#JohnMastodon is proof that things *CAN* go viral here on Mastodon, but the key is that *YOU* are the algorithm. The reason that the John Mastodon meme showed up on other people's timelines is because so many users boosted the posts.

The lesson here is: please don't just favourite something if you really enjoyed it; BOOST it so that other people can enjoy it, too! This is the only reason why I bother to create as large a social graph as I can on Mastodon—to act as an amplifier. You can, too!❤️😉

#introduction

Hello, I'm Byron. I'm a Wall Street Journal reporter based in Washington. I write about: law and courts, national security, law enforcement, technology and cybersecurity — and often the ways in which those topics interact and intersect.

I'm also writing a book on commercial data and national security. Pub date TBD.

Outside of work, I'm an avid reader. I'm interested in urbanism and cities. I'm an aggressively amateur chess and poker player. And I like to run, hike and cycle.

Elon is running a Twitter poll to see if he should stay or go.

It's received nearly 6 million votes.
He's losing by about 15 points.

He paid 44 billion dollars for this opportunity.

Hey y'all: Given Twitter’s turbulence we want to build our platform here on Mastodon to make sure we can continue our conversations on a public social media platform.

Can you please BOOST this post and FOLLOW our account and encourage your followers to do the same? Thank you.

Ritchie