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Chris Trottier

Yet more Press that gets Mastodon wrong!

Mastodon’s growth has not slowed down. We just added 1 million users in less than a month—for a total of 11 million!

There was a momentary spike in November that resulted in Mastodon hitting 2.5 million MAUs, most generated from sign-ups.

But since then, the rate of growth has been consistent. In fact, compared year-over-year, sign-ups have more than tripled.

And that’s just looking at sign-ups!

pressgazette.co.uk/platforms/t

@fediversenews
14 Apr 2023 at 19:10 | Open on mastodon.social
28 comments
Fabio Manganiello

@atomicpoet @fediversenews This is apparently a common pattern with the press: they keep confusing growth and rate of growth.

14 Apr 2023 at 19:13 | Open on social.platypush.tech
Chris Trottier

What I haven’t seen reported by the Press even once is that, last month, the Fediverse reached 1 billion monthly messages sent.

Which is odd because that’s a more significant metric than sign-ups and MAUs.

For one thing, it indicates that people are more active on Mastodon than they were in November when MAUs hit their peak.

But Press ignore that!

14 Apr 2023 at 19:13 | Open on mastodon.social
Kevin Leecaster

@atomicpoet
How does Mastodon's new account activity compare to any other social media platform?

14 Apr 2023 at 19:18 | Open on mstdn.social
Chris Trottier

@GreenFire Hard to know because while Mastodon’s data is largely transparent, other proprietary platforms are not.

14 Apr 2023 at 19:21 | Open on mastodon.social
Kevin Leecaster

@atomicpoet
So the media reports could state it like this, "As far as we can tell, Mastodon is the fastest growing social media platform", #JustSayin

14 Apr 2023 at 19:23 | Open on mstdn.social
Chris Trottier

Reading about that Press Gazette article, it seems they have an axe to grind against Mastodon.

Sure, Alphaville closed their Mastodon server. But why?

Because they allowed open sign-ups, which enabled anyone to join their server, and Alphaville didn’t have the resources to moderate it. Yet the Press Gazette don’t mention that.

Meanwhile, @TexasObserver runs their Mastodon server quite well, and even used it for crowdfunding—which has helped their publication survive!

14 Apr 2023 at 19:18 | Open on mastodon.social
DELETED

@atomicpoet @TexasObserver

And thrive even. But they want to exist in the preplanned and measured lanes. The cheese has moved and they aren't looking around for more.

14 Apr 2023 at 19:21 | Open on beige.party
Mike Fraser :Jets: :flag:

@atomicpoet @TexasObserver I've beat this drum a lot, but I believe if you're any sort of public facing organization you need to run a closed instance for your people and sponsor open instances in your vertical.

14 Apr 2023 at 19:22 | Open on thecanadian.social
Chris Trottier

I often wonder why Press gets the reporting of Mastodon and the Fediverse so wrong.

And it’s because they’re not actually doing reporting. They just want to repeat the current narrative.

Wow! Mastodon is growing fast!

Wait! It’s dying!

Well, actually, it’s growing but its growth is slowing even though I’m offering no stats to back up that assertion! And I’ve cited another inaccurate media report to back me up!

This entire narrative arc occurred within the past 6 months.

14 Apr 2023 at 19:26 | Open on mastodon.social
Ward Mundy :mastodon:
Jeff (of the internet)

@atomicpoet

The growth is steady and slow and very awesome!

The majority of the "reporting" I've seen on Mastodon.... It seems that they're just making it up and calling it in.

14 Apr 2023 at 19:31 | Open on newsie.social
Chris Trottier

@jeff Steady growth is better than a momentary spike.

14 Apr 2023 at 19:33 | Open on mastodon.social
Craig Nicol

@atomicpoet I suspect journalist Mastodon is a very different place from what I've seen, given how many admins actively block journalists and journalist instances.

14 Apr 2023 at 19:32 | Open on octodon.social
Chris Trottier

People talk about ChatGPT being inaccurate, and that’s true.

But is it that more inaccurate than all those bad journalists who just make stuff up? Because believe me, I’ve seen so many articles where fact checkers are asleep at the wheel!

You know why ChatGPT is taking over? Because too many publications no longer give a damn about facts.

14 Apr 2023 at 19:39 | Open on mastodon.social
Travis F W

@atomicpoet No one gives a damn about content. And they haven't for a long time, because internet. And the search engines know that, which is why they're looking at LLMs to replace indexes.

14 Apr 2023 at 19:42 | Open on fosstodon.org
Chris Trottier

If there’s one positive outcome that I hope comes from ChatGPT, it’s for journalists to separate bullshit from fact.

That’s the real value of journalism—ideally.

14 Apr 2023 at 19:47 | Open on mastodon.social
Jesse Baer 🔥

@atomicpoet Definitely feel like it's giving me a needed workout on the reader side. mastodon.social/@misc/11015424

14 Apr 2023 at 19:49 | Open on mastodon.social
DELETED

@atomicpoet

Many 'journalists' are literally paid to produce BS that adds noise not signal.

The, few admittedly, I know are well aware. They mostly are deeply frustrated they can't get paid to do investigative or truth to power stuff. They need food, shoes for the kids, pay mortgage and bills.

Either we pay journalists to get social good journalism, or bad faith businesses will pay them to provide distracting 'free' BS.

Fediverse revolution dreams. User funded Fediverse News24...

14 Apr 2023 at 20:19 | Open on mastodonapp.uk
@reiver ⊼ (Charles) :batman:
@pineywoozle (s) for HARRIS

@atomicpoet Sadly, a large part of the media cares more about their bottom line than the truth and a ridiculous number of them even the ones that pretend to be liberal are owned by old white guys. Those old white guys, whether they support Republicans or the #farL don’t care about facts. They only care about manipulating their readers.

14 Apr 2023 at 19:47 | Open on masto.ai
ch0ccyra1n :she_her::neocat_floof_cute:

@atomicpoet
Two words: Blog Spam.

It is the scourge of anyone who uses a search engine and is likely being accelerated due to chatgpt

14 Apr 2023 at 19:50 | Open on emeraldsocial.org
Ben Curthoys
Resting Facebitch

@atomicpoet Journalists really don't do their profession any favors.

It's self-inflicted at this point.

14 Apr 2023 at 20:05 | Open on mastodon.social
DELETED

@atomicpoet
ChatGPT is the definitive tool for automatic fake news and mass control. It's far more cheaper than paying a bunch of "handwritters" mercs. The AI and the sutile manipulation of digital historic archives and information is the beginning of the end.

14 Apr 2023 at 20:44 | Open on masto.ai
Paul Förster :verified_blue:

@atomicpoet There is a bot that posts #Mastodon user counts on an hourly basis. So growth stats are backed.

mastodon.social/@mastodonuserc

14 Apr 2023 at 21:09 | Open on swiss.social
segv11

@atomicpoet There's no big PR or marketing department to do a flashy press release. Tech reporters are used to getting their stories fed to them in press release sized bites. It's just too tough for them to get easy metrics out of the Fediverse.

They also don't like the lack of microtransaction options, so that adds some bias right there.

14 Apr 2023 at 19:25 | Open on mastodon.online
Adam

@atomicpoet
For real, how do you report that "news bosses" found Mastodon "empty and fragmented" without also reporting there are a BILLION posts per month from millions of active users 😕

14 Apr 2023 at 19:26 | Open on mstdn.social
Dr. Juande Santander-Vela

@atomicpoet @fediversenews if the only metric they have for growth is percentual, then 1 million added after 10 million is less growth than 1 million added after 8 million… and that let's you say the grown has slowed down 🤦🏻‍♂️

14 Apr 2023 at 19:36 | Open on astrodon.social
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