After two years, it's time for me to retire as an active moderator at mastodon.social. This is an amicable departure and I'll remain available to Eugen and the other moderators as a resource, but I won't be a formal part of the moderation team anymore.

Thank you all for the work you put into making mastodon.social and the Fediverse at large a good place to be.

Take care and be kind. 💚

Reposting for the day crew:

Hello, new arrivals to mastodon.social! Some thoughts:

mastodon.social is not the only Mastodon instance. Check out https://instances.social to find more niche instances.

mastodon.social has rules. Read https://mastodon.social/about/more for general guidelines.

mastodon.social is not a haven of free speech, and the admins and moderators are pretty leftist. If you're here because Facebook banned a bunch of alt-right accounts and you're Mad About Censorship,

Hello, new arrivals to mastodon.social! Some thoughts:

mastodon.social is not the only Mastodon instance. Check out https://instances.social to find more niche instances.

mastodon.social has rules. Read https://mastodon.social/about/more for general guidelines.

mastodon.social is not a haven of free speech, and the admins and moderators are pretty leftist. If you're here because Facebook banned a bunch of alt-right accounts and you're Mad About Censorship,

If you're on ANY Mastodon server:

Please make sure that the email address associated with your account is one that you check regularly. (If you need to adjust your email address, you can do so under Preferences > Account.)

A reputable Mastodon server will never sell or distribute your email address. However, we may need to contact you outside of Mastodon about your account, so it's important that your address be correct and frequently checked.

If you're on mastodon.social, please use content warnings/CWs to hide spoilers for current media content, like #GameOfThrones, #Endgame, #Gotham, etc.

This includes anything you cross-post from Twitter.

Going forward, we will be disabling account access (NOT suspending) if we see un-CWed spoilers until we have confirmation that you've received the message and will act appropriately going forward.

When you sign up for a Mastodon instance, please make sure that you actually check the email address you used to sign up.

Your server's moderators and admins will assume that the address you signed up with is a valid means of communication if they need to get in touch with you (for instance, if you've violated your server's rules).

mastodon.social users: If your reason for joining Mastodon is to post nudes and/or pornography, please start looking into other Mastodon servers to join.

We're happy to have been a sandbox where you can figure out how Mastodon works and get comfortable with it, but mastodon.social isn't really suited to large volumes of adult content.

humblr.social comes to mind as a server that might be better-suited to your content.

Thank you!

Reminder: Kiwifarms and Encyclopedia Dramatica are not reliable sources. The sites and their contributors care far, far less about the truth than they do about generating outrage, and both are linked directly to 4chan and as such are inherently suspect.

I am saying this not in response to anything in particular, just as a general PSA. Do not trust Kiwifarms and ED. They care only about increasing your fear and anger. They do not have your best interests at heart.