Mastodon Continues to Grow - But Still .27% the Size of Twitter (cnn.com)
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By Tuesday morning Mastodon had gained 123,562 new users since October 27 (the site told TechCrunch) and had 528,607 active users. But by Saturday the number of new users had nearly doubled, to 230,000, reports CNN — with 655,000 active users.
In fact, for every 363 active users on Twitter, there's now one on Mastodon, CNN's figures suggest (since Twitter has nearly "238 million daily active monetizable users"). Exploring the recent spike, they note that Mastodon "has a similar look to Twitter, with a timeline of short updates sorted chronologically rather than algorithmically. It lets users join a slew of different servers run by various groups and individuals, rather than one central platform controlled by a single company like Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook." Unlike larger social networks, Mastodon is both free to use and free of ads. It's operated by a nonprofit run by Mastodon creator Eugen Rochko, and is supported via crowdfunding... "It is not as large as Twitter, obviously, but it is the biggest that this network has ever been," said Rochko, who originally created Mastodon as more of a project than a consumer product (and, yes, its name was inspired by the heavy metal band Mastodon)....
A lot of Mastodon's features and layout (particularly in its iOS app) will look and feel familiar to current Twitter users, though with some slightly different verbiage; you can follow others, create short posts (there's a 500 character limit, and you can upload images and videos), favorite or repost other users' posts, and so on.... There are some key differences, particularly in how the network is set up. Because Mastodon users' accounts are hosted on a slew of different servers, the costs of hosting users is spread among many different people and groups. But that also means users are spread out all over the place, and people you know can be hard to find.
CNN also notes the problem with signing up for a Mastodon server: "some of which are open to anyone, some of which require an invitation (you can also run your own server). There is a server operated by the nonprofit behind Mastodon, Mastodon.social, but it's not accepting more users."
In fact, for every 363 active users on Twitter, there's now one on Mastodon, CNN's figures suggest (since Twitter has nearly "238 million daily active monetizable users"). Exploring the recent spike, they note that Mastodon "has a similar look to Twitter, with a timeline of short updates sorted chronologically rather than algorithmically. It lets users join a slew of different servers run by various groups and individuals, rather than one central platform controlled by a single company like Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook." Unlike larger social networks, Mastodon is both free to use and free of ads. It's operated by a nonprofit run by Mastodon creator Eugen Rochko, and is supported via crowdfunding... "It is not as large as Twitter, obviously, but it is the biggest that this network has ever been," said Rochko, who originally created Mastodon as more of a project than a consumer product (and, yes, its name was inspired by the heavy metal band Mastodon)....
A lot of Mastodon's features and layout (particularly in its iOS app) will look and feel familiar to current Twitter users, though with some slightly different verbiage; you can follow others, create short posts (there's a 500 character limit, and you can upload images and videos), favorite or repost other users' posts, and so on.... There are some key differences, particularly in how the network is set up. Because Mastodon users' accounts are hosted on a slew of different servers, the costs of hosting users is spread among many different people and groups. But that also means users are spread out all over the place, and people you know can be hard to find.
CNN also notes the problem with signing up for a Mastodon server: "some of which are open to anyone, some of which require an invitation (you can also run your own server). There is a server operated by the nonprofit behind Mastodon, Mastodon.social, but it's not accepting more users."
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
I've seen this movie before (Score:5, Insightful)
What is clear is that the number of people on "Mastodon/Fediverse/ActivityPub", and on other alternatives like counter.social, has jumped significantly over the last few days
While clear does it mean anything?
Because I saw this before. Not sure how many remember, but back when FOSTA-SESTA, anyone who posted anything remotely sexual was trying to jump off U.S. services (including Twitter) with a large number of them jumping over to Mastadon...
But then... they had to actually use Mastadon. And if you've ever tried to use Mastadon, it kind of sucks. especially compared to Twitter.
So what happens is yes, the numbers jump, but by two weeks from now most of those people will be back on Twitter.
Especially when word gets out that Twitter has hardly even impacted moderation at all [twitter.com] - since that's what the people leaving seem concerned about.
In my own use of Twitter, I have seen zero moderation changes evident.
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I'm on Twitter mainly to follow sports news - not to interact with friends (who generally aren't on Twitter). A lot of other people use Twitter to follow breaking news. Until / unless reporters and other news folks start jumping to Mastodon, it seems likely to stay a niche player - basically yet another descendant to IRC or Jabber.
Yes great for breaking news (Score:2)
Until / unless reporters and other news folks start jumping to Mastodon
Even if they did where would you go to follow them? I like the decentralized nature of Mastodon but it also prevents real use like that.
As you say on Twitter you can get news from all around the world... it's pretty invaluable.
I also have a few different accounts for specialized following like you, if you just treat it as a subject based news feed with a personal take it's pretty fantastic and that has not changed. Really not sure that
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Quite a few accounts have been banned for insulting or mocking Elon Musk.
The problem with Mastodon is that while you can follow people from any server, the timeline only includes posts from the server you are on and any it federated with.
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Quite a few accounts have been banned for insulting or mocking Elon Musk.
No, no. He's all about free speech. Trust me, dude.
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As a follow up, the "free speech" guy is throwing tantrums [imgur.com] left and right at anyone who dares question his mental stability.
Re: I've seen this movie before (Score:2)
Is there a source on his account being restricted? From what I see it's protected by the owner.
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Is there a source on his account being restricted? From what I see it's protected by the owner.
I'm only posting what I'm seeing. Perhaps the poster was mistaken.
That said, I have seen similar things posted where someone makes a comment about Musk and their account mysteriously is locked. For example, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's notifications were mysteriously turned off [thehill.com] after she called out Musk for saying people needed to pay $8/month.
It wouldn't be out of the question for that pedo guy to do such a thing.
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I thought the $8.00/Mo was for maintaining the blue check, which must be really aggravating to people who paid up to $15,000 under the table to corrupt Twitter employees to get verified.
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Or for getting one with no verification process to speak of, because that would cost money and musk already fired those guys
Re: I've seen this movie before (Score:2)
It's all a bit anecdotal. My notifications have been odd, only refreshing after I've loaded a few pages.
Re: I've seen this movie before (Score:2)
Would you have some sources for that? It'd be good to expose the hypocrisy.
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And if you've ever tried to use Mastadon, it kind of sucks. especially compared to Twitter.
yup, hamstrung by their own idealism
Some people just want to log in, see what's trending, see what lady gaga had for lunch, troll a few people who disagree with them, and log out.
I want an app where I can do that, and I'll even take the indignity of an add or two, just don't violate my "no Elon musk" policy.
The mastodon experience is just too disjointed and isolating.
Counter.social has promise, but they should probably ease up on the whole "no algorithm" "no trends" things.
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Just wish it could have been done without destroying so many livelihoods in the process. And I can think of better uses for the money.
I've have more sympathy if their livelihoods weren't tied to working at a parasitical company like Twitter - an entity whose very existence damages other people's lives.
Lie down with dogs . . .
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They lie down with rats, and rats run away!
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Here on Slashdot it hasn't been that uncommon for people (at least pretend) to harbor "the sky is falling"-kinds ideation for the case one of the major social media platforms would crumble. While others thought that the vacuum left would be relatively quickly filled by competitors.
But of course it's not certain whether twitter will go down the drain.
Advertisers may not like the idea of having to advertise on platform that are fractured into individual communities. Even
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The closest thing to social media that I use is Discord, where you also have your smaller more oversee-able, individual special interest communities with local rules and moderation. Then the next closest thing would be in fact Slashdot.
I prefer it that way, so by that logic Mastodon would feel be preferred.
But I know very well that I'm no gold standard in any kind of way. If I was, we wouldn't have the likes of facebook and twitter in the first place. I know that preferences of the maj
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That's the main difference between Twitter & Mastodon. Mastodon don't need no stinkin' advertising to stay afloat. Also, it isn't beholden to shareholders who want their RoI & are constantly calling for ways to increase it no matter the consequences. I'd call that an advantage rather than a disadvantage.
At the end of the day, somebody has to pay for the servers and bandwidth and that takes money.
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Yeah, but how long can that last? A donations model is inherently unstable, it probably works well with a small loyal user base but as the user base gets larger and the resource requirements go up the instability increases exponentially. Put simply, if you only have a few hundred/thousand active users you can run it off of a single server in someones basement/well located business, as such it has little overhead. If you've got millions of active users you need data center(s) which require constant and si
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Re: fundraising, there are already multiple funding models in common use that could support Mastodo
Re: Kinda... (Score:2)
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The advantages to Mastodon are pretty good for me; I like no advertising, promoted tweets, "suggestions", etc.. & I like that my feed is simply chronological. I follow a pretty narrow band of like-minded professionals in my field so it's a work thing for me.
For o
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Just wish it could have been done without destroying so many livelihoods in the process. And I can think of better uses for the money.
Apparently a number of people who were told they were fired are now being begged to come back. [imgur.com]
Personally, if a company fired me in the way he did, I'd tell them to fuck off. It's clear how toxic the place will be. The only ones he'll be getting back are either the desperate or the stupid.
Also, here is the current list [imgur.com] of known companies who have stopped buying ads (for the
Who? (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't use this crap.
To me it seems its nothing but a direct line to your brain with crappy information bought by everyone that isn't wholesome in any way.
I'm always curious about the people, other than every marketing company on the planet, that feel they need Twitter for anything relevant to their lives.
--
A secret talent or hobby... Hmm... I weirdly collect shot glasses. - Austin Mahone
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Pretty sure I know that guy.
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Touche.
But in all reality. I definitely don't know who Elon Musk is. Probably because I don't use Twitter.
--
I refuse to join any club that would have me as a member. - Groucho Marx
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I don't use this crap.
I've always felt that if you have something to say that you can say in 140 characters (or 280), then you have nothing to say.
Re: Who? (Score:2)
I've always felt that if you have something to say that you can say in 140 characters (or 280), then you have nothing to say
I didn't have time to write a short reply so I'm outlining my thoughts in this longer one.
In humans, meaning can be expressed vocally, that is by emanations of the mouth, and these vocalisations have led to the development of written languages.
In writing, syllables are represented by one or more letters from an alphabet of around two to several dozen glyphs.
Now, imagine if the lan
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I've always felt that if you have something to say that you can say in 140 characters (or 280), then you have nothing to say.
Someone sound the Irony Alert!
Re: Who? (Score:2)
So what I get from this is: (Score:3)
No competition right now for Twitter?
Why is there no competition for Twitter?
Well, I suppose a startup would have to hemorrhage money like crazy.
I am surprised there isn't something better* than Mastodon for people to use as an alternative**.
*I'm not really trashing Mastodon, I'm sure it's good for a smaller scale, but there's no global network/server for it, so it's not really a replacement for Twitter.
**I hated Twitter, mostly because it's 90% PR people it seems. I have no personal use for it nor Mastodon, but certainly lots of folks do.
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Elephant in room (Score:2)
outside of the smaller number of people on the network right now I've yet to come across any disadvantages.
Other than that how did you like the play Mrs. Lincoln?
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Don't you only get messages from just the people on the same shard as you?
The official social shard isn't accepting any more users. Twitter is a global, unified platform, and you can still sign up for it. Mastodon is apparently not a unified platform. I don't see how it fills the same niche as Twitter. Yes, it shares messages, but not globally available to everyone.
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No, the shard you're on is invisible to you in practical use.
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Law of Large Numbers (Score:1)
Why is there no competition for Twitter?
Here's my theory - because Twitter has ossified the interface for years now, but that ALSO means that unlike Facebook and other social media, it has not yet made the interface so bad they start really driving people to use something else.
Once you really have the network effect going for you as a service you have a lot of momentum that can keep carrying you forward almost forever, you just have to not mess it up...
So, will be really interesting to see If Musk can chan
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I'm not trashing email, I'm sure it's good for a smaller scale but there's no global network/server for it.
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No competition right now for Twitter?
Why is there no competition for Twitter?
Well, I suppose a startup would have to hemorrhage money like crazy.
I am surprised there isn't something better* than Mastodon for people to use as an alternative**.
*I'm not really trashing Mastodon, I'm sure it's good for a smaller scale, but there's no global network/server for it, so it's not really a replacement for Twitter.
**I hated Twitter, mostly because it's 90% PR people it seems. I have no personal use for it nor Mastodon, but certainly lots of folks do.
Previously, there were three fixable issues with Twitter:
1) It was centralized, and people are rightly nervous when a single entity controls everything.
2) There was a lot of spam and harassment.
3) People would get moderated & banned.
While Mastodon could solve #1 it was hard to solve #2 without making #3 worse, and vice versa. So just like people love to complain about taxes being too high and spending being too low it's really hard to do better. So even though no one liked the balance Twitter found betw
some service struggles to get users (Score:3)
some random service struggles to get users.
cnn also says so.
fuck me if i know what's newsworthy here ...
(slashdot, we need to talk about your whoring habits)
I don't think Mastodon is what's going to take off (Score:1)
I could be wrong but firing half your employees including the teams that created the infrastructure that made yo
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Why would people leave a place where everyone they want to communicate with already has active accounts and go be the first folks at some new empty ghost town screaming into the quiet night?
Oh because Musk?
No. Very few people are that psycho. Just like every four years half of Hollywood says they'll leave the country forever if the Republican wins and only a handful ever have.
It's all virtue signal noise.
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Did you warn Mark Zuckerberg when he was in college about the impossibility of getting people to abandon MySpace for Facebook?? This is sorta the equivalent situation.
Smartguy. The abandonment of Twitter isn't driven by an effort to spite Musk. No. The user base is seriously concerned that Musk has dism
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The user base is seriously concerned that Musk has dismantled the mechanisms that created some semblance of civility in the site. Same reason the advertisers are stepping back.
That and maybe Musk threatening that "thermonuclear name & shame" is coming to companies that have paused their advertising [yahoo.com].
Advertisers love to do ad spends on a platform where the CEO threatens to vilify them if they modify their ad buy. Nothing crazy or unhinged about that. Just nowhere else they could spend their money. Nuh-uh.
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Those companies usually loudly virtue signal their ad spend / cuts. What are you talking about?
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That and maybe Musk threatening that "thermonuclear name & shame" is coming to companies that have paused their advertising [yahoo.com].
That is pretty insane. I'm not even 100% sure that doesn't approach a form of racketeering under the circumstances. . It certainly does not seem like good business. Musk does seem to have this whole thing lately where he whines like an overgrown baby when people call him out on the things he says or does(or the contracts he makes).
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That is pretty insane. I'm not even 100% sure that doesn't approach a form of racketeering under the circumstances. . It certainly does not seem like good business. Musk does seem to have this whole thing lately where he whines like an overgrown baby when people call him out on the things he says or does(or the contracts he makes).
It is nuts. I work with our sales & marketing teams so I know people responsible for ad purchasing, and there's no way we want to be associated with a service that even contemplate "name & shaming" over ad buy decisions. What a joke.
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He certainly does seem to jump to grandiose statements and gestures and dramatic stunts before trying basic things like actually talking to people. Details are still fuzzy, but news reports do seem to be saying that he cut off Starlink access earlier to some Ukranian terminals earlier this month over payment. Considering the situation in Ukraine and the fact that payment for that was virtually guaranteed somehow even if delayed, it does sound a lot like people probably died unnecessarily just so he could ma
Re: I don't think Mastodon is what's going to take (Score:2)
Another controversially wealthy and famous person said (allegedly) that "success is a poor teacher".
I may be paraphrasing, and of course, that is attributed to Bill Gates.
popcorn time!
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MySpace was fucking broken. It often took minutes to fully load a page. It was begging to die.
I stopped reading the moment you went ad hominem. You had nothing to say after that.
Re:I don't think Mastodon is what's going to take (Score:5, Interesting)
The advertisers are stepping back because the loud groups that have had influence to pressure Twitter to censor things they disagreed with have no leverage over Musk, so they're now pressuring the advertisers. This is the issue that's really a 'threat to Democracy' -- loud, outspoken activist groups that are able to shut down discourse over threats of calling people (or corporations) 'racist' with no basis in reality (other than changing the definition or 'racist'). Democracy dies when we allow a group of one viewpoint to bully anyone with opposing views in to silence. And yet those screaming 'Facist!', 'Authoritarian', 'Dictator', 'End of Democracy' are the only ones that seem to want censorship with the excuse that words put people at risk. Well, that's exactly what China has been doing for decades. Do we really want to model our political and personal freedoms on the CCP?
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The advertisers are stepping back because the loud groups that have had influence to pressure Twitter to censor things they disagreed with have no leverage over Musk, so they're now pressuring the advertisers.
Advertisers are pulling back because they don't want their brands to show up next to cool messages such as "going death con 3 On JEWISH PEOPLE".
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you have it the wrong around (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:I don't think Mastodon is what's going to take (Score:5, Insightful)
The advertisers are stepping back because the loud groups that have had influence to pressure Twitter to censor things they disagreed with have no leverage over Musk, so they're now pressuring the advertisers.
Advertisers are mostly stepping back because Musk is developing a partisan, somewhat toxic, political reputation, and giving that reputation to Twitter. The whole point of advertising is creating a positive impression of your brand and brands don't want to be associated with Musk.
This is the issue that's really a 'threat to Democracy' -- loud, outspoken activist groups that are able to shut down discourse over threats of calling people (or corporations) 'racist' with no basis in reality (other than changing the definition or 'racist'). Democracy dies when we allow a group of one viewpoint to bully anyone with opposing views in to silence. And yet those screaming 'Facist!', 'Authoritarian', 'Dictator', 'End of Democracy' are the only ones that seem to want censorship with the excuse that words put people at risk.
The foundation of Democracy is loud, outspoken activist groups being able to get their message out. Including the message "this business entity is doing something wrong and should be held accountable".
You can go overboard of course, and it's up to society to determine when a boycott or protest is justified.
The point of free speech isn't being able to say whatever you want without consequence, if there's no consequence then there's no critique and the public dialogue becomes polluted with nonsense.
The point of free speech is that it's people, and not the government, who determine those consequences. That keeps the consequences bearable (since people don't have the power of the government) and still allows for the peaceful transfer of power.
Well, that's exactly what China has been doing for decades. Do we really want to model our political and personal freedoms on the CCP?
The difference between western activist group pressure and the tactics used by China, Russia, and to a lesser extent Hungary (DeSantis's template) is that the activist groups are being directed by the government for the benefit of those in power.
That "by the government" part is bolded because in the context of free speech the government getting involved is really, really, really important!
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Why would everyone leave Livejournal for Friendster?
Why would everyone leave Friendster for tribe.net?
Why would everyone leave Tribe for Myspace?
Why would everyone leave Myspace for Facebook?
Why are teenagers already leaving Facebook for TikTok?
There's nothing inherently necessary about any social media platform. The only significant stickiness is how cool it is perceived as being. And when the new hotness comes along... well, I'm sure we all remember how Myspace went from "New York, London, and Tokyo com
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Because all those earlier systems were shit and didn't have most of the planet's potential users on them.
MySpace was so broken it often took minutes to fully load a page.
That's why.
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Maybe it took minutes to fully load a page on your computer.
Re: I don't think Mastodon is what's going to take (Score:2)
Re: I don't think Mastodon is what's going to take (Score:1)
Problem with theory (Score:2)
Instead I think what's going to happen is the engineers musk is in the process of firing will go off and do a startup and somebody will throw some cash their way.
Where that breaks down is that a lot of the people laid off were those hardly coding anything (this is pretty obvious if you think about it as it's the only metric they could have realistically checked in the short time frame before they started firing people), so how are a bunch of slackers that have not really worked in years going to build a who
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Decentralization is its USP and curse as well. (Score:2)
I am not sure how Mastodon will be able to scale to the same level as Twitter. It depends on generous benefactors running their own server and letting others register. This will inevitably lead to fragmentation.
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This will inevitably lead to fragmentation.
It already did.
When Gab switched to a Mastodon software base, it was briefly integrated with the rest of the fediverse, until a number of major server operators and client apps actively blocked the Gab servers. Eventually the Mastodon connectivity was so little used that Gab stopped maintaining it.
For a decentralized platform seeking to become a standard, this kind of behaviour is poison. It is like a Google refusing to accept email sourced from Microsoft-hosted domains because they don't like some politica
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This is the point!
The Mastodon ecosystem proved itself unreliable as infrastructure. In Twitter or Facebook, I only need to worry about one group of moderators gone mad and silence my account or posts. In Mastodon, I need to worry multiple groups of moderators. It is not enough to setup my account on a host that is tolerant to my political standpoint. If your friend choose a host that is highly intolerant unknowingly, then online social life between you and your friend can be chopped off in any time. And
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For a decentralized platform seeking to become a standard, this kind of behaviour is poison. It is like a Google refusing to accept email sourced from Microsoft-hosted domains because they don't like some political position Microsoft held, or Microsoft patching Outlook to refuse to connect to Yahoo mail accounts because Yahoo didn't align with Microsoft. It undermines the point of an open, distributed architecture.
No, it's like google refusing to accept email from Stormfront-hosted domains.
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Google (in its GMail persona) and stormfront are not near-peers. Gab and other fediverse servers were near-peers (Gab was on the larger end of servers in the network). That's why I chose to use Microsoft/Yahoo/Google in my analogy - they are in the same ballpark in terms of users and visibility as each other.
However to directly address the analogy - Google blocking stormfront or 4chan associated emails simply for being associated with stormfront or 4chan is also an issue for the infrastructure of email. An
It's not the same thing. (Score:3)
I can go to twitter.com and instantly start twittering. I have no idea how to even see a mastodon feed, and I'm not going to download some app when I don't even know if found the right place.
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Someone needs to buy a domain name, virtual machine service, commercial email service, cloud-storage service, then tell you to register an account. Then you need to use a different service (email/Wordpress/Twitter/Facebook) to tell everyone your account name. Of course this is less popular than Twitter/Facebook.
What happens when a Mastodon domain becomes really, really popular? The owner will need to monetize the service, by either demanding money or filling the site with adverts. That's assuming the
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https://joinmastodon.org/ [joinmastodon.org] was my top google result for "mastodon" — I don't know how much of that is that it's trending now, how much is that I've looked up mastodon before, and how much is just google being useful. The site loads and mostly functions even without scripts or cookies (it will get you to downloading an app at least.) But having to go on to choose a server... that will be too much for some people :) Also, what I really want in a server browser is some kind of idea of how useful the serve
Things the world does not need (Score:2)
At least Musk is oobviously determined to completely destroy Twitter, so we may get rid of that one.
Does not matter (Score:1)
Re: Does not matter (Score:1)
Parler was doing pretty well before AWS pulled the plug. Iâ(TM)m surprised they didnâ(TM)t face some kind of antitrust action over it. Actually, Iâ(TM)m surprised anyone is still willing to use AWS after that.
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I'm happy to use AWS knowing it won't host fascists on its infrastructure.
Re: Does not matter (Score:2)
Parler is not run by fascists. It turned out the Jan 6 people used Facebook, and Parler had nothing to do with it at all. You would use a service knowing they would shut you down over totally false accusations without even giving you a chance to plead your case?
So, here's what'll happen... (Score:5, Insightful)
All those people that ran to Mastodon, will realize that they can't talk shit directly to people on Twitter...and they'll realize that nobody is seeing their "witty" comments on Mastodon. So, gradually they'll crawl back to Twitter...saying it's "for the cause". And everything will go back to (gag) "normal".
Re: So, here's what'll happen... (Score:2)
They will just go back and not say anything at all. Same for advertisers, assuming Musk is still willing to work with advertisers after this.
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Same for advertisers, assuming Musk is still willing to work with advertisers after this.
I'm sure he'll be more than happy to work with them...after the rate re-negotiations.
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And everything will go back to (gag) "normal".
Hopefully not. Because Musk just fired a whole bunch of activists that made voicing conservative opinions on Twitter a ban-worthy offense. As such,what they will crawl back will not be the same Twitter they left..
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Hopefully not. Because....
Ok yeah, I wasn't going that deep..."normal", as in the usual back-and-forth pissing matches.
Meh...I'm not on Twitter, so I don't really have a dog in the fight...
Slashdot in 2022⦠(Score:2)
Open source software canâ(TM)t compete and is pointless. Corporate overlords are our gods.
What happened here?
Too funny :) (Score:2)
Never used Twitter and not gonna start now, so I have no dog in this fight ... but this is so funny to watch :)
So your newfound (2019-2020ish) love of private companies owning the public square and doing whatever they want has gone south already, has it? Hmm, so puzzling, lol!
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Never used Twitter and not gonna start now, so I have no dog in this fight ... but this is so funny to watch :)
So your newfound (2019-2020ish) love of private companies owning the public square and doing whatever they want has gone south already, has it? Hmm, so puzzling, lol!
But yes, I'm glad that Mastodon has like 5 more users now, "massive growth", lol!
Headline: Mastodon 27% the Size of Twitter! (Score:3)
Oh, wait -- you forgot the leading zero so I accidentally misread it. It's 0.27%, not 27%.
Were you not paying attention? But don't worry, you've got a whole lot of company in your errant typo.
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Twitter is a huge single entity .... Mastodon is a group of interacting servers it's now the size that Twitter was after a few years ...
Can't run a social network for free (Score:2)
Sure, small scale for a short time people run it as a hobby but at a large scale it's a job and requires money. A lot of money in the case of moderation.
A P2P/darkweb version won't work either in the long run, because it will be flooded with illegal shit and people will refuse to run nodes.
Schadenfreude (Score:2)
I have to admit I'm enjoying the hell out of all this hand wringing and chicken little "sky is falling" nonsense about Musk purchasing Twitter. I especially love how democracy now hangs in the balance because a social media platform that less than 1/4 of the population subscribes to (and to which 10% of user posts 90% of tweets) and most users don't even use regularly may not be as draconian as they once were about banning speech that people hate.
All of the people leaving Twitter because of this are exactly
Re: (Score:2)
The left are pissy that their free toy is being taken away from them. They won't move elsewhere as they need the huge echo chamber.
However : Elon suspended all access and fired 50% of the staff [mostly I suspect non-technical]
Twitter is still up and still running.....
Re: (Score:1)
I doubt they care given how tiny the entire system is compared to twitter.
Maybe there's some small group at the cia or fbi or whatever 3 letter agency who vaguely looks at mastodon once a month but twitter is orders of magnitude bigger and the odds that zillions of people leave twitter for mastodon and stay is about zero.
Maybe right after Linux takes over the windows desktop and Microsoft collapses.