Reading the latest Michael “mookie” Terraciano blog post on the migration to BS is almost painful

Oblomov

During the first #TwitterMigration, there was a hammering campaign around the absence of “quote boosts” as the critical reason. This, despite the fact that 1. QB is barely more than a fancy UI over “linking to a post from another post” 2. as such, it could already be done for the purported purposes that those advocating for it claimed to need it for 3. actual QB are available on #Fediverse platforms other than #Mastodon.

Oblomov

Each and every time any of this was pointed out, it turned out that despite the original claims, QB was not, in fact, the reason for not joining the #Fediverse, but an excuse for hiding a much simpler fact: the Fediverse ethos and mechanisms are anti-viral, and this drives away clout chasers, people that have built their entire “social” persona on gaming the silo algorithms to garner attention.

Oblomov

I'm not the only one who noticed that, see for example @_elena's post here https://mastodon.social/@_elena/113332435360449024
Even better, go to the OP here
https://mastodon.social/@mhoye/113332019246104828
and browse the whole thread —it's an excellent example of what I'm discussing here.

Oblomov

Again, before anyone jumps in my mentions shouting «but the #Fediverse has real issues!!!111» —nobody is denying that. That's not really the point. The question is: are those issues really the main reason why people don't come here? And the answer is, by and large, no. For the most part, the main reason why people don't join the Fediverse is:

people go where people are

It's really as simple as that.

Oblomov

And here's the thing: people are where trendsetters are. And trendsetter are such because of clout. No clout, no trendsetting, no trendsetting, no people.

Does that mean that the Fediverse doesn't have issues that need solving to make it easier for people to join and have a good experience here?

No, but it does mean that even when those features will be available (and in fact, they often already are, just not in Mastodon) people will still not join en masse.

Eniko | Kitsune Tails out now!

@oblomov the reason people are on bluesky and not on fedi is because most people would rather bury their heads in the sand and pretend there isn't an ongoing ever worsening problem. Which means when the problem finally gets huge enough to acknowledge there's a crisis that must be resolved imminently

So where do they go? The place that involves the least friction for relocating. And that's bluesky, not fedi, because bluesky is more like the thing they already know

Oblomov

So yes, for the most part the reason why people aren't on the Fediverse is that the Fediverse is essentially anti-viral (and that, despite many changes in the last couple of years made on Mastodon to take inspiration from the worst virality features of commercial silos).

And honestly, I'd be happier if we don't try “fix” that.

Riley S. Faelan

@oblomov The catch is, clout-chasers often have plenty of clout, so if they decide to poop on Fediverse, they might be in a position to convince a lot of other people that Fediverse is all pooped upon.

Jon

A slightly different way of looking at it though is that the reason people who are looking for a Twitter alternative are on Bluesky instead of fedi is that Bluesky's made a lot more progress than Mastodon on addressing the problems people who checked out fedi in 2022 (or 2017) encountered.

Sure there's a lot more to social networking than a Twitter alternative, and there's a lot more to fedi than Mastodon, but press coverage of fedi focuses on Mastodon and Threads as Twitter alternatives. So even people who want something more don't know to look for it in fedi. And Mastodon in particular doesn't make it easy for people who are looking for something other than mastodon.social (the default signup) and the mediocre Twitter-like mobile apps.

@[email protected] @[email protected]

Jon

@[email protected] It's interesting going back and reading https://privacy.thenexus.today/black-twitter-quoting-and-white-toxicity-on-mastodon/ (which has those quotes and others).

As @[email protected] and @[email protected] (and others) said at the time, it wasn't the lack of quote boosts per se that was an issue for most people. It was the discourse around quote boosts -- the racist false claim that they "inherently lead to toxcity", and the double standard that a key component of Black digital practices shouldn't be supported because it could be used for harassment even though other harassment vectors are supported and there hasn't really been an effort to address the problems.

Oblomov

@jdp23 there were definitely multiple layers to the discussion. In my timelines, both here and on Twitter, the vast majority of posts I came across on the topic at the time brought forth the lack of QBs itself as the reason for not joining/choosing not to stay. And any comment pointing out the possibility to link to other posts or even switch to other Fediverse platforms that did have QBs consistently revealed that resistance to clout chasing was the underlying issue.

@futurebird @mekkaokereke

Jon

I guess it's situtational. That wasn't the case for my timelines either here or on Twitter ... in general it was mostly the racism and other stuff that also showed up in Erin's survey last summer. https://erinkissane.com/mastodon-is-easy-and-fun-except-when-it-isnt

I don't actually think the fedierse is particularly resistant to clout chasing in general. Taylor Lorenz, Robert Reich, George Takei, Neil Gaiman, and quite a few self-promotional white tech influencers all do just fine here. It's more that there are antiboides against a few particular kinds of high-visibility accounts -- so non-tech journalists, self-promitional non-tech influernces, high-profile activists and organizers, and celebreties all get lumped together as clout chasers. So yeah, they're all likely to have a much better experience on Bluesky

@[email protected]

Scott VOTED and you should too

@jdp23 @fromjason @eniko @oblomov Bluesky is more like Twitter because of for-you-style algorithms. I hate those, but many many many people love them and see them as central to social media. I think that’s the core issue for lots of people, so I don’t expect them to show up here.

Jon

There are algorithms here too -- Mastodon's Explore page and Trending Topics, now recommendations for new people to follow. But they haven't increased the percentage of people who stick around after showing up.

And last time I asked around, people how have been on Bluesky for a while spent most of their time on the Following feed (which is similar to Mastodon's home feed: chronological posts and boosts from people you follow, with some replies from people you follow as well).

So, there are algorithms in both places. One big difference is that Bluesky gives you the ability to choose between multiple feeds, which is very useful (and one of the areas they go beyond Twitter). It would also be useful to see something like that here but I don't think its absence is a big reason why the overwhelming majority of people who show up here decide not to stay.

@[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected]

Scott VOTED and you should too

@jdp23 @fromjason @eniko @oblomov It’s the crickets, that’s why.

That was the primary feedback I got from moving 143 friends off Twitter and onto my own community Masto instance here. Most have gone back to Twitter and/or play around in Bluesky and Threads. They want an algo—federated feed doesn’t cut it for them, even though I spent a lot of time curating hashtag relays they’d enjoy—and more engagement from randos.

Jon

That must be really frustrating. I've also invited a lot of people here and helped them get started, relatively few of them have stayed, but you put a lot more effort into it than I did ... and, your experience really speaks to the challenges fedi has.

Here's how I'd phrase it in terms of the problem statement: People in general want interesting content, and most can't find it here. People who want more engagement from randos don't get it here -- and conversely a lot of my friends left because of unpleasant engagement with randos. Even when the instance admin does a lot of work, the federated feed doesn't address either of thees problems.

People are used to finding these things on Twitter and Facebook, both of which rely heavily on algorithms. Mastodon uses "no algorithms" as a selling point (even though it's not true) ... and it seems like algorithms would help with these very real problems.

But Mastodon does have algorithms. What gets shown on the federated feed is a really complex algorithm! It's just that the algorithms don't give people what they want.

Different algorithms could help with these problems ... if the content that people want is here, and if the culture leads to that non-obnoxious randos engaging in non-obnoxious ways. Of course there aren't any one-size-fits all algorithms, which is where Bluesky's choice fits in. Still, using Twitter-like algorithms in a situation where the demographics and culture are very different isn't necessarily going to lead to results right off the bat that are anywhere near as good here as they were for many people on Twitter (who had spent a long time training the algorithm with their likes and boosts).

And algorithms aren't the only way to address these problems ... affordances, federation structure, norms, demographics etc etc etc all factor into it too. So while I think Bluesky-like algorithmic choice is very useful, I'm still not convinced that it by itself would have a major impact on more people having a good enough experience that they want to stay and invite their friends.

@[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected]