[kieran]

Seems like a lot of invites went out this past week and people are really joining up.

I've put my name on the list for an invite, but haven't gotten in yet.

Anyone get in here yet?

I really want Mastodon to be successful, but a lot of people seem to be jumping to Bluesky at the moment who haven't seemed interested in moving to Mastodon.

[turtle]

Linky? I've not heard of this one so I know nothing about it. I thought Bluesky was a production house for animated movies.

[Brad]

https://bsky.app/
https://blueskyweb.xyz/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bluesky_Social

It's yet another private twitter clone, but this one is founded by a Twitter ex-CEO and it's trying to ape a lot of Mastadon's technical benefits of federation and decentralization. I wish Mastodon would get the mainstream traction it needs, and that the Bluesky folks would contribute to that instead of building yet another protocol that surely they will maintain exclusive control over, but I guess there's not enough VC and ego to be made in existing platforms.

[PB PM]

Mastadon is too techy to take off, most people will never want to do that much work. It would be better for the world if they all die.

[psmith2.0]

[chucker]

I can see a world where I use Mastodon for more private stuff (since it seems to be designed to be more privacy-conscious, e.g. limited search) and Bluesky for more public stuff (since, for example, it has more pervasive search).

I'm baffled by some of the arguments people are making in favor of Bluesky and against Mastodon, based on… very little so far. For example, on paper, it's decentralized, but in practice it really isn't so far, since only one instance can be publicly used.

I also find "Mastodon is too hard to use" arguments to be a bit overblown.

[kieran]

There are some clients now that are just defaulting to an instance for Mastodon, so that part has been taken away. Makes signup a bit easier.

I think a bigger barrier is not having everyone from Twitter on Mastodon and finding them has been difficult with the Twitter api being shut down.

Mastodon is still lacking universal search and quote posts, so that's also stopping some people from using it.

There are just so many alternatives at this point that it's become difficult to figure out which one will take off.

Seems like most of the tech side has gone to Mastodon, but Bluesky has taken some of the celebrities and journalists, with some of those journalists have also moved to Substack Notes.

Decentralization is good, but too many options and this type of social media will just disappear.

[Ryan]

Mastodon's underlying protocol (ActivityPub) is truly garbage. Its reference implementation is an operations nightmare and the dominant culture is just plain hostile to newcomers. I don't think it has a future. Telling people to "pick an instance" is like telling them to pick a Linux distro. DOA.

I'm on both Mastodon and Bluesky at the moment but don't love either. Frankly I want nothing to do with a platform controlled by Jack so I'll be disappointed in Bluesky gains much traction. Bluesky's UX is far superior to Mastodon's, and the invite system is probably a good thing for it at the moment, but I'm not bullish on either platform at this point.

[chucker]

Originally Posted by kieran Seems like most of the tech side has gone to Mastodon, but Bluesky has taken some of the celebrities and journalists,

I think it's way too early to tell whether that's because they genuinely love it, or because they're trying out something new.

Clubhouse, for example, was all the rage for a few weeks. Then it has been barely heard from since. In part because it was easy for Twitter to copy its core idea, call it Twitter Spaces, and release it to a much larger user base. But also in part because it was, frankly, overhyped.

Originally Posted by kieran Decentralization is good, but too many options and this type of social media will just disappear.

Definitely.

One of the things Twitter still has going for it, for now (but shrinking) is the "does (random celebrity) have an account here?" question. Mastodon is pretty bad at that, and probably always will be.

[turtle]

Thanks. I threw my email in there to see if they will give me an account.

[709]

Originally Posted by Ryan Telling people to "pick an instance" is like telling them to pick a Linux distro. DOA.

This has been the biggest hurdle for me in getting others on board – they just want a one-stop place where they can easily find who/what they're looking for. I mean, Walmart is gross but it's ubiquitous for a reason.

I signed up for an invite earlier today – I heard some talk that it may be more likely to get an invite if you use a business email (not a freebie email like gmail), but I don't know how true that is.

[chucker]

Originally Posted by 709 This has been the biggest hurdle for me in getting others on board – they just want a one-stop place where they can easily find who/what they're looking for.

I guess I don't feel installing the Mastodon app is that far from it.

Originally Posted by 709 I mean, Walmart is gross but it's ubiquitous for a reason.

Right, but also, people do figure out how to go to a smaller shop, right? Like… they can handle going to a hair stylist?

[709]

Sure, but as soon as you realize that all your friends are getting their hair done at, say, .social salon, you try to join up with them and... WHAT? They're not accepting any new members at this time? Fuck. This.

The whole instance thing is a barrier. Not a big barrier, but enough to turn off the 'if at any point this process confuses me it's not worth it' crowd. Any deviation from picking a user name and clicking 'Join' sends those people into a tailspin.

[chucker]

Originally Posted by 709 Sure, but as soon as you realize that all your friends are getting their hair done at, say, .social salon, you try to join up with them and... WHAT? They're not accepting any new members at this time? Fuck. This.

Yeah, but does it matter? So they're at fancyHairdo.social, but you instead join mastodon.social. You can still follow them just fine, unless mastodon.social has defederated from that instance (which is unlikely). And odds are they're on mastodon.social as well.

Which, yes, kind of makes decentralization less useful, so people are encouraged to move to a different instance sooner or later. But I don't see how Bluesky solves this better. My cursory understanding is that they handwave the topic away and really just use decentralization as a form of load-balancing.

Originally Posted by 709 The whole instance thing is a barrier.

I don't disagree. I just find it a tad overblown.

[Brad]

I don't mean to be Old Man Yells at Cloud, but the more I see talk about the "instance thing" regarding these decentralized services, it makes me think about how most people today would be completely lost trying to use the internet of just 20 years ago when a small handful of mega-corporations didn't hand-hold and control all the major services. The "instance thing" feels no different to me than picking an email service. How did anyone possibly function back then, having to pick a provider/domain for their email and remember that domain and tell people about it before Gmail came along?

Yes, I know the answer is lot more complicated than I'm implying. Some people got their email through their ISP by default instead of deliberately choosing a domain, and running your own required (and still does) a very high tech skill level, but guess what? It worked. Thousands of mail servers with different "instance" names working around the globe using the same protocol, and most people don't think twice about it.

I guess it's too much to ask modern users to think about and remember more than just one word to uniquely identify themselves on a global communications system.

grumble grumble

[Ryan]

Originally Posted by chucker Yeah, but does it matter? So they're at fancyHairdo.social, but you instead join mastodon.social. You can still follow them just fine, unless mastodon.social has defederated from that instance (which is unlikely). And odds are they're on mastodon.social as well. Which, yes, kind of makes decentralization less useful, so people are encouraged to move to a different instance sooner or later. But I don't see how Bluesky solves this better. My cursory understanding is that they handwave the topic away and really just use decentralization as a form of load-balancing. I don't disagree. I just find it a tad overblown.

It's like trying to join reddit by first having to pick a sub.

[drewprops]

Remember: 20 years ago all of the people who are now in their 80s and 90s did pick an ISP because it was their cable provider.

When they got fed up with prices and switched to a different provider they forgot to tell all of their family, who didn't know until the emails began bouncing.

"Oh yeah, we switched to Windstream back in February."

::headsmack::

I, on the other hand, want to get a "dot com" of the instances, not a "dot biz", and a "mastodon" instance feels like a n00b move that everyone will still judge, silently.

We got stars on ours.


...

[kieran]

Mastodon just set up a default sign on process to join Mastodon.social directly.

https://blog.joinmastodon.org/2023/0...e-on-mastodon/

Definitely should help with people joining and not having to pick an instance if they don't know about it.

Still waiting on my Bluesky invite.....

[chucker]

Originally Posted by Brad I don't mean to be Old Man Yells at Cloud, but the more I see talk about the "instance thing" regarding these decentralized services, it makes me think about how most people today would be completely lost trying to use the internet of just 20 years ago when a small handful of mega-corporations didn't hand-hold and control all the major services. The "instance thing" feels no different to me than picking an email service. How did anyone possibly function back then, having to pick a provider/domain for their email and remember that domain and tell people about it before Gmail came along?

Well, they mostly didn't. This also frustrates me about conversations regarding browsers: almost nobody actually actively chooses a piece of software among alternatives.

People used whatever e-mail provider their ISP had, or whatever the neighbor's son's cousin recommended. Gmail didn't spread because millions of people said, "boy, that's such a great offering", but because of word of mouth as well as aggressive ad campaigns.

Originally Posted by Brad Yes, I know the answer is lot more complicated than I'm implying. Some people got their email through their ISP by default instead of deliberately choosing a domain, and running your own required (and still does) a very high tech skill level, but guess what? It worked. Thousands of mail servers with different "instance" names working around the globe using the same protocol, and most people don't think twice about it.

Well, it kind of worked, yes. It also had big spam problems.

Originally Posted by Ryan It's like trying to join reddit by first having to pick a sub.

Yeah, well, Reddit is owned by a media conglomerate, and Msatodon / the Fediverse is very much not that.

[709]

I didn't even know that instances could be defederated until you mentioned it above (although, it makes sense). That at least does seem kinda reddit-y.

Originally Posted by 709 Any deviation from picking a user name and clicking 'Join' sends those people into a tailspin.

On that note, went to Spoutible yesterday just to see what the signup experience was like. Picked a name, hit join, got a welcome email with code, now I'm a member. Took all of 30 seconds. I get that it's not the same thing as Mastodon, but that's what signing up to Mastodon needs to be like if they want it to take off with the average Jane & Joe. From the post that kieran links to it sounds like they're working towards that.

[PB PM]

I think the name Mastodon tell us all we need to know, it will go extinct. Given the media attention, I suspect Bluesky will get more users in the long run. Not that I care one way or the other.

Seriously though do we need a twitter replacement? Wasn’t twitter bad enough already, even before Musk? I was an avid twitter user 10 years ago, but stopped because it was so pointless.

[kieran]

Originally Posted by 709 I didn't even know that instances could be defederated until you mentioned it above (although, it makes sense). That at least does seem kinda reddit-y. .

Once it came out that Truth Social was just a reskinned Mastodon instance, it makes complete sense that an instance can be defederated..

Mastodon.social made some odd choices about not allowing bots and such, so I just switched to just running my own instance so those decisions are mine, so that is something I like about Mastodon. I believe you can do the same on Bluesky as well

[PB PM]

Why would you want to allow bots to run? Typically they just flood the place with crap.

[turtle]

Bots are helpful for automated notices if you use your feed for that kind of service. I kinda get it, though really already have enough notifications in other places that adding another social media platform to the list just isn't one I want.

[drewprops]

What's missing for me is a reason to move to any of these platforms.

What is my incentive?


...

[turtle]

That is why I have deleted all the other social media accounts and left my Twitter account completely dormant.

I did ask for an account with Bluesky, not because I plan to use it, but because I want to see how it actually works. Basically just play with it. Not like I'll put anything that gives away my privacy.

[kieran]

Originally Posted by PB PM Why would you want to allow bots to run? Typically they just flood the place with crap.

Originally Posted by turtle Bots are helpful for automated notices if you use your feed for that kind of service. I kinda get it, though really already have enough notifications in other places that adding another social media platform to the list just isn't one I want.

There are some bots that replicate a Twitter feed so I can pull in feeds from people on Twitter that haven't moved to another platform. I can still read what people I follow are saying and still stay off of Twitter

Originally Posted by drewprops What's missing for me is a reason to move to any of these platforms. What is my incentive?

I get this. I feel like my social media use has gone down and I've gotten less information from social media since I decided to stop posting on Twitter. The biggest reason I don't want to be on Twitter is that without a 3rd party client, I'm forced to use their awful official clients/webpage. I just don't want an algorithm determining my feed and getting regular suggestions to follow people that I have no interest in. People who have paid for Twitter Blue are being promoted over everything and everyone, and I just don't want to deal with that overall.

[chucker]

Originally Posted by PB PM Why would you want to allow bots to run? Typically they just flood the place with crap.

Yeah. I think it makes sense that most user-focused instances aren't bot-friendly. It clutters the local feed.

[drewprops]

I'll say this: I have been dreaming of a decentralized social media platform for 15 years. Some sort of client that can connect in a way like email and newsgroups can. No strings attached. Few strings attached, at least.

Mastodon seems to fulfill this idea.

But now I need a commonality to make me use that client.

I do not like talking to strangers, this place being the exception. We all have a long history together.

That same history extends to my social media network. Friends that I mostly know in person.

People I have dined with, pirated with, schooled with, worked with, made out with.

If I had a political axe, a social axe, any axe at all, then interacting with strangers might interest me.

It's not too late to find new passions, but nothing is driving me now.

Interacting with people based on their celebrity is the worst way to encounter them, so Twitter is not particularly useful for me in that regard.

Dissemination of news is the most useful aspect of anonymous social media.

But that nuke in Moab* just spooks me.


...
*Neal Stephenson reference

[Ryan]

Originally Posted by PB PM Why would you want to allow bots to run? Typically they just flood the place with crap.

There are both good bots and bad bots. A shocking number of bots are popular and highly appreciated by their followers.