Mastodawn

Chris Trottier Jan 26, 2023

The Financial Times is shutting down their Mastodon instance (alphaville.club).

Their reason? Security, liability, and cost.

With all due respect, I believe they went about their instance the wrong way:

1. Keep your instance moderated, you're less likely liable
2. Keep your instance closed to registrations, you're more secure
2. Keep your instance light, it's inexpensive

Also: Financial Times' site runs in WordPress. Why not use WordPress as an instance?

https://www.ft.com/content/8d995a24-d77c-4208-a3a6-603d8788ebcd

Client Challenge

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Chris Trottier Jan 26, 2023

If Financial Times simply installed this plugin on their current website, they perhaps wouldn't feel the need to shut down their Fediverse instance.

https://wordpress.org/plugins/activitypub/

ActivityPub

Connect your site to the Open Social Web and let millions of users follow, share, and interact with your content from Mastodon, Pixelfed, and more.

WordPress.org

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Chris Trottier Jan 26, 2023

This is the problem with a "Mastodon is the Fediverse" narrative:

Mastodon can't be all things to all people.

It's certainly not a suitable tool for journalism.

The Press has unique demands, and therefore requires a unique featureset.

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Chris Trottier Jan 26, 2023

The Press doesn't need to run a social network.

But they do need to distribute their work.

The question: what kind of instance allows them to do this?

It's not necessarily Mastodon.

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Robin from Colorado 🇺🇸🇺🇦

@atomicpoet if I were the Washington post I’d set up my own instance for journos and subscribers