"Twitter/X plans to disable the block feature, impacting both user experience and safety.”

"There's this alternative called Mastod-"

"And it’s beholden to one vain, insecure, capricious man obsessed with fighting Zuck."

"There's this federated option Mast-"

"Not to mention it refuses to suspend pro-Hitler accounts and unsuspends CSAM accounts because it’s lucrative."

"The non-profit Ma-"

"Welp, nothing to be done about Twitter/X I suppose, might as well stick it out on this hellhole."

@MissingThePt people really don't have any principles.
@FortunateFool @MissingThePt 100%, and it sickens me how many people still regularly post to twitter
@MissingThePt "But I'd have to choose a server and actively look for interesting content! That's too much effort, I just want my outrage delivered to me automagically!"

@ticho @MissingThePt to be fair, I'm new(-ish) to this site, and the lack of an algorithm to help me find new people to follow is quite difficult.

..especially since the default for this site seems to be politics, a thing I actively despise.

any suggestions?

@ticho @MissingThePt @IamDohnut have you searched for and followed hashtags? That’s how I started filling up my timeline

@IamDohnut @ticho @MissingThePt generally follow hashtags. Take an
few minutes, search for related hashtags, and follow the tags themselves.

Then follow people that use the tags over time as you find if they might be interesting.

@hlfshell @IamDohnut @ticho @MissingThePt Yeah, I generally agree. Following a hashtag itself can be a bit chaotic, but if you use it to find people you like, it’s quite useful.
@Ferrichrome Hashtags might work, but IDK how to follow them except for actively searching for them. any suggestions?

@IamDohnut @MissingThePt There are no "defaults for this site" - you could set up your follows/blocks/mutes/filters in a way you will rarely see anything political in your Home timeline.

You decide what you get out of it. :)

@ticho even the news and explore tabs? that's filled with depressing stuff .w.

@IamDohnut Afaik, the explore tabs show what’s popular on your instance, choosing an instance that is focused on something you are interested in (art, tech, gaming, etc.) will change what you see on those tabs.

Also, you can follow hashtags on here so follow some tags of the topics you are interested in to find posts that you might like 

@IamDohnut

Make an intro post with a bunch of your relevant hashtags and people will boost it around relevant communities organically.

Honestly like @ticho said I too almost never see politics. That's partly due to some filters I added but mostly I just see tons of relevant retro tech, FOSS and linux stuff and it's basically my entire home timeline at this point.

Once you follow some topics and people you like, that's basically all you'll end up seeing anymore (in my experience).

@IamDohnut

Also follow my friend @Em0nM4stodon who is basically a legend here and check out her profile for lots of wonderful getting started tips

She's spent a lot of time writing some absolutely wonderful, easy to understand and follow material about using Mastodon

Convenient compilation thread here:

https://mastodon.online/@Em0nM4stodon@infosec.exchange/109323504552814966

Em :official_verified: (@[email protected])

If you are new here, I've compiled this list of posts I wrote with tips for newcomers. I hope these can be helpful to you! Welcome! 🐘✨ Profile Page 👤 https://infosec.exchange/@Em0nM4stodon/109316634420493334 Mastodon Features :mastodon: ​ https://infosec.exchange/@Em0nM4stodon/109287715784844066 Content Warnings ⚠️ https://infosec.exchange/@Em0nM4stodon/109282181601490676 Alt-Text 📝 https://infosec.exchange/@Em0nM4stodon/109323425237412179 Filters 🚫 https://infosec.exchange/@Em0nM4stodon/109323462169819778 Lists 🗂 https://infosec.exchange/@Em0nM4stodon/109265634017886918 Culture :ablobsmile:​ https://infosec.exchange/@Em0nM4stodon/109299435630063038 Fediverse :geodesic:​ https://infosec.exchange/@Em0nM4stodon/109293952488692993 Questions ❓ https://infosec.exchange/@Em0nM4stodon/109305965618704182 More Resources 👇 ‣ Browse this hashtag to see more of my tips: #TinyMastodonTip ‣ Browse this hashtag to see more Mastodon and Fediverse tips: #FediTips ‣ Follow this great account for regular Mastodon tips in your timeline: @[email protected]

Infosec Exchange
@IamDohnut follows don't help with those but mutes and blocks do
@IamDohnut I have found the hashtag searching thing! it is working well, thank you!
@IamDohnut what are you interested in? Mastodon is basically a giant hashtag search engine. #bloomscrolling #photography #chemistry #books
Just search then add people
@HiwayRobyn I've found a tonne of useful hashtags anyway, so it's pretty full of what I enjoy. I just wish I could drag my twitter feed to here, y'know?
@IamDohnut yeah, I remember when I joined, it was the same way, but it should be filling up quickly and none of it are science denying sewer mouthed nutjobs! 😆
@HiwayRobyn my explore feed is still full of cringe-ass nae nae motherfucker politics bullshit, but oh well, my feed isn't, so there's that!
@IamDohnut you can turn it off or on!
@HiwayRobyn pls explain how ;w;
@IamDohnut. Well I mean that if you like only look in the hashtags you don't see it, so you can effectively turn it off, then go to the "world" icon and turn it on. It'd so weird, when I look, in the world, because it's usually late at night Pacific time, I get most exclusively Japanese anime and anime porn. I have almost never seen politics. But Japanese anime porn is not my thing either so I have to go back to hashtag scrolling

@IamDohnut @ticho @MissingThePt Try searching by hashtag on the subjects you like. One can even follow hashtags, in most servers!

Also, go to the profiles of people you find interesting, and check out their follows and followers.

If all else fails, take a walk on the local or global timelines: scroll down until some post catches your fancy.

@jcastroarnaud the.. local timelines? wussat?
@IamDohnut Here's a screenshot of mastodon.online, on my mobile browser. To find it in your server, click in the globe icon at the sidebar on the right. There are options for the local #timeline (all public posts within your server) and global timeline (all public posts of all servers, that someone in your server knows).
@IamDohnut @ticho @MissingThePt Welcome! The good thing is Mastodon is not like Twitter, so we don’t have the same kind and level of trolling and nastiness- the moderation process tends to quickly suppress it here vs. at for profit social media that wants to inflame to engage eyeballs longer and sell more ads. The bad thing is you have to learn a somewhat new way of thinking and finding what interests you - some combination of hashtags and follows.
@amart oh fair enough! yea this site seems to be a mix of spacehey's confusing non-algorithm layout and twitter's whole build.

@IamDohnut @ticho @MissingThePt A few tips I can offer, from my own experiences:
1. Browse hashtags, and follow ones you're more interested in; you'll gradually find people who post often about stuff you're interested in. If you use the Advanced Web Interface (which works like TweetDeck, from what I understand), you can even have a separate column for each hashtag. EDIT: There's also hashtag blocking features; I've never used them but I know they exist.
2. You can find lists of people to follow on these sites: https://fedi.directory/ and https://communitywiki.org/trunk
3. You're not stuck browsing only your own local feed! Check out other Mastodon instances (a.k.a. servers) and check their local feeds. Maybe check out some that are themed on topics you're interested in. If you wanna reply/fave/boost anything there, just copy the link to the post (it's on the timestamp) and put it in the search bar of your home instance.
4. Thinking a bit further, if you find another server you really vibe with, you can also try to join it. It's okay to start off on the flagship server; now you can proudly reference this account when you request to join another server! :D

Let me know if you want sites that can give you lists of servers to seatch/filter through.

Fedi.Directory – Interesting accounts on Mastodon & the Fediverse

Interesting accounts to follow on Mastodon and the Fediverse

@MissingThePt It’s like he keeps taunting people to quit. Will anything be horrible enough to break it? It’s like a movie plot where the bigwigs set up an experiment and bet on how the minions adapt.
@MissingThePt That's actually right on point 
@MissingThePt you must be referring to the elite journalists who are so elite they lost all their actual journalism skills and need to remain with the fascists because their million bot followers make them feel important and smart. Makes me think they are not that good at journalism tbh.
@MissingThePt ironically most people are talking about threads and blue sky
Blue sky is still invite only and threads is spyware with the info it asks from you 😭
@MissingThePt Journalists are celebrity hounds, so they won’t leave that cesspit.
@MissingThePt maybe if people on mastodon stopped whining constantly about twitter, this would be more appealing to more people.

@billyok @MissingThePt

Except that I don't believe that those "journalists" and "celebrities" on Twitter know anything about the discussions on Mastodon.

@ThusSpakeMe @MissingThePt yeah, maybe not. But I came over here with the intention of it being my primary social network and now I check in maybe once every 2-3 weeks, see that most of the popular posts are still about Twitter/Mastodon itself, and leave.

Those folks follow the crowd, and if the crowd doesn’t like this place long enough to stick around, maybe those who do like it should talk about something else for once. It’s been 10 months of the same thing.

@ThusSpakeMe @MissingThePt @billyok Twitter is in the news a lot, so I don’t think it’s weird people here and elsewhere are talking about it, but I get that you don’t want to marinate in it. Have you followed hashtags for stuff that *does* interest you, and followed accounts that post the stuff you do want to see? It’s not too hard to fill up your timeline with topics you’re actually interested in.
@Sadsquatch @ThusSpakeMe @MissingThePt Right, but I’ve already found places for my interests, from RSS to Discord and so on. I expressly want a social network where I don’t have to build silos to enjoy and can just see what people are talking about while I talk to my friends and their friends. I found that on BlueSky, but I spent months hoping this place would be that.
@MissingThePt people on Bluesky are complaining that Jack Dorsey said the same thing. It's almost like all the billionaires are in cohoots, and the choice is an illusion or something...
@iagox86 @MissingThePt Jack Dorsey does not run BlueSky, nor does he have any ownership stake in it anymore.
@MissingThePt Would you be OK if I put a screenshot of your post on Twitter? No worries if not.
@MissingThePt but how can I comfortably talk about stuff without some billionaire making money off of me? 🤑 💰 🔥
@MissingThePt The people who continue to remain there deserve their faith. They cannot be saved nor should they, I'm sorry.
@MissingThePt there are a number of lefty youtubers I follow , they make videos ranting about twitter and then during end video they would ask to follow them on twitter , I suggested mastodon on comments but them too busy to notice i guess !
@MissingThePt I don't follow a lot of people (~120) on Twitter-X, but I know over 80% aren't on Mastodon. A few are on Facebook, but for most Twitter is it, and comparatively Twitter is far easier to find people or discover new people than Mastodon. I enjoy Mastodon, and Twitter is turning into landfill, but I only recommend Mastodon with reservations. Twitter is still my mainstay.
@MissingThePt It's tempting to get out of there, but surrendering the battlefield looks scary to me. But obviously we need alternatives.
@MissingThePt
I don't understand it. It's a sewer and yet, people stay.
@MissingThePt Cut to a shot of a parakeet screaming bloody murder to get back in its cage.
@MissingThePt Then iOS will remove X from the App Store as it requires block. (Correction: This info has been debunked.)
@MissingThePt It's interesting to think there are nazis, other facists, and all sorts of other folks talking to eachother on the fediverse, we just don't federate with them. It works well enough for me, though.
@MissingThePt MasTOdOn is ToO CompLIcaTEd

@MissingThePt

About all those people who just won’t switch no matter what Trump— er… Twitter does:

Why the constant obsession with them? Why do people care?

@MissingThePt Anyone who stays there at this point is basically complicit. Communities have had PLENTY of time to move to an alternative at this point. There’s really no excuse. If you can’t get people to follow you elsewhere, you really have to question why they wouldn’t want to leave a nazi platform or why they keep giving you excuses at to why they “can’t” leave it