As far as I can remember, Twitters history was kind of the same in the early days. Would appreciate to see the fediverse become more diverse in any kind of way.
Show thread@[email protected] has movedDec 29, 2022

@naunihal

you might be interested in scholar.social although they have a particular focus on cultivating a focused Local timeline that means they have a few extra rules you won't see on other instances

https://scholar.social/about#rules

Scholar Social

Microblogging for researchers, grad students, librarians, archivists, undergrads, high schoolers, educators, research assistants, profs—anyone involved in learning who engages with others respectfully

Mastodon hosted on scholar.social
Show threadGrant 🇺🇦ArmUkraine🇺🇦Dec 28, 2022
@naunihal Awesome thread. I'd have quote-tooted it if the option were available. (Edit is nice as well) :)
Show threadHilaryDec 28, 2022
@naunihal I see you are on .social which I believe is a large and quite generic server.
I agree some features inhibit virality, but in terms of meeting people you might perhaps do better to move to one that's more suited to your interests. Then looking at and interacting with the local and even federated (as I'm doing here) timelines might be worthwhile.
Show threadNaunihal SinghDec 28, 2022
@regordane I'm not sure if there is one that matches my interests. Maybe an academic one, but there are no Africa oriented ones. Most of my network on Twitter has not moved over and if they have, they are largely silent here & continue to post on other platforms.
Show threadRobert GuillamDec 29, 2022

@naunihal @regordane that's kind of the thing. Being discovered here seems to depend on 1) following hashtags and 2) following the right people.

It helps if the people you follow are active here. Unfortunately the bird site is still useful for now so more activity happens there

Show threadSeanDec 29, 2022
@RoboGorillaman @naunihal @regordane The following hashtags thing is a good basic idea but I’ve found it frustrating in practice. I don’t want all that in my personal feed (where it lands) because the volume of posts makes it easy to miss the posts from mutuals, and I haven’t been able to figure out a way to add a hashtag to a list instead. So I’ve mostly found myself searching hashtags manually, but then I forget.
Show threadIggyDec 29, 2022
@complexmath @RoboGorillaman @naunihal @regordane I don't know if it would work with your flow, but you could always make a list of mutuals and keep your feed a firehose of content.
Show threadIggyDec 29, 2022
@RoboGorillaman @naunihal @regordane My approach was to just follow a bunch of accounts of different types right out of the gate. Not saying journos are the end all be all, but there tends to be a lot activity under their posts. Import this list of ~1000 journalists to get your feed kickstarted.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1KPGG5PA8uYCUWz85SyVvkg5-Hq6PX-hojpPOQBPxc5Q/edit?usp=share_link
journalists

journalists Account address,Show boosts @Trubluelefty @azraf @[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected] @...

Google Docs
Show threadNaunihal SinghDec 28, 2022
@regordane How do I check out other servers? I can see a "sciences.social" server, but I don't know how to see what is being posted there.
Show threadHilaryDec 28, 2022

@naunihal just go to https://sciences.social/explore to take a look. Also, I take your point about the lack of African servers. Hopefully that will change.

Hashtags are also a very important way of finding people with common interests on Mastodon as they can be both searched and followed.

sciences.social

Non-profit, ad-free social media for social scientists. Join thousands of social scientists here and across the fediverse.

Mastodon hosted on sciences.social
Show threadNaunihal SinghDec 28, 2022
@regordane I'm not seeing much use of hashtags on peoples posts. It's one of the reasons why full text search is useful :( Maybe people will change but even guessing which hashtags are the right ones is not easy (for either posting or searching). And if you have to search 7 variants for each possible hashtag, it increases the load on the user.
Show threadNotNowOrLaterDec 29, 2022

@naunihal @regordane

if you are not seeing the hashtags, it is most likely because the people are new.

there are many growing communities here and we find each other via hashtags. you can follow them, you can mark them, you can make sure that everytime it is used, you are notified.

it is not twitter and i am so happy about that... but you can make it work for you. also, there are instances in the fediverse that allow QTs. mastodon is just a small part of something much bigger.

Show threadAnne CarpenterDec 29, 2022
@NotNowOrLater2 @naunihal @regordane if you use a tool like fedifinder.glitch.me to find the Mastodon accounts of those you followed on Twitter, it will also tell you which servers most of them are in, which might help you move somewhere with an interesting Local feed. I’ve found enough interesting in my Home timeline for it to not matter personally.
Show threadLars FosdalDec 29, 2022

@naunihal Using hashtags is essential for building reach.

I do not want another Twitter with an algorithm driven feed, so I am very happy to build my list of people to follow organically - by perusing the local and federated streams - in addition to looking at hashtags.

Another way is to look at posts that get traction and read the streams of people that make good commentary.

By using or not using tags, you sort of opt in or out of discoverability.

Going viral is not a requirement, IMO.

Show threadNiquleiDec 29, 2022

@LarsFosdal @naunihal
Yes, I also don't want a algorithm like in Twitter.
But what I realized very fast: a chronically timeline makes my experience far less international, the one thing I really liked on Twitter.

Here i have much more to do, to find informations from e.g. America.
So sometime I wish for at least a 'scroll to time xx:xx' function.

Show threadTom HolubDec 30, 2022

@LarsFosdal @naunihal

"I don't see any problem with the Mastodon status quo. Also, I'm a white male tech guy from the global north."

Show threadJosh SorefDec 29, 2022

@naunihal @regordane certain communities use hashtags.

#ActuallyAutistic certainly does...

Show threadJosh SorefDec 29, 2022
@naunihal @regordane hashtags take time to evolve/coalesce. The #BirdSiteMeltdown had a long time for communities to form and settle on hashtags. Hopefully communities won't need as long to migrate, reform, and select hashtags here.
Show threadJosh SorefDec 29, 2022
@naunihal @regordane #BlackHistory seems like a good hashtag
Show threadJosh SorefDec 29, 2022
@naunihal @regordane topically , here's a toot listing hashtags: https://toot.cat/@kevix/109464322357861173
Kevix (he/him) :debian: (@[email protected])

Content warning: a log list of hashtags

Toot.Cat
Show threadJosh SorefDec 29, 2022
@naunihal @regordane interesting meta-analysis (?) on followers: https://sauropods.win/@futurebird/109593070725061562
myrmepropagandist (@[email protected])

Attached: 1 image I've been creeping around looking at a lot of people's accounts (I'm doing a survey) Noticed that people with very few followers have one thing in common: they have not boosted the posts of other people often if at all. (When I see posts like this encouraging boosting I always think "well that person just wants boosts, whatever") That's not it. On twitter it was important to only boost exceptional content -- boost here to invite more people to join in talking about something.

Sauropods.win
Show threadSummer BreezeDec 29, 2022

@naunihal @regordane People post hashtags if they want to be part of the general discussion on a topic. They don’t if they don’t.

It gives control to the user.

Look at the hashtags and pick the ones that correspond to the discussions you want to join.

Show threadStop ThatJan 10, 2023
@naunihal @regordane Hashtags are really important, but using them is a habit not everyone, especially folks who came over from twitter like I did, are used to. But I made a conscious effort to start using and searching for hashtags, and it was like a new Mastodon opened up for me.
Show threadacmJan 16, 2023
@naunihal You definitely need hashtags -- almost every post in my feed has at least one, and some have a bank of them. You can search for some hashtags that seem intuitive and then click on others where posts have several, and soon you'll find yourself where you wanted to be. You can actually subscribe to hashtags here, which is powerful. I get lots of good stuff via #BlackMastodon (which is a community, and even some servers spaces), and lots of other communities define tags to gather.
Show threadThe Nexus of PrivacyDec 29, 2022

@regordane @naunihal https://sciences.social/public/local is better for getting a feel on what they talk about on that server in particular. The /explore timeline includes popular posts from other servers. Most (although not all) servers make one or both of these feeds public.

And Naunihal Singh excellent points in the thread! Not sure if you've seen The Whiteness of Mastodon but he talks about some of these issues https://techpolicy.press/the-whiteness-of-mastodon/

sciences.social

Non-profit, ad-free social media for social scientists. Join thousands of social scientists here and across the fediverse.

Mastodon hosted on sciences.social
Show threadMartin KellerDec 29, 2022
@naunihal
I just looked for a local instance to get some info of things happening around me, even without anyone knowing in this instance. Then I added the people I followed on Twitter and knew their Mastodon account. This was already a good start for me here.
The big difference to Twitter is: Here I could discuss with a climate sceptic and the discussion went in whole sentences and without any ad hominem attacks. Great!
Give Mastodon time to grow!
Show threadPoliverso - notizie dal Fediverso ⁂Jan 1, 2023
@naunihal using the fedilab application you can follow an entire instance, as if it were a mastodon list!

You can also ask any friendica administrator to create you a forum group dedicated to a particular topic, so that by following and mentioning it, you can create threads (or, alternatively, you can subscribe to a friendica server to create one yourself)

@regordane
Show threadJohn PellJan 15, 2023
@naunihal @regordane iOS client app “Ice Cubes” can add “local” timelines from arbitrary instances
Show threadJohn O’ConnellDec 28, 2022
@naunihal There are multiple tools to use, which will locate your Twitter contacts here on Mastodon and automatically follow them, encouraging them to follow yourself. It takes about eight minutes, maximum.
Show threadNaunihal SinghDec 28, 2022
@jdpoc I used a good one but little of my network is here and also apparently I couldn't follow people on other instances so I had only around an 80% follow rate.
Show threadSummer BreezeDec 29, 2022
@naunihal @jdpoc You definitely can follow people on other instances. Most of the people I follow are not on my instance.
Show threadJohn O’ConnellDec 29, 2022
@SummerBreeze @naunihal Mine too.
Show threadDr. Ruchira S. DattaDec 30, 2022
@SummerBreeze @naunihal @jdpoc Yes, likewise.