Mastodon

[Levin]

Has anyone made the plunge? It seems like there are a lot of things to be aware or wary of. Especially when it comes to selecting your server. You've got to find an org you trust.

I know that people are going to overlook flaws in their determination to find a home away from Twitter but it doesn't sound like as much of a replacement as I'd like.

[ad hoc]

I signed up today. I haven't actually looked at it or worked out how to make it work for me though. I'm adhoc@mas.to in case anyone else is on. Just as with twitter I need some people to follow to make it useful

[Snake Plissken]

I’m @ukplissken@mastodon.org.uk

Its similar but different. There are definite philosophical and design choices in terms of discovering content and interactions. I’ve been looking for somewhere to throw words out into the ether that doesn’t wind me up and this seems alright to me.

[WOM]

I downloaded the app a couple of days ago, but I got stuck and confused at the 'choose your server' stage. No clue.

[Toby Gymshorts]

I like Once More 'Round The Sun but a lot of the rest of it is just nonsense.

[Snake Plissken]

I downloaded the app a couple of days ago, but I got stuck and confused at the 'choose your server' stage. No clue.

It doesn’t really matter. You can move around. But mastodon.org.uk or toot.community seem fine to me.

[diggedy derek]

I've joined. Like a lot of music journalists, I've started given it a try to see if anything sticks, while still sticking around on Twitter ... for now. I figured I'd just set up a semi-anonymous, so it didn't need to be 100% official, and start hanging out.

Finding a server was a bit confusing but there's a good website they've set up called joinmastodon.org which looked handy. I know that you can move servers if you need, so, you don't need to massively stress about where you choose. I saw something called linernotes.club and thought that sounded cool so went for that

So far, it's a bit quiet, but... very quickly I noticed interesting conversations happening, and the bit I'm hanging out in does actually seem friendly and genuine and quite quickly I started noticing music people I didn't know talking about interesting stuff

The central idea, which is that we are all using different websites/servers, but can follow and talk seamlessly between different websites/servers, really starts to make sense quite quickly. And you start thinking, yeah, if one of those servers goes rogue or starts allowing Nazis, people are going to move elsewhere, and no-one's going to support it.

[Discordant Resonance]

As diggedy derek says, in Irish Mastodon, journalists seem to be the early adopters, in this case political ones, now I just need that in the realm of sport, and I'll have all the reasons for which I currently use Twitter.

[My Name Is Ian]

I've joined it, but haven't had the chance to properly investigate it yet. I'll get on with that when I'm back in the UK.

[ursus arctos]

I've had an account for about two weeks, but have been having issues accessing it, apparently due to server issues

[Femme Folle]

I'm @brentitude.toot.community

[Femme Folle]

I downloaded the app a couple of days ago, but I got stuck and confused at the 'choose your server' stage. No clue.

I just picked a general one. It doesn't really matter which one you join, you can follow people from any server. And you can switch to another server later, if you want to.

[3 Colours Red]

When I see the word Mastodon I'm so tempted to just shout PTERODACTYL! TRICERATOPS! SABRE-TOOTHED TIGER! TYRANNOSAURUS!

Just me?

[Femme Folle]

When I see the word Mastodon I'm so tempted to just shout PTERODACTYL! TRICERATOPS! SABRE-TOOTHED TIGER! TYRANNOSAURUS!

Just me?

This is what goes through my mind:

Priests and cannibals, prehistoric animals
Everybody happy as the dead come home
Big black nemesis, parthenogenesis
No one move a muscle as the dead come home

[Snake Plissken]

The poor sod running one of the instances that got popular is currently having his server keel over with the incoming traffic. Gone from ~50k to a million in a week.

This is one of the issues I have with the setup - you have to manually pick a server. Perhaps it would be better to auto-allocate one, but then that does go against the administrator polices his server model.

[ad hoc]

The first couple I tried to register on rejected me with messages like this one:

mastodon.jpg

[Levin]

Every server has its own moderation policies? I guess that makes sense, but you could end up on one that forbids swearing?

[ad hoc]

Every server has its own moderation policies? I guess that makes sense, but you could end up on one that forbids swearing?

Maybe. But if so you could just switch to another one.

[diggedy derek]

Yep, and thinking positively, if (say) people are posting too much spammy content you might like to consider moving to another, better server with more moderation.

[Snake Plissken]

I think one of the things that you have to do, if you feel it is a bit quiet, is to go looking. Searching only searches hashtags not words (by design) so if you search that way you will find things. Also use hashtags in your own posts if you want other people to notice them.

[diggedy derek]

Great advice, thanks for that. And I will, I'm sure, be doing my standard thing of looking which interesting people other people are following.

[ad hoc]

I think one of the things that you have to do, if you feel it is a bit quiet, is to go looking. Searching only searches hashtags not words (by design) so if you search that way you will find things. Also use hashtags in your own posts if you want other people to notice them.

When you search does it search all the servers or just yours? I'm not sure.

[Snake Plissken]

I think it searches all. But yeah, it's not clear!

[diggedy derek]

I think it searches all, or at least tries to, and that's precisely why it's not nearly as quick as, say, Twitter. Price you pay.

[Nesta]

Buckle up guys, joke incoming

More like Masto... BATE, amirite?