Something about starter packs that I think gets lost when they're discussed on Mastodon:

Lord Hurkle-Durkle :bc:

@williampietri Because it’s easier to just talk to people than to read theory. Why can’t people just talk to each other anymore?

William Pietri

@GuyDudeman It may be easier for you. It's not easier for the people you're insisting educate you. Caring more about your feelings than the people harmed by racism is an important part of racism's operation.

W6KME

@mastodonmigration @thenexusofprivacy @nullagent @Nelfan @ryanrandall @ErickaSimone I've brought a few dozen people in so far, a few hams but mostly "regular"people, and not one single person had trouble. So many of these replies are projecting the myth onto people, and THAT is something a new user senses.

The Nexus of Privacy

It's great that you've brought so many people here -- and mastodon.radio seems like the kind of instance that''s fedi at its best, so kudos to you and everybody else involved in it.

That said, your experience isn't typical. 85-90% of the people who sign up don't stay. It's worth reading https://erinkissane.com/mastodon-is-easy-and-fun-except-when-it-isnt to get an idea of the reasons why many people don't stay.

For the people you brought here, you were probably able to suggest a good instance; that's an advantage that random people signing up don't have. And they were starting out by following at least one person they knew (possibly more than one if they knew each other).

And I don't know how many of the people you brought here were Black, Indigenous, or Muslim but unless the answer is "a lot of them" then you're projecting white experiences to very different situations.

So it would be great if everybody had similar experiences to the people you brought here, but that's not currently the case.

@W6KME @mastodonmigration @nullagent @Nelfan @ryanrandall @ErickaSimone

W6KME

@thenexusofprivacy @mastodonmigration @nullagent @Nelfan @ryanrandall @ErickaSimone

My point is not that it's easy...nor is it that it is easy for all people.

My point is that those people going on and on that it's so hard no one can do it are contributing to the difficulty. It's up to those people to decide whether they want to promote what the fediverse can do or to tell potential newcomers that it's just so hard it will never work.

That's ALL I have said. Please don't add to it.

Lord Hurkle-Durkle :bc:

@williampietri How is anyone ever to learn anything from anyone if the student is not allowed to ask questions even about the directions to the library??

The Nexus of Privacy

That's not all you said.

You replied to conversation where I quoted a Black social network expert about the difficulty here, and said "pity so many people keep perpetuating the myth of difficulty".
You replied to my point about the challenges of getting to a well-moderated server by saying that it only took ONE CLICK to get to a server where a Black woman on this thread has expereinced a lot of racist abuse.
You talked about your experience bringing a few dozen "regular" people here, and how not a single one had trouble.

Anyow, I'm not saying it's so hard no one can do it -- and I don't think Rudy was saying that either.

@W6KME @mastodonmigration @nullagent @Nelfan @ryanrandall @ErickaSimone

Mastodon Migration

@thenexusofprivacy @W6KME @nullagent @Nelfan @ryanrandall @ErickaSimone

Can we all agree that however easy or difficult it is now, it can, should and hopefully will be improved? We all care a lot about the Fediverse and want it to be both in reality and perception a more user friendly, welcoming, useful and safe place for everyone including black people. The purpose of these discussions would be best served by a constructive forward looking focus on these goals, and how to achieve them.

William Pietri

@GuyDudeman Please cut the bullshit. You did not just ask directions to the library. You are centering yourself and your feelings in a discussion that is not about you, but about the people harmed by racism.

You are obviously not serious about learning anything about the topic here. This is all about your white man feelings and making everybody else cater to them. If you ever get to the point of actually trying to learn, you'll discover that plenty of people, me included, are happy to help. But you seem quite far from there, and in a fashion tediously familiar to people who did not just fall off the turnip truck.

Matthew Lyon

@stefan @puppygirlhornypost2 I didn’t follow much of the ensuing conversation because I’m not super familiar with a lot of the AP/coordination efforts, but Stefan if you missed it I did a writeup about what Jennifer & I learned from a bunch of UX interviews with people doing trust & safety work as it pertains to admin/moderation; If you’re indeed making your own instance software, some things to think about: https://letterbook.com/blog/post/2024/11/18/moderation-tooling-research.html

Stefan Bohacek

@mattly Thank you for sharing this, very insightful!

@puppygirlhornypost2

Lord Hurkle-Durkle :bc:

@williampietri

There are a lot of things to unpack in this post, and a lot of projection, ultimately.

You may be seeing an earlier version of yourself in me, possibly. I don't know.

But what I do know is that I'm being 100% sincere. That's all I know.

And I also know that it takes patience to communicate with people.

I'm learning that patience is not something that folks in this sphere of the internet have much of.

I'm learning that the trolls have so often bombarded you guys that you suspect everyone of being a troll, even if they're sincere. You don't believe them, and nothing they say or do will convince you otherwise.

I'm sorry that they have damaged you to this extent.

William Pietri

@GuyDudeman Lots of people who act like you believe they're sincere. The tell is their refusal to examine what they do or how it impacts people. What they're sincere about is ultimately just themselves.

Pout all you want, but I've seen this scam run 100 times. I'm only responding now to help other people know they don't have to take people acting like you at face value.

Your actions show you don't care about racism. About how your behaviors support racism. People can look past your drama and see that in your old posts. They don't have to listen to me here.

Lord Hurkle-Durkle :bc:

@williampietri

Feel free to peruse my entire catalog of old posts. I think you'll actually be surprised to find out how wrong you are about me.

> refusal to examine what they do or how it impacts people

Curious how you're expecting someone to do that, exactly? What is expected of someone to show that they have/are doing that?

Especially if they don't understand exactly what they did that was so wrong in the first place?

>Your actions show you don't care about racism.

What actions in particular? Trying to communicate the fact that I AM anti-racist?

Trying to clarify text communication? That shows that I don't care about racism?

> how your behaviors support racism.

Again, spell it out please. I don't know what I'm doing wrong.

William Pietri

@GuyDudeman Again, no. You demonstrate no willingness to learn. If you were sincere, you'd be figuring that out on your own.

The Nexus of Privacy

@williampietri yeah. @rysiek and I and several others have also spent time trying to deal with him, and @inquiline (who's been observing it all) has called for a fediblock.

I and others have reported a couple of his posts, but the beige.party moderators unsurprisingly haven't done anything. And he's getting support from others on beige.party. I wonder if it makes sense to increase the visibility of this to put more pressure on beige.party to do something about it and raise the bar here against sealioning in general?