Why would the EU get behind W Social, a European social media platform that barely exists, rather than Mastodon, a European social media platform that has been successfully operating for a decade?

Oh, right

https://blog.elenarossini.com/w-social-uncovered-the-reality-behind-the-hype/

This is not just a European problem. Here in US civic tech, whenever I saw "actually good software made from the grassroots" go up against "crappy software with a bunch of well-connected people attached to it," the crappy software won every time
@jalefkowit nobody expects competence from an unkempt gay trans kid, they always expect it in the next BMW.