Gregory's Server3. I've never wanted Twitter to fail. It's against my self interest.
Nevertheless, I can't ignore how Twitter has failed to serve its users, the public square, and democracy.
They've profited directly from the rise of modern Fascism.
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 5. I joined Mastodon in 2018. It was a much different place back then. The majority of the Fediverse was what the mainstream would term "fringe": folks who had been harassed off of the big social networks. 6. During the past 5 years, Mastodon (and the Fediverse) has gradually shifted towards four core groups: 1. Programmers & tech enthusiasts Each group has become protective of their space. 7. Every time there's a crisis on Twitter (Birdsite) or Facebook (Booksite), there's a new wave of sign-ups to Mastodon and the Fediverse. Most of these users don't stay because Mastodon is not a clone of those services. But some stay. 8. Six months ago, I decided to make the Fediverse my social media home. While I stay on mastodon.social for quick status updates, I've also set up my own Pixelfed instance at peerverse.social -- which I update every day. 9. As a frequent user of Mastodon and Pixelfed, I make monthly monetary donations to both those projects. Since I plan on building my instance(s), I've been thinking of increasing these donations. 10. It's important to remember that the bulk of the Fediverse is not made by multi-billion dollar corporations. Mastodon is a non-profit. Pixelfed is made by @dansup, and he does it part-time. And there are many other projects. 11. Right now, there are only 1.5 million active users on the Fediverse. This is minuscule compared to Twitter. Nevertheless, I get more social interaction on the Fediverse than I do on Twitter. 12. The Fediverse needs investment. Not everyone agrees with this notion because some prefer that it be a hobbyist enclave. For its own long term survival, it needs infrastructure that scales. Not even Mastodon can handle growth. 13. Over the past year, I've developed enough working knowledge to run a Fediverse instance. The best way to grow the Fediverse is to setup an instance. I'm by no means a sysadmin, but I've learn how to do it. 14. With Elon Musk's purchase of Twitter, government and media SHOULD adopt the Fediverse. But WILL they? Not until there's a crisis that forces their hand. Which there will be -- it's just a matter of when. 15. Yesterday, Elon Musk sent out a pro-Russian tweet. Do you think the Ukraine government wants to be on Twitter right now? What about the EU? What about NATO? I guarantee they're looking at the Fediverse as an alternative. 16. Right now is the calm before the storm. People won't leave Twitter until they have to. Eventually, they will. So how do we all prepare for this eventuality. 17. Recommendations for building the Fediverse prior to the next mass migration: 1. BUILD instances -- lots of them 18. Building the Fediverse isn't just a matter of finding a Twitter or Facebook alternative. It's about building a ROBUST social media infrastructure that is protected from the whims of shareholders and governments. 19. Am I going to be sad about the "old" Fediverse? Yes I am. No one likes change but change to social media is coming. The great thing about ActivityPub is that we are not a slave to opaque algorithms. We can build better social media. 20. It's time ⏱️ Elon Musk's takeover of Twitter is imminent. It's costing him $44 billion. For the fraction of the cost, you can build the alternative. And it already works. /end thread @atomicpoet wonderful, thoughtful thread. Thank you! One thing I would point out is that it's not either-or. We don't have to lose the "old Fediverse" to be able to build it out as a robust, mainstream social network. There will always be nooks and crannies, some will not federate with the Big Network, some will, but the beauty of a standardized protocol with a bunch of independent implementations is that we *can* have those. And the beauty of no "real name policy" is alts. We can have both. @rysiek I agree with you. If you want to preserve part of the old Fediverse, nothing is stopping you from building an enclave. Nevertheless, the Big Network will change. @atomicpoet fully agreed. I just think it's important to keep that possibility in mind. The reason being: I've seen a lot of pushback against newcomers and changes that is not doing anyone any good. I feel if we communicated more clearly that it's not an either-or and we can have both, the pushback and internal fedi struggle around these changes would be lesser. Anyway, thanks again for the thread and for engaging! @atomicpoet You don’t buy Twitter for the software or even the infrastructure. You are buying their brand and user base. That’s why the issue of bots was important
@atomicpoet I'm one of today's new signups. This is a wonderful thread. Thank you.  @atomicpoet In any rate, this is a very informative thread and thanks for dojng this!  @atomicpoet I would like the Fediverse to be for everyone and have seen incumbents explain newbies rather aggressively how to behave, but I think the main reason people do not stick around is that we are substantive and boring. Those are explicit design choices of the current Fediverse systems. Twitter is an additive outrage machine (that not only benefited from the rise of Fascism, but also helped it), that is a subsystem the Fediverse does not have (yet). @atomicpoet re instances, it's fine running your own (I did for a while) but it's lonely as you aren't as discoverable. Likewise it's global or nothing.  @atomicpoet parts of the German government (mostly tech related) and some EU organisations are already on here, there's also a TV presenter (of factual/science programmes) who is on telly literally every week who posts here every so often.. @atomicpoet the EU actually has its own instance already @EU_Commission @atomicpoet as much as i dislike elon, he is right in this case. Its not even pro-russian tweet, its just being rational. He described the shortest path to peace. But whatever...
@atomicpoet I like running my own instance. I tried Mastodon on a VSP for a while but I eventually settled on Soapbox on my own gear. It was much easier to set up and I like what the devs are doing. I’m even running a couple of boys in my instance that I forked from another open source project. It’s been a fun process.
@atomicpoet because the conversation died in 2010 on twitter. thats when the bots started coming in, and other stuff.. @atomicpoet I think the other reason that many don’t stay is that the Mastodon community is not that great at welcoming new users and helping them to feel at home. @KolokokoBird This is true. In the past, I've had certain folks get hostile to me because I said that the Fediverse should be for everyone. And I stand by that notion. Well that may be true; but also, the sheer volume of doom scrolling in twitter for #lazyweb could be another attraction for some. Plus all that nonsense. #fediverse in comparison, is more substantive. @arin_basu @atomicpoet As it is now, I think the users who stick around are those who are able to read instructions and persevere. That does select for a subset of people that I particularly like, so it works for me. 🙂 Well said! For me too, 'subset of people I particularly like' and feel safe to discuss things as well. Nice, safe, interactive, get to discover new people and topics, what more can you ask from a 'social media app', and what more rewards will satisfy people 🙂 ? @arin_basu @KolokokoBird I'll be real. I wish critical communications were delivered through the Fediverse. I don't want to be checking Twitter to find out health policy and economic data. @atomicpoet @KolokokoBird @atomicpoet there will also be a wave of another type of user: people like me who never used Twitter or Facebook but just heard about Mastodon and find the idea fascinating. @atomicpoet That last point is the killer. As with newspapers, bad news sells. The issue, I suspect, for most non-geek users, will be the federation aspect and understanding that everything is not 'all in one place' but remains workable and usable nonetheless. That and getting the big users to commit. @atomicpoet why does twitter need to be a "public square"? Especially when such a low percentage of the world's population use it. @Haikyo_neko No service has to be anything. Nevertheless, that's how Twitter is used. Government, media, academia, and PR use Twitter to affect public opinion. Now I wish this wasn't the case—yet it is. @atomicpoet but I don't think it does? That list of people seem to think it does, and other twitter users think it does, but since I've left I've no idea what any of them are saying, just like most of the world. @Haikyo_neko That's the point. You have no idea what any of them are saying but if you ever were interested in knowing, you'd have to check Twitter. Again, I don't wish this was the case. There's no reason why the President of the USA nor the BBC nor Coca-Cola has to use Twitter. Now if you're wondering why people want to know what those entities have to say, it's because they do. It's as simple as that. Should they use a different service? Yes, I do—that should be obvious.  @atomicpoet @Haikyo_neko The thing is, I don’t think Twitter drives a lot of public opinion. You leave and have no clue what they’re saying because other than affecting those on Twitter it’s mostly irrelevant. @maddiefuzz @Haikyo_neko Personally, I'm constantly having to check Twitter for government health updates because that's where my government disseminates up-to-date information. That's one example. What I would prefer is if governments and media wouldn't use Twitter and instead hosted their own Fediverse instances. |
4. In 2018, I discovered the emergence of the ActivityPub protocol. I've long felt that Twitter should have open sourced its API a long time ago. Until 2010, Twitter was a somewhat "open" platform.
Instead, they went the other direction.