Tim ChambersMay 25, 2023

This seems very important and worth ongoing study:

“Once again, results suggest a rise in diversity as the 10 biggest server contribution to the Fediverse is reduced by more than 10%. So, even if the biggest servers are accumulating more users, it seems that the Fediverse is becoming more decentralized.”

@fediversereport @spreadmastodon @fediversenews

https://socialhub.activitypub.rocks/t/analysis-of-fediverse-diversity-in-terms-of-decentralization/3252

Analysis of Fediverse Diversity in terms of Decentralization

Hello! Following a previous analysis (!it’s in catalan language!) and recovering the interest on the Fediverse, I’ve extended my analysis focusing in software diversity in that case. The two time points analyzed are from September 2022 and May 2023. In the initial analysis above there is a mistake. The dataset used is obtained using script based on this code written by @spla. Before getting into the analysis itself, I want to state that the active users measure is somehow confusing. Some ser...

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Show threadJon (now at neuromatch.social)May 25, 2023
@tchambers @fediversereport @spreadmastodon @fediversenews Interesting! Although there are some quirks in the data, with joindiaspora and diasp.org (neither of which are Mastodon) in last March's accounts and not the current list, and with mastodon.cloud and gc2.jp going from over 10% of MAU to not appearing at all in the latest statistics.
Show threadmaegulMay 25, 2023
@jdp23 @tchambers @fediversereport @spreadmastodon @[email protected]

Also, it'd be nice to know something about what comprises all the "others", how many accounts do those instances have, how many of them are there?

Otherwise, it'll be interesting to track this going forward because mastodon.social right now is growing faster than it did between March and 17 May ... the picture could very well look different when comparing May to August.
Show threadmarcelcostaMay 25, 2023
@maegul @tchambers @fediversereport @jdp23 @fediversenews @spreadmastodon

>Also, it’d be nice to know something about what comprises all the “others”, how many accounts do those instances have, how many of them are there?

Others means all the rest! Which means 21089 in May (as shown in the first table).

>Otherwise, it’ll be interesting to track this going forward because mastodon.social right now is growing faster than it did between March and 17 May … the picture could very well look different when comparing May to August.

Totally true! I would like to take monthly pictures (with the help of @spla, which is the author of the API query script).
Show threadmaegulMay 26, 2023
@[email protected] @tchambers @fediversereport @jdp23 @[email protected] @spreadmastodon @spla

Thanks for the reply!

Any chance others can get their hands on the data set?
Show threadmaegulMay 26, 2023
@[email protected] @tchambers @fediversereport @jdp23 @[email protected] @spreadmastodon @spla also, another question … any insights on your your data set and its creation would differ from any of the others out there like fedidb or instances.social?
Show threadmarcelcostaMay 26, 2023
@maegul @tchambers @fediversereport @jdp23 @spla @fediversenews @spreadmastodon Hey! That is interesting... I didn't thought in using fedidb (the other one I didn't know). The truth is that @spla took the data by itself and, as I had the chance to look at it, performed the analysis.

It will be interesting to do the analysis with the fedidb dataset. For what I see right now, it seems that it differs from the dataset used by me. I can see an increase in servers in Oct 22 that results in a decrease in Users by server, and then it keeps more or less stable.

I would like to apply the shannon and simpson indexes and the top10 server distribution, as they gives a broather view of diversity.
Show threadmarcelcostaMay 26, 2023
@maegul @fediversenews @fediversereport @jdp23 @spla @spreadmastodon @tchambers I am playing with fedidb API and I think I could get all the data I need (first time using APIs myself!).
Show threadmaegulMay 26, 2023
@[email protected] @[email protected] @fediversereport @jdp23 @spla @spreadmastodon @tchambers

Yea the API works well ... I've used it myself. Last time I used it though I think there was an issue in the data not having many of the small (1-10 user) instances. But from the dashboard that seems to have been fixed now.
Show threadmarcelcostaMay 26, 2023
@maegul @tchambers @fediversereport @jdp23 @spla @fediversenews @spreadmastodon When I find some time, I will try to recover this global data. I find particularly interesting the ecology measures of diversity to be applied to user distribution and software distribution.
Show threadJon (now at neuromatch.social)May 26, 2023

@marcelcosta I agree, applying those ecology measures of diversity is very valuable -- I really appreciated that in your post!

Does the FediDB API let you get at historical data? Or, is the historical dataset available?

@maegul @tchambers @fediversereport @spreadmastodon @spla @fediversenews

Show threadmaegul
@jdp23 @[email protected] @tchambers @fediversereport @spreadmastodon @spla @[email protected]

Not that I know of ... if so it would be a hidden/undocumented feature.

In the end, given that these datasets aren't terribly large, especially if we have a temporal resolution of only 1 month or week, I think it's getting to the point that it'd be nice if they were just stored somewhere easily accessible to all.
May 26, 2023 at 6:18amWeb