Alright so 2017, tech blogs are all "Have a gander at mastodon, it's like twitter but without the nazis," all the folk who don't like nazis or supporting/hosting/enabling nazis go "Alright let's give this mastodon thing a go" and almost immediately discover that no, it's not like twitter at all, it's very very different to twitter, it's its Own Whole Thing. Folk who were expecting something like twitter go back to twitter, folk who like it here stay here, all good and normal.

2022, this place has had years to develop its own vibe and its own way of doing things and has in the meantime become even MORE Not Twitter, but tech blogs go "Try Mastodon, it's like Twitter but without Elon Musk," and there was this... honestly, Exciting At First But Generally Unpleasant Period where people who were *actively mourning twitter* came to mastodon again expecting something like twitter, something they'd been promised by I dunno tech journalists or whatever, and they either went "Ooh this is actually not at all what I was told it'd be like but I like it" and stuck around, or they had Bitter Disappointment And Confusion and left, or they did "This place is not like twitter and therefore it is Wrong and I will Make It Like Twitter" and they had an even worse time than the Bitter Disappointment And Confusion folks.

2023 now, we've had the folk who wanted Twitter Without The Arseholes, then we had folk who wanted Twitter Without The Biggest Arsehole, who's left, Folk Who Want Twitter? Folk Who Meant To Try Leaving Twitter Six Months Ago But Who Now Suddenly Can't Log In And Have To Move Right The Heck Now? Honestly I think there's gonna be a LOT of disappointment mixed up with panic and mourning and generally hurt feelings because of this billionaire fiddling about and pushing people out before they're ready.

I think the theme of the late web 2.0 era is one where people are on websites that they Do Not Want to be on, because that's where their mates are or that's where the memes are or that's the only game in town or whatever, and I've said in the decade-scale-online-community-management thread and I'll never quit banging this drum, websites that are full of people who'd rather be somewhere else are really miserable places that can chug along in misery for years and years.

So aye, I don't celebrate when twitter hecks up, I think the people who actually want to be on twitter would be happier on twitter. Folk who want to move their stuff to other websites should have the chance to do so at their own pace, dipping their toes in and casing the joint, they shouldn't have to deal with trying to adapt to a totally different place ON TOP OF the trauma of having their existing place yanked out from underneath them, compounded by, honestly, being lied to about the new place. It wasn't like twitter five years ago and it's even less like twitter now, I really wish we could just bury that association but I guess it's gonna stick around and keep tripping people up for ages 'cause, y'know, first impressions I guess.

Just. Bloody. Tech boys, stop pressing buttons and breaking things for a minute, yikes