You might have seen somebody using the proverb Vox Populi, Vox Dei. What was missing was the context in which it was used:

Nec audiendi qui solent dicere, Vox populi, vox Dei, quum tumultuositas vulgi semper insaniae proxima sit.

In case you do not speak Latin, it means in English:

And those people should not be listened to who keep saying the voice of the people is the voice of God since the riotousness of the crowd is always very close to madness.

Here's your irregular reminder that:

Twitter was a multi-billion dollar company with thousands of employees.

Mastodon is a niche hobbyist product run by volunteers

The fact that we're being seen as a viable alternative to them is an admission that a federated, decentralized future is not only possible, but desirable.

Mastodon is not one thing, or one place. It's a network of many things and many places. We don't have a spokesperson (I mean, there's me. I'm the official spokesperson for 💯 of the fediverse, but beyond me there is no spokesperson) we don't have consensus on moderation or blocking or tools or what is good and what is bad. Some of us are professional SREs and Sysadmins, some of us aren't. Some of our instances have been around for 5+ years, some won't be here in six months.

And that's good! All of it, every last bit of it is good.

We're wrestling power away from the billionaire class, in real time, and reclaiming it for the People.