Mastodon isn't perfect.

Kevin Beaumont

But the fact a social network exists that is completely free to use,

has no venture capital investors,

has no shareholders to answer to,

has no growth targets,

with a web interface with zero cookies,

and mobile apps with zero trackers at all

with ten thousand server administrators who donate their time for user safety

is - in my opinion - mindbogglingly cool, given the state of the world we live in. Not everything has to be shit. People make things better.

DJGummikuh

@GossiTheDog
with no ads, even without ad blockers!
With no engagement-reinforcing force-feeding of content
with no arbitrary rules that only exist to keep the platform "advertisable" (there are still arbitrary rules, though )

just wanted to extend your list by some additional noteworthy selling points

BrianKrebs

@GossiTheDog On that note, if you're able to but not financially supporting your favorite server and the people who are toiling to keep it healthy, shame! Fix that now!

Marty Fouts

@DJGummikuh @GossiTheDog It would be nice if we could come up with language that captures the difference between ads and “posts that someone paid to place on timeline”.

There are ads on Mastodon, such as the artists who post to promote their work or services for sale. They are generally a good thing because you only see them under the same circumstances that you see any post.

But there are no posts that are forced onto your timeline.

Mac Berg

@MartyFouts @DJGummikuh @GossiTheDog What should we call them? Organic ads? Homegrown ads? I've seen plenty of those on Mastodon, even from companies, but the corporate ones have so far only popped up in the federated feed and are easy to block so they don't bother me that much.

n8chz 🩎

@macberg @MartyFouts @DJGummikuh @GossiTheDog

I call it self promotion. I engage in a bit of self promotion here, although the things I promote don't involve money changing hands. Fedi accounts that only exist to promote a substack account are a bit of a pet pet peeve, and I tend not to boost, but I coexist without complaint with advertising that is not of a "pay to play" nature.

Even in the commercial web, I don't ad block, but I do tracker block (with Privacy Badge) and of course I get accused of ad blocking by the ad blocker blockers. THAT business model makes me vomit.

Deejacker

@briankrebs @GossiTheDog A very good point!

David Chisnall (*Now with 50% more sarcasm!*)

@n8chz @macberg @MartyFouts @DJGummikuh @GossiTheDog The first post is self promotional but boosts are just advertising. I think the main difference currently is that there’s no money (or other tangible incentive) changing hands.

That’s not guaranteed though. If someone collects a hundred thousand followers on Mastodon, companies are likely to start asking them to boost posts in exchange for enticements. The only differences between that and something like LinkedIn are that the reach is limited to people who follow the big account and the money goes to the person who did the boost (who is, at least, explicitly linking their reputation to it) and not the platform.

Nothing in the Fediverse is intrinsically immune to advertising, though being able to flag accounts as spam and have them blocked (and possibly their instances if they fill up with marketing drones) may help.

n8chz 🩎

@david_chisnall @macberg @MartyFouts @DJGummikuh @GossiTheDog

Boosts are indeed advertising, which is why when stuff is seriously morally reprehensible such as Nazi shit we go out of our way to avoid signal boosting it.

In less sinister cases I think most of us are constantly amplifying (boosting) signal and attenuating (muting) noise, and the effects are synergistic, and more effective as a "relevance" filter than any "algorithm."