Steven T. DennisMastodon’s limitations mean it relies more on its users to surface good content. Search doesn’t really work. There are far fewer suggested posts. QTs don’t really exist yet. Trending doesn’t really work. So boosting becomes the absolutely critical way for other people to find interesting things. IE, if you see something you like, boost/RT it, tag people who you think might be interested, etc.
Boosts on here are what will make or break Mastodon. If people can find other interesting people and content, they will stay and the site will grow. If its too much of a chore, they won’t. Other sites reward lazier social media grazing, and they surface content designed to maximize engagement, which often = lies, hate, stuff that enrages rather than enlightens. Mastodon just surfaces what imembers boost.
Benjamin Ross@steventdennis @mtsw I discover new people to follow here through replies more than boosts. Also, a lot of the boosts I see are posts I've already seen, often 2 or 3 times before (a weakness of either the software or the federated model). Unless you have a very large followership, writing thoughtful replies is a better way to improve Mastodon than boosting.
@BenRossTransit @mtsw Replies are also very important. But I don’t think I’ll even see the conversation unless someone I follow boosts it into my timeline.
shaun@steventdennis @BenRossTransit @mtsw The one feature I really, really want here is to be notified about who interacts with my boosts.
A _huge_ driver of my participation on T was that I'd retweet something, people would reply to my retweet, I'd get notified of their replies, and I'd engage in conversation.
Here, I boost something and I have no idea whether anyone even _sees_ it, much less replies to it. Any interactions go directly to the OP and leave me out of the equation.
mtsw@BenRossTransit @steventdennis some of the clients being released apparently handle this issue the same way twitter does (show you RTed posts in your main timeline once and then not again). Not mine (Tusky) and I agree its exasperating and annoying to see the same post over and over.