#mastodon has whole communities hosted on private servers

[blue-sleeps-in]

i have this vague vision in my mind of a social media where everyone's account is actually their own website hosted on their own computer. but even if i had the skill (i do not) i am not dumb enough to try to make a social media

[thegreatbacon]

The Coming Discourse Vacuum

Food for thought in a post-Twitter world

I originally published this piece 2022-11-18 on my blog, but then forgot to share lol. Thought it was relevant again with the Twitter/Reddit/Bluesky/Threads talk this past month.

There is no doubt that Twitter is collapsing. Millions of bytes have flown over the last few weeks describing the chaos both on the platform and in the private domain of its offices. Advertisers have pulled out, poorly thought out technical decisions have been made, hastily designed products have shipped, the majority of staff have either been fired or walked out the door, and the new owner and CEO is publicly melting down ON the platform for all the world to see. Some real grade A content if you will. The Adam McKay movie is writing itself. Yet as dumb as the whole saga is, it feels like there’s clearly something else at stake here, some sort of loss being felt. As much of a carnival as Twitter has always been, there is social value in it.

The widespread recording and reporting of police brutality in communities leading to the Black Lives Matter movement and the George Floyd protests of 2020 likely couldn’t have occurred without it. Last year when a wildfire broke out in the north suburbs of Denver, I used the platform to get almost real-time info and pass it on to friends and family living close to the disaster.

It’s the place to go for breaking & front page news. To hear the latest japes and gossip. It’s one of the town squares of the internet. And now it’s on fire while a lone, pathetic, billionaire is trying to rip it apart and sell it for scrap after buying it on a whim.

So, what’s next?

Some people are starting to look for the future in newer, less established spaces. But what if before our society immediately moves on to the next big thing, we take a step back to dream of a green field. If we could do it all over again, what should it look like?

To start with let’s talk about the elephant in the room, Mastodon, which is one of the new things that people have been migrating towards. Mastodon is part of the Fediverse, a collection of open source tools and platforms that prize decentralized architecture first and foremost. This means allowing anyone to host their own instance of a server and then connecting it to other servers in a federated model to gain network effects.

So instead of just one single giant ship plying the shitposting seas, it’s a bunch of rafts lashed together. If you don’t like how things are going, you can untie your raft and set off on your own. Or that’s the idea anyway.

But in my experience I’ve found the whole system unintuitive and overwhelming despite the fact that I write software for a living. Where am I supposed to make an account? How do I make sure I’m in the same network as the funny people I was following on Twitter? Does anyone in this federation even live in my state?

The barrier to entry is too high and the core architecture of Fediverse software fragments the new social network right out of the gate, undermining the very reason Twitter was useful in the first place. The replacement has to be centralized, it has to be the same place everyone agrees to show up. That’s how town squares work.

Another consideration for this future digital town square should be democratic controls baked into it from the start. The goal here is to keep any one particular petulant owner from taking control of the whole thing. This is ostensibly the purpose of federation in Mastodon, but I’m talking about even lower level controls. Elected moderators to patrol the space and ways to debate and decide the rules that govern the space. Baked in polls for voting on anything from names to new channels to modifying community guidelines. Focus on democratically controlling a single instance from within its own framework before jumping straight to federation.

Lastly, just like how a good tax base helps keep public places clean and maintained, this theoretical future platform would need some mechanism for collecting monetary support from its users, instead of an ad driven model. Ad driven platforms will always be forced to sacrifice the user experience for driving advertiser metrics.Instead let's talk about things like up-front registration fees or monthly supporter tiers, cosmetic items or badges for purchase, and publicly published operational budgets so users know how much they need to open their wallets. We could even dream of an honest to god new state-run utility that can actually levy taxes to manage and operate the platform!

As I’m writing this piece, one of the top trends on Twitter is literally #RIPTwitter. Even if the website technically lives on past tonight, it’s clear that it has lost the trust and confidence of its community, the lifeblood of any social media platform. So as we stagger out of this burning square, we should all take a moment to unplug, touch some grass, talk to our friends and family around our kitchen tables, and take a deep breath. In that moment of quiet, let’s dream about something better, before we go back to looking for something to fill the vacuum.

[feedyourdeadnametothevoidfish]

Hey you! Worried that tumblr might disappear? Want a place to express yourself online but don’t want to dive into the nazi ridden hell pit of twitter or the orwellian nightmare of facebook? Mastodon* might be just what you’re looking for!

What is Mastodon?

Imagine a social network, but instead of one giant service run by a faceless corporation, it’s a true network comprised of small, friendly instances (many of them run by queer people). Unlike the big corporate sites, where if you have a problem there’s no one to turn to, on Mastodon there’s a good chance you’ll know and be friends with your instance admin. Like twitter and tumblr, you can post text, photos and videos, follow and message your friends, reblog their posts and become part of a community.

What features does Mastodon have?

It has some great features that are sorely lacking from other platforms

Built in content warnings - whenever you post, you have the option to put a content warning on the post so that people can choose if they want to view it or not. Use of content warnings is strongly encouraged!

Built in image descriptors - any image or media posted can be given an image description that appears as alt text, improving accessibility

Built in blacklist/filtering - automatically hide posts that contain keywords you don’t want to see

Audience settings on a post by post basis - want to post something that only your followers can see? sure! want the whole world to see it? that’s fine too! you decide with every post, and don’t have to restrict your whole account

Approved followers - you can choose to approve new followers before they’re allowed to see your content

Ability to silence and block users - prevent them from interacting with you entirely, or simply hide their posts from your timeline

Chronological post order with no bullshit algorithms - this shouldn’t even be a thing, but unlike all the big social media platforms you get to see the posts from people you follow, in the order they were posted. No ‘posts we think’ll you’ll like’, promoted posts, adverts or any other bullshit affecting what you see and the order in which you see it

I’m in! Where do I sign up?

The first thing to remember is that Mastodon isn’t a single service, it’s hundreds of small ones. So there are many different instances to choose from. I recommend starting with this list of instances with good anti harassment and anti bigotry policies - https://instances.noct.zone/

Simply choose one that matches your interests and sign up. You can have accounts on more than one instance, so if the first one you pick doesn’t fit you then you can simply move to another. Make sure to read the rules and policies of your instance when you sign up, as each instance differs.

My friend signed up for a different instance, can I still follow them?

In most cases, yes. When you sign up for mastodon, your handle will be @username@instance.name - for example, I’m xaphania on the monsterpit.net instance so to find me you would follow @xaphania@monsterpit.net. Like email, if you use gmail and your friend uses hotmail, it’s still possible to communicate as long as you know their full address.

It is possible for the admins of an instance to silence or block other instances. This means that you may not be able to follow or see posts from that instance. This is usually only done in drastic cases to protect users, for example where an instance allows harassment or bigotry. You can also choose to block instances personally, if you want to avoid all people on a particular instance.

Do I need an app?

The short answer is no - you can access mastodon directly through the web page of your instance. It will automatically scale the site for mobile use, and looks great on my phone so this is how I choose to use mastodon. However there are a number of different apps for Android, iOS and other platforms, so check out your app store and try some out if you want

Sounds perfect - what’s the catch?

Well it’s far from perfect. Many of the problems of social media still exist, and harassment is still possible, though there are better tools to deal with it than some platforms, and it has a personal touch that’s missing in corporate social media. It’s also not a completely secure platform, so if there’s something you absolutely don’t want some people to see - don’t post it on mastodon. It’s possible (though generally unlikely) for an instance admin to see anything you post, including private messages. But then, it’s possible for employees of twitter or facebook to do the same! Also, since instances are generally run by hobbyists out of their own pockets or small donations, sometimes instances close down or disappear, taking your posts with them. So if you want to post something that will stay online forever, then find somewhere else to host it. But if the worst happens and your instance shuts down, there’s others you can move to!

*Technical note - Mastodon is the most common piece of server software in the wider network called ‘the fediverse’. There are other servers, such as pleroma which are similar but may have some different features. But because they all use the same protocol to communicate, it’s possible to follow and interact with someone regardless of what software their instance runs. For the interests of simplicity, I have used the term Mastodon throughout this post to refer to the whole network.

[davidmarkblogger]

5 Best alternatives to Google+

Google+ already has its one foot in the grave. What started out as a brainchild of Google that was going to rival the likes of Facebook and Instagram will finally cease to exist come April 2, 2019. What a ride full of highs and lows (well mainly lows, it’s shutting down after all). So now the handful of locals will have to find a new alternative to the platform.

Here are the 5 best alternatives to Google plus out there.

Minds: In many ways a mirrored version of Google+, Minds is a free of charge and open source platform. It allows you to form an audience for your brand and attractive content here is paid in the form of mind currency or simply Tokens. So this platform is s suitable all-in-one need kind of platform.

MeWe: MeWe today is seen by many as the biggest beneficiary o0f Google+ shut down as the majority of former users are estimated to be migrating onto this network. This is largely because MeWe is similar to Google+ and provides a similar experience with its calling and video calling features. MeWe platform is privately owned and the best thing is that it contains no ads.

Pinterest: Pinterest is perhaps the best multi-purpose and one of the most renowned platforms out there. You can link your audience with your website or simply share random posts and photographs. Though Pinterest doesn’t have a chat feature as of now users do have the facility to follow and/or comment on user pins.

Tumblr: Think of Tumblr as a beta-Facebook network as it also allows you to make new friends and socialise with people all over the world. The platform is lighter and you can create a whole new community. Find new people, socialise with them over things you like and feel connected.

Mastodon: Mastodon is the first suggestion for users looking for a life long relationship with their network platforms. Mastodon is almost immune to dying away where server hosting is carried out by the users themselves. The phenomena is called Decentralisation.

Facebook: If you’re on the internet (which you are) and still haven’t heard about what Facebook is, that’s some accomplishment. Simply put, Facebook is the proverbial juggernaut of social media websites that was intended to bring all the users closer to each other. You can share and post all your day to day happenings with your family and friends. Features including chat and live video along others help to form a united community. When the Facebook Privacy routine came into the limelight, it no longer seemed to be the fun little platform where everything was secured and private.

Conclusion: If the demise of Google+ tells us anything, it is that nothing is here to stay. Irrespective of how huge the organisation is, change is always around the corner as the human brain constantly strives to be better than the day before. However, as of today, the aforementioned names are some of the best Google+ alternatives that currently exist. FutureProfilez is one of the leading digital marketing company in India that is renowned for providing the best and complete Web development services to its clients.