FadeFeb 5, 2023
Is the sudden drop in traffic on my timeline here lately because people are wandering away from Mastodon again, or because of defederation, or because of DDOS attacks? Whoooo knows? Sigh.
Show threadFadeFeb 5, 2023

I am extremely fond of Mastodon. I want to hang out here for a good long time. But I'm seeing a lot of my friends quietly detach from this place because there's so much "here are the etiquette rules for this tea shop, I can't believe you didn't lift your pinky" going around that, well, who has the energy for that these days?

I cope by just ignoring most of that, but then, I've got no following or public career to worry about.

Show threadFadeFeb 5, 2023

...ah. And apparently if an instance gets completely blocked, even briefly, it severs the follow relationships between any users across the block.

Which explains why some people I thought I was already following (and vice versa) recently followed me, and showed as not being followed by me.

Well that's not great.

Show threadAnne JeffersonFeb 5, 2023
@fade are you on mastodon.online? What defederated? :-(
Show threadFade
@annejefferson I don't know what defederated, which is part of the problem! I'm still seeing wandering.shop stuff, where a lot of my friends are, but I hear mastodon.social got blocked/unblocked, and my timeline got real quiet recently, so I'm wondering if there was a block (or block/unblock) with another instance where I know people, and... HOW WOULD I EVEN KNOW, augh, it's stressful.
Feb 5, 2023 at 4:24pmWeb
Show threadAnne JeffersonFeb 5, 2023
@fade it would be nice if there were any easy way to sign up for alerts about our instance. I’ve contemplated migrating to spore.social but it seems like such a hassle. I worry I’ll lose links even though it’s supposed to be Ok.
Show threadFadeFeb 5, 2023
@annejefferson I've been planning a move to zirk.us for ages, but I've been waffling because lately I'm posting a lot about pokemon, and how does that go over on a more academic instance? But how would all my posting about academic stuff go over on a game-focused instance? Sigh. I just want to talk about whatever I feel like. I hate feeling like I have to Theme.
Show threadAnne JeffersonFeb 5, 2023
@fade I think your CWs work well. I enjoy a lot of your content, but don't do Pokemon, and the CWs let me scroll by. :-)
Show threadFadeFeb 5, 2023
@annejefferson I do try to CW long specific threads!
Show threadYingtaiFeb 5, 2023
@fade I am on zirk.us and I had exactly the same reservations about moving here. But my impression is that nobody minds. :) To be honest, I don't think this instance has a very strong culture of reading the local timeline. And if you look at people's actual profiles and the Exploring tab, we're boosting exactly the same kind of thing as mastodon.social. There is highbrow stuff on the local timeline, but there's also normal fun stuff.
Show threadFadeFeb 5, 2023
@yingtai This is encouraging! I found some really need people from the Local timeline when I poked around, but I've been feeling shy about committing.
Show threadHeatherFeb 5, 2023
@annejefferson @fade For what it's worth (which might be nothing) I've been very happy with spore.social . I backed the Kickstarter when they were fundraising because I was looking for a place to land. I kept my old account (mastodon.social) going for a bit but eventually migrated and was a pretty straightforward process.
Show threadFadeFeb 5, 2023
@Habigelo @annejefferson It looks like a neat place! Alas, the ban on all NSFW, even with a CW, makes it unworkable for me. I don't often boost such, and pretty much never post any, but I need to have the option available at times.
Show threadHeatherFeb 5, 2023
@fade @annejefferson very fair. It's not my favourite rule either. I'm finding the collective boundary negotiation process on here interesting. We all come to social media to connect on some level but the nuances of that play out differently for everyone.
Show threadFadeFeb 5, 2023
@Habigelo @annejefferson And admittedly I shy away from a lot of perfectly reasonable rules that I would almost certainly never break anyway because of the Strikethrough era of LJ: I've seen the "good" rules applied quite aggressively in bad ways, so I end up leery of all sorts of things.
Show threadink and yarnFeb 5, 2023
@fade @Habigelo @annejefferson What I don't know, about rules like "no NSFW even with CW," is whether it applies to boosts - because boosts don't show up on the local TL. (Obviously this would be a question for the server admin.)
Show threadLucyKemnitzerFeb 6, 2023

@emery @fade @Habigelo @annejefferson Wait, boosts don't show up on the local timeline? That seems both counterintuitive & counterproductive.

I'm having a very hard time making mastodon work for me in very basic ways, and it makes me sad.

Show threadink and yarnFeb 6, 2023

@LucyKemnitzer @fade @Habigelo @annejefferson The local timeline shows posts from people on your local instance. As far as I can tell, you see boosts only from people you follow, and they appear in your home TL.

ETA: much in the same way that replies to other people don't show up in the local TL - it only shows original posts from people on your instance.

Show threadLucyKemnitzerFeb 6, 2023
@emery @fade @Habigelo @annejefferson Yes, one of the things I find especially difficult about mastodon is trying to read whole threads and replies. It's pulling teeth to get them all to show. I really want this to work because so many of my friends are here but maybe the federation part is just not for me after all.
Show threadink and yarnFeb 6, 2023
@LucyKemnitzer @fade @Habigelo @annejefferson This may only be working for me because I'm on a computer, not a phone, but I open the post on its original page in a new tab, and then I can see the whole thread/all replies.
Show threadAnne JeffersonFeb 5, 2023
@Habigelo @fade thanks for the recommendation. I also backed the kickstarter but I started the #52LakeChamplain project here and haven’t decided how to best migrate it if I move
Show threadHeatherFeb 5, 2023
@annejefferson neat project!
Show threadpa28Feb 5, 2023
@fade @annejefferson TBH this is why I finally settled on a commercially run instance hosted by what I believe to be a reputable and transparent company. It is nice that there can be instance for people who wear pink on Tuesday but they seem to be as problematic as the bird site. Internet sites will always be a reflection of the people who use them, who will be ultimate selected by people who run them. Commercial ops aren’t better, but tend to be pragmatists.
Show threadCautionWIP 🎃+🇨🇦+🏳️‍🌈= Feb 5, 2023
@fade @annejefferson Limited means individual users can find them and follow them but they don’t show up in the federated timeline, & I believe boosted toots get muted(?) & won’t be seen by others unless they are already following that specific account. It basically acknowledges that they exist, but tries to keep their users’ shenanigans from bothering the locals unless they actively opt in. I’ve only recently gotten into looking at the moderation structures around here so I don’t really know.