Erin KissaneJul 1, 2023

Hey masto, if you’ve been here for more than a few weeks and you really like your instance and have a minute, could you weigh in here and name it and say why you like it? We have new folks coming in and I never know where to point them for real-talk instance recs.

Would love to know whether your instance is open to new people, whether it strictly moderates abuse (racist, misogynist, anti-LGBT, disability-linked), how aggressive its defed policies are, whether it’s technically stable.

Show threadErin Kissane

FWIW I’ve found mstdn.social to be generally well (strictly) moderated against abuse, no-nonsense about yeeting dogwhistlers into space, and technically solid. I like big instances because they help with the gaps in federated UX.

We’re defederated by a few instances for various philosophical reasons, and our main admin briefly defederated from another big instance over a disagreement a few weeks back, but then went back. Overall, I’ve had a good experience with the way the instance runs.

Jul 1, 2023 at 9:33pmWeb
Show threadInnerPartisanJul 1, 2023
@kissane honest question, because i haven't posted here much yet: what about dark humor & clear sarcasm and stuff like that? just don't want to lose another social media account for jokingly calling someone a "h*nkey" 😞
Show threadErin KissaneJul 2, 2023
@InnerPartisan I think it really depends on where you are here—a lot of people are making mod calls who aren’t necessarily speaking English as a first language/being fluent in US cultural dynamics.
Show threadDavid MorrisonJul 2, 2023
@InnerPartisan @kissane I would assume you are safe as long as you are using the sarcasm font.
Show threadnoodlejetski Jul 1, 2023
@kissane the same admin manages a few other instances, namely masto.ai (which I'm registered on), and mastodon.coffee. he's overall a Decent Human Being.
Show threadStan Wonn 🏳️‍🌈 🌹Jul 1, 2023
@kissane I’m on the same instance and generally agree with your assessments. But I am going to point out that we had a recent repeat of the .art dustup because our admin defederated from a much smaller instance (Tooters.org) apparently due to a tiff with their admin. That bugs me because I think that using defederation for such reasons is unfair to other users. Why not just block the other person instead? That would seem to be a far more proportional solution.
Show threadacbJul 1, 2023
@kissane I’m still on the big mainstream instance. Am I missing anything?
Show threadJessamynJul 1, 2023
@kissane I'm on Glammr.us an instance specifically for GLAM (galleries, libraries, archives and museums) folks. They take moderation seriously and have a team but they're not super strict either. About 1000 users. Registration is by mod approval. If those people are your people I highly recommend it. I really like being on a smaller instance.
Show threadPastor of MuppetsJul 3, 2023
@jessamyn I feel like it should be GLAM! with the bang on the end
Show threadRufus J. CooterJul 2, 2023

@kissane Cosign the mstdn.social @stux endorsement!

They're on top of their stuff, issues get resolved near instantaneously, cute cat pictures, what more could you want?

Show threadRyan RandallJul 2, 2023

@kissane I'm quite happy with hcommons.social. It's open for registrations, and I'd recommend it to anyone.

The local timeline is mostly academic-ish or generally bookworm-ish, but it's a good crowd.

There haven't been any moderation shenanigans, and the admins folks involved all seem like steady hands with deep experience involving scale prior to starting a Fedi instance. I often don't see or hear anything from the more clearly abusive instances, so I assume they must do regular preemptive defederation with some of the shared blocklists.

Show threadJohn McChesney-YoungJul 2, 2023
@kissane I second the recommendation of mstdn.social for the reasons you mention and would only add that @stux, the owner, has two adorable cats and he frequently posts photos of them (not a deluge but enough to make this cat-lover happy).
Show threadRachaelJul 2, 2023

@kissane
I really like nerdculture.de

The moderation is A1 and proactive. Feel totally safe as an LGBT+ member of the community.
It's a mix of English and German speaking accounts but that's cool with me.
And I'm a nerd, so I'm at home!

https://fedidb.org/network/instance/nerdculture.de

FediDB - Fediverse Network Statistics

Fediverse Network Statistics