@ChrisMayLA6 I’ve seen it noted that the civility follows the “social contract” formulation of tolerance.

E.g. people join, feel “safe” enough to start making transphobic comments, refuse to listen to polite responses and requests to please not, and then get chased out of the fediverse screaming “so much for the tolerant left!”.

I feel this is not an ideal solution, but I’m not sure how else it could go while still maintaining said social contract.

Of course, they are always welcome to create their own shard of the fediverse. That’s the whole point of the fediverse.

@ChrisMayLA6 I concur wholeheartedly with both points you made, Chris.

The worst thing I can say about my time on Mastodon is that I've been called an idiot twice in 3 years.

Insults and foul language directed at me were a daily occurrence on Twitter.

@ChrisMayLA6 I like all the features that enable my home feed to be as tailored to my wishes as possible.

I think Alt Text and CW use are wonderful plus points of mastodon.

@ChrisMayLA6 I’d agree, although it’s also possible we’re not in a group that attracts abusive types. Mastodon structure means we don’t always see all the replies other people get, hopefully that will change.

This could be an effect of non-algorithmic networks not sending up troll flares to attract trolls, damping aggression rather than actively generating conflict and maximising it.
Similarly, it may just be too hard for paid interests to widely penetrate a damp system.

@ChrisMayLA6 These two features are fantastic - but there's another that is an order of magnitude more important - and enormously more satisfying!

And that is that the messages in my feed arrive raw and unfiltered from the people I follow in the order that they write them.

No algorithm.
No manipulation of what I see.
No idiot box in my pocket.

Nirvana!

@ChrisMayLA6

People on the Fediverse are simply nice, in general, I find.

I'm fortunate to be on a good instance though, who I'm sure do a good job of keeping the forces of darkness away.

I genuinely feel fortunate to have this polite, inclusive corner of the internet as I do, as I'm otherwise quite socially isolated.

I'm sure many people here spent time on bulletin boards back in the day, and the civil vibe on here feels not dissimilar to the assorted forums I used to frequent in the 90s.

@ChrisMayLA6

You are so spot on with this indeed…

And both are in fact about quality in discussion, thinking a layer deeper beyond the surface. Beyond the moment…

And as a third I would say the absence of algorithms, the fact that you seed it yourself by following people and those following you.

@ChrisMayLA6 I thought editing posts was a "nice to have" feature, until I tried Bluesky. Now I realize how *crucial* it is.

If not just for fixing silly typos, it's especially important for fixing the alt text if I make a mistake or omit an important detail.

So in a way, it's an accessibility feature.

@ChrisMayLA6

also ...

no algorithm tricking you into seeing posts that the algorithm wants you to see.

vanity seekers hate mastodon because your followers are real and it's harder to make the follower count number be artificially high.

@ChrisMayLA6 oh yeah?! Well a good day to you too sir!

I said good day!

@ChrisMayLA6 As a protocols geek, I spent some of my early time with Mastodon reading the protocols. I found the general resemblance to email disheartening. Not because email "doesn't work", but because its very openness lead to the toxic landfill called spam. Email, for many, is effectively dead.

So, while I am deeply enjoying Mastodon, my fear is we get the next round of the Eternal September and it's all over.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September

@ChrisMayLA6 the editing feature is a godsend. Wish other services had it like this.

And I suspect the audience here is a lot more mature/technical than on Twitter/Threads/Bluesky, so we get less trolls and attack posts as a result of that.

@ChrisMayLA6 There is literally no cookie handed out by an algorithm for being uncivil; on the other hand, there are some, if not completely consistent, penalties handed out by users to users who are not civil.

Now the commercial social media that is in the eyeball economy, who needs to optimize engagement?

Let me summarize: A/B testing suggests that quarreling users stay engaged.

@ChrisMayLA6

I think it's worth considering what real life is like. Generally you find like minded people to engage with & when you come across dissimilar people, it's not going to be in a hostile place. E.g. If you're a lefty you won't frequent pubs where fascists hang out. Mastodon makes it easy to curate a feed similar your social circle so there's likely to be less conflict

Other social media is the opposite - algorithms selecting provocative material for engagement which leads to conflict

@ChrisMayLA6 the ability to edit is a big deal! Because edit notifications propagate, it lets us issue corrections that will spread somewhat.

This makes it MUCH easier to counter misinformation, retractions, and corrections, since we can push correction notifications to every booster!

@ChrisMayLA6 agreed.

Civility tends to be good.

I have had some less civil people. A handful. And while others seem intent on calling on moderators, we have our own agency.

Muting. Blocking.

And I have muted and blocked some. I rarely involve a moderator unless it's about scams or something along those lines.

And the editing...

It's 'goid'. (One of my biggest typos). 🤣