Shauna GMJan 19, 2024

My biggest complaint about mastodon these days is how easy it is to miss things in the flood of posts. A good problem to have! But has anybody solved it?

A while back I made a list of accounts that I especially wanted to see updates from, but there's no way to filter out boosts from those accounts so it's still pretty unmanageable. You can filter out boosts from your home timeline, but not a list timeline, I'm pretty sure.

Any advice?

Update: solved it (I think!) https://social.coop/@shauna/111783099957849233

Shauna GM (@[email protected])

@brecht @[email protected] Omg this is it! It's perfect! Thank you! I tried using phanpy a while back, but didn't like the boost carousel feature overall, so I went back to Elk. But that feature is exactly what I need in this use case. And using two separate front-ends eliminates the need to toggle it on and off. I'll just set phanpy 'boost carousel' to on, and bookmark this specific list, and then whenever I want *just* to catch up on the posts from people I know, I'll click the bookmark. Thank you!!

social.coop
Show threadmccJan 19, 2024

@shauna So— from a design/tech perspective, I *have* seen a solution!

Cohost (it's a Tumblr-like treehouse social network) has this cool "Following" page where rather than the usual linear feed, they list *people*. Two panes, one is everyone you follow sorted by who-posted-first, click one and see their recent posts on the right. This means if one person is posting 10x as much as everyone else, they probably get sorted to the top, but they don't take up any more *room* than anyone else.

Show threadmccJan 19, 2024
@shauna You could imagine a variant of this where instead of sorting by most-recent, it remembers whose posts you've seen and surfaces people whose most recent posts you haven't read. A big problem I think is how to keep visible the posts of people who only post once a week, where some people post several times a day. (Back on Twitter I had a list named "low hz" for exactly this purpose, curated for people I knew who made infrequent but well-considered posts… but I kept forgetting to check it.)
Show threadShauna GMJan 19, 2024

@mcc Yeah, this is a neat design.

I just wish it were easier for people to make UX innovations like this to Mastodon (or elsewhere in the fediverse) without having to dedicate weeks of their life to getting all of the other fiddly bits of setting up a server, learning AP protocol, etc. My kingdom for a fediverse app with a vibrant plugin ecosystem!

Show threadJulian Fietkau

@shauna @mcc I'm like... 75% certain I've seen someone work on a Mastodon client that looks pretty much exactly like that, but I don't remember who it was or how far along it is. I think it was brought up in a context of a conversation on what if a social media client looked more like an RSS reader. Maybe it was more of a concept.

@box464 @Damon Did either of you also see what I'm remembering, and perhaps know where to find it?

Jan 19, 2024 at 11:50amWeb
Show threadJeffJan 19, 2024

@julian @shauna @mcc @[email protected] There's a few apps I think could help. Lists are definitely the right direction!

@MonaApp is the strongest. You can filter a list all kinds of ways (exclude boosts) and it saves your preferences (per device).

@ivory can filter any feed to exclude any combination of things. You can save the filter and use it throughout the app, too. Doesn't save your preference for a list, tho.

@radiant has a quick and simple filter on all timelines as well, to show "posts only”.

Show threadJesseJan 19, 2024
@julian @shauna @mcc @box464 @[email protected] Maybe Ebou? https://github.com/terhechte/Ebou
GitHub - terhechte/Ebou: A cross platform Mastodon Client written in Rust

A cross platform Mastodon Client written in Rust. Contribute to terhechte/Ebou development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHub
Show threadJeffJan 19, 2024
@[email protected] @julian @misc @mcc @shauna This is the one I thought of as well! But..the TestFlight isn’t open anymore, and Shauna is linux/android.