@chat I just want to ask you guys if you have any input on how the decentralization of Mastodon has ever posed benefits/drawbacks for you? I’m really interested in exploring the site and would love any feedback!
I have a separate account from Beehaw, which I use on a different Mastodon instance. I created it about a year ago. I also recently created a Bluesky account (I know, I know, proprietary social media…)
So for Mastodon, I’ve noticed it’s harder to find the content I’m interested in. My instance is small, but active, so I find that I mostly interact with the folks there. Which is fine, it’s our own little community of mostly political memes and life and work and such. That said, our instance is well-federated, so I do get some interaction with others outside of it.
But on Bluesky, maybe because it’s algorithmic, right away I’m seeing content that I’m interested in. Gaming, anime, arts, news, tech. And in some ways, it feels more like Twitter back in 2009, when I initially created my (now-deleted) account there.
@JCPhoenix Thanks so much! Do you feel like in comparison to other, algorithmic social media like Bluesky and Twitter, the decentralization of mastodon allows you to avoid outcomes that might make those other platforms less attractive to you?
Not sure. And not sure I ever thought about it that way. I get the point of decentralization. Ideally, it allows us to avoid what’s happened to Twitter and reddit and other platforms. Plus there’re are safety considerations (like Beehaw defederating from some less-moderated instances, even if they are larger). Basically, enshittification, in various ways.
But that’s not why I’m on the Fediverse. In fact, I’m still using proprietary platforms like reddit and Instagram. I may have come over here in the last year, after reddit’s APIgate, but I didn’t stay because of the FOSS/decentralized principles. It’s mainly because these communities and the people are cool. I don’t mind spending my times in these different communities, because they’re offering something different from each other.
I guess to me, these are all just tools. Tools to connect people with each other. And so long as I find a tool useful and isn’t too awful – looking at you, Twitter…deleted my 14yo account last year) – I’ll keep using it.
I don’t know if that’s answers your question, lol.
@JCPhoenix I see! Your answers are very helpful! One of the topics that I wanted to engage more with from my class was whether the for you page-less format of Mastodon helps contribute to any type of good/bad effect on information overload, and whether this kind of decentralization affected the argument that the internet is progressing to become an information utopia/dystopia.
I apologize for the long reply, but do you have any thoughts on this?
No worries, I enjoy conversations like this. Though would you mind explaining what you mean by “page-less format of format of Mastodon?”