Mastodawn

Paul Jul 1, 2023

So let me break down how things are going on the internet today:

- Twitter: Rate-limited
- Reddit: Third-party apps dead
- Pornhub: Effectively just got banned in my state because of a bad law
- Bluesky: Slow as molasses because everyone’s on a single server
- Twitch: Hear they’re having problems, too
- YouTube: Working OK but sudden questions about them, too
- Mastodon: Running perfectly

We can make this work.

kkeller Jul 1, 2023

@ernie in fairness, at some point one's Mastodon instance will have problems. I don't want to present Mastodon as a perfect utopia that never fails, giving users a false sense of what it can or can't do.

Ernie Smith Jul 1, 2023

@kkeller Certainly, and there was some legit downtime earlier this week. But it is built for these moments.

Andrew (Television Executive)Jul 1, 2023

@ernie @kkeller "having problems" vs "is being intentionally rendered useless" is an important distinction in this conversation.

Ernie Smith Jul 1, 2023

@ajroach42 @kkeller Yep. It is not perfect. But imperfect is solvable vs. the serious business issues we’re starting to see.

kkeller Jul 1, 2023

@ajroach42 I know that we know the distinction. I want to make sure we make that distinction to new Mastodon users. I've seen Mastodon users complain "it's just as bad as Twitter" after one Mastodon outage because they have outsized expectations of what Mastodon is (or isn't).

Andrew (Television Executive)Jul 1, 2023

@kkeller ah. This is an "all things to all people" kind of concern. Valid.

TechyDad Jul 2, 2023

@ajroach42 @ernie @kkeller As someone who has created and managed websites for 25+ years, Twitter appears to me to be "we're limiting folks because we fired all the sys admins and now the servers crash if you sneeze near them."

Mastodon crashes seem more along the lines of "we got popular very quickly so we need to switch to a beefier server. Then everything will be fine again."

If you need to have crashes, the Mastodon case is better than the Twitter one.

TurboQuokka Jul 2, 2023

@TechyDad @ajroach42 @ernie @kkeller Also because they owe all their cloud providers money, and refuse to pay any of them.

🇪🇺 Paul Schoonhoven 🍋🍉Jul 2, 2023

@TechyDad the large influx in November showed exactly what mastodon is capable of. As it happened for the first time in history, Mastodon did cope very well with the large influx. Of course with problems. But that was to be expected.
Since then lessons are learned and software is updated.
@ajroach42 @ernie @kkeller

@kkeller @ernie this is a good point. I took a break from mastodon for a few months. When I came back my server and account were gone. Mastodon.lol

kaukamieli Jul 2, 2023

@kkeller
Biggest instances that get most of mass migration will have problems, like always when these happen. Though this time I've only heard about lag, so maybe they were somewhat prepared.
@ernie

@kkeller @ernie fediverse Kind of gatekeeps people with how their used to signing up and seeing posts, not that simple
And defederating people whimsically like ppl who signed nda's with meta etc

excited for the mastodon rise Jul 1, 2023

@ernie profile loads are a bit slow here today, but whatever

@ernie @Kye YouTube: experimenting with blocking adblock

greatquux Jul 1, 2023

@robinsyl @ernie @Kye in the grand scheme of things this isn’t the worst thing. I wouldn’t do it but it sorta seems like a cat and mouse game everyone expects them to play anyway? Any company that decides to go down that road needs to understand it’s not possible to be 100% effective and it’s not worth it to try. But then again I pay for YouTube Premium because I think it’s a great deal for the amount I watch and do want to support creators.

meadhbh Jul 2, 2023

@greatquux @robinsyl @ernie @Kye I wouldn't have any issue with it personally, except for a little annoyance, because at the end of the day they are a for-profit company and someone has to keep the servers running. But too many of youtube's ads are just hate speech, and forcing potentially vulnerable people to watch that just because they won't or can't pay is diabolical on youtube's part.

@TransEejit @greatquux @ernie @Kye should maybe mention instead that the YouTube site is buggy as hell. Shorts on web is just broken. And often when I click on a video it shows a different video.

ZZ Bottom Jul 2, 2023

@ernie ❤️

Garbage Data 🦝Jul 2, 2023

@ernie YouTube is trying to ban ad blockers.

Benji Jul 2, 2023

@ernie Tumblr is running as usual.

Which is to say, Mastodon is coming out on top.

Pierre Stromberg (Official)Jul 2, 2023

@ernie Tumblr: Still proudly retaining its crown as the Amiga of the internet.

Brian Grinter Jul 2, 2023

@pierres @ernie

belikekramer Jul 2, 2023

addie Jul 2, 2023

@ernie Correction
*Mastodon: Constant drama/warring of the different federated instances over whether to block Meta and the influx of new users from them, with a similar cycle of arguments over defederating from big groups every few months :/

Geotechland Jul 2, 2023

@EposVox @ernie I agree this is a challenge we have to work on.

Democracy is difficult but I think eventually we'll figure out a good system and how to get along better.

addie Jul 2, 2023

@geotechland @ernie Certainly, but I fundamentally don't think it can happen if people here keep acting like it's some perfect eutopia and nothing needs to change.

HACK13 Jul 2, 2023

@EposVox @ernie I can agree with this statement. It’s one of the big reasons I take the approach of I don’t like to use the block button on instances unless they directly conflict with the moderation rules I have in place. I often opt for silence so users are free to continue interacting but blocking the federation feed from being filled with content that violates the terms they signed to join this instance.

I typically only block instances that are allowing illegal content, allowing hate speech, and refusing to moderate because “true free speech” you are entitled to have that right but users who join this instance joined knowing we do not tolerate those types of behavior.

@ernie how does anyone at all even get a bluesky invite code?

Joseph Jul 2, 2023

@ernie yes it looks good

Stephanie 🎀Jul 2, 2023

@ernie If YouTube blocks adblocker users, they can get in the effing garbage for all I care.

Callisto Jul 2, 2023

@ernie seems like this is the only alt site that is fully functioning

TomSeppert Jul 2, 2023

@ernie
-Discord: Locked up valuable content that used to be open and searchable on forums.

jirsch Jul 2, 2023

@ernie I highly recommend lemmy to replace Reddit.

Replic Cheegon Jul 2, 2023

@ernie Youtube is getting AD block protection, which is fine, but I still think Premium is too expensive for the things you get, this same thing I had with Twitter (but also due to that verified mark)

The Shinxposter Jul 2, 2023

@ernie YouTube is starting to block adblockers and third party apps

artnetworx Jul 2, 2023

@ernie I hope so. No choice now. Twitter app moved off to an obscure page on this smartphone; Masto moved into Twitter’s place. When Elon took over, I predicted I’d be gone in double digit days. I was close.

Aeáro, a SeaWyrm

If I'm not mistaken, the latest Twitch thing was about them not letting streamers run ad banners on their streams, because they're trying to force them to use Twitch's in-house ad stuff (which of course gives Twitch a cut of the revenue.)

But a lot of the big streamers rely on things like sponsorships to make money, and they can't get sponsors if the sponsors can't get their logos onscreen during streams.

Philipp Pixel Jul 2, 2023

@ernie you might add imgur moves away from hosting reddit porn without further notice as of a recently changed EULA.

It may be still on, but the doors are open for the big sweep.

@ernie youtube is testing out anti adblocking and potentially banning users who use adblockers

The Eye of Hindsight Jul 2, 2023

@ernie About Reddit apps: RedReader still works. They have a non-commercial license. https://www.reddit.com/r/RedReader/

RedReader • r/RedReader

RedReader is a free and open source Android app for Reddit, available on Google Play and F-Droid.

reddit

Jahleesu Jul 2, 2023

Tumblr: in the background, living their best life in a cute little trash pile while everyone thinks tumblr is dead

😂💜🌈

@ernie @SuitedUpDev What makes Mastodon work so well is the plethora of small instances. For me it works as well as Twitter did, if not more so.

famkeZ Jul 2, 2023

@ernie you missed spoutible

Christopher E. Stith Jul 2, 2023

@ernie certain instances are a little slow today. Some are experiencing scaling errors like 503 errors, and people are having to retry operations. Here at least that's a slight growing pain and not boneheaded policy.

Stefan Scholl Jul 2, 2023

@ernie Gfycat : Shuts down on September 1, deletes all content.

Kansas Grant Jul 2, 2023

@ernie To be fair, you forgot:
- Twitter: has post-quoting feature.

mirachUwU Jul 2, 2023

@ernie Twitch is rewriting the creator rules to be much worse, so people are flocking away.

@ernie I think one thing not always appreciated about Twitter v. Mastodon is that Twitter, as a centralised service, is acting in aTCP-like fashion, while Mastodon is UDP-like. Probably a bad analogy technically…but Twitter has everything in one place to ensure delivery to everyone (subject to blocks, etc.). Even without user-active blocks, mutes and filters, you can’t be *sure* Mastodon content will be seen by everyone. Federation of messages, like delivery of UDP packets, isn’t guaranteed.

N'Jobu Tupaki Jul 3, 2023

@ernie @vmstan Twitch is on and off and a lot of the content just isn't good or interesting. Bluesky is on the petri dish to cesspool pipeline just like Twitter. Youtube is really the only platform of its kind but it's also gross and weird. Mastodon is so much better. Much, much, better. I understand that this is just my opinion though.

Opalium Jul 3, 2023

@ernie This might sound wild, but... maybe you *don't* need to be a 5D-chess champion genius multi-billionaire to run a microblogging platform.

Farhan Tajuddin Jul 3, 2023

@ernie Makes you question why people still don't embrace open source solutions.