With all the tiktok drama I have been telling people Mastodon is still here and kicking!!
-
With all the tiktok drama I have been telling people Mastodon is still here and kicking!! I love this app and I really think the decentralized model is the best for social media.
Still, people don’t want to join! What do you think Mastodon’s biggest barriers are to courting new users? What could be done to improve the product and grow the user base in a positive way?
@taylorlorenz Lack of search. Inability to click on a user’s follows/following and see who they follow/are following.
-
A feed creation tool could have options such as:
* Include/exclude these hash tags
* Include/exclude these users... but only if -- condition is met.
* Always pull a post with an image from, for example -- talented artist/photographer
* Never show two posts from the same user in a row.
* Include trending posts, but only if it's not/is "US pol" (for example)Make a tool to design an algo, let us give them cute names, let people vote and argue about which ones are the best.
@futurebird@sauropods.win @aurochs@todon.eu that sounds similar to misskey antennas, but those don't really work for me and I don't know why. -
Curating content is real work. Tiktok didn't talk about it a lot but they put a great deal of effort into making the first experience users had with the app fun.
Showing them things they'd never seen before that were funny, or exciting ... using the spy data to tailor it to the particular user. Using the way the user scrolled to improve that experience.
-
Curating content is real work. Tiktok didn't talk about it a lot but they put a great deal of effort into making the first experience users had with the app fun.
Showing them things they'd never seen before that were funny, or exciting ... using the spy data to tailor it to the particular user. Using the way the user scrolled to improve that experience.
I think most people here find that kind of tracking and filtering a little creepy? But, it was also very convenient.
Over here we are like "follow two-dozen hash tags, and 300 people and then MAYBE your feed will be kind of interesting." Alternately? Here is the fire hose of your server's feed with 200 posts from the same person. Or the global feed which is just chaos.
Can we respect the art and craft of curating content? Can we make it a human thing?
-
@futurebird@sauropods.win @aurochs@todon.eu that sounds similar to misskey antennas, but those don't really work for me and I don't know why.
For better or worse mastodon has primary influence over what features are "really" a part of the fedi.
I feel they are far too adverse to change and stuck on pleasing existing users, not making the app, more accessible and popular.
There is this *false* idea that being popular is the same thing as being corporately captured, driven by a desire for profits, ads.
There are other good reasons to want your app to be fun and popular. Not esoteric and exclusive.
-
@taylorlorenz Lack of search. Inability to click on a user’s follows/following and see who they follow/are following.
@gloriousnoise @taylorlorenz I can view a user's follows/following.... (I'm just using the mobile website).
-
@gloriousnoise @taylorlorenz I can view a user's follows/following.... (I'm just using the mobile website).
Right, it’s a user’s choice regarding what show. Which I think is fair.
-
For better or worse mastodon has primary influence over what features are "really" a part of the fedi.
I feel they are far too adverse to change and stuck on pleasing existing users, not making the app, more accessible and popular.
There is this *false* idea that being popular is the same thing as being corporately captured, driven by a desire for profits, ads.
There are other good reasons to want your app to be fun and popular. Not esoteric and exclusive.
For one thing, if your app is popular it can be because the UI is easy to use and the design is excellent.
Equally important? You can only build diverse, resilient communities if you can bring a wide range of users together. That cross-pollination between otherwise desperate communities is the magic of social media for me.
I often call the fedi "a nice college town" and it even has an HOA (an HOA that gets huffy and offended if you point out they are acting like an HOA)
-
What if we had a kind of mini-app where users could create their own algorithms and then share combine and trade them?
I might design a mix of hashtags, users, and hand picked posts and call it "Ant News" someone else might pick a group of users and hash tags and create "Italian Football Bloopers"
Then we could share and rate these feeds and new users could just click on the popular ones?
@futurebird @aurochs A plugin algorithm system would be great. Selection, ordering, etc. Default algorithm of all posts that you follow in chronological order, but it would be excellent to put other things into too.
From such simple things as "skip posts with images without alt text" to "show me a weighted random selection by favs of the recent posts in these hashtags".
-
I think most people here find that kind of tracking and filtering a little creepy? But, it was also very convenient.
Over here we are like "follow two-dozen hash tags, and 300 people and then MAYBE your feed will be kind of interesting." Alternately? Here is the fire hose of your server's feed with 200 posts from the same person. Or the global feed which is just chaos.
Can we respect the art and craft of curating content? Can we make it a human thing?
@futurebird@sauropods.win @aurochs@todon.eu The analogy I keep falling back to when describing my ideal "social network platform" is a porch.
I choose what gets on my porch. I can see what's on the road over there, and what's on my neighbors porches. Maybe I'm interested in some of that, so I'd like it on my porch as well. But the stuff I definitely don't care about, definitely can't get on my porch without my explicit consent.
I think properly crafted human curation is a big part of that. -
With all the tiktok drama I have been telling people Mastodon is still here and kicking!! I love this app and I really think the decentralized model is the best for social media.
Still, people don’t want to join! What do you think Mastodon’s biggest barriers are to courting new users? What could be done to improve the product and grow the user base in a positive way?
@taylorlorenz In USA it is for sure artists and sports, it's a religion basically.
-
With all the tiktok drama I have been telling people Mastodon is still here and kicking!! I love this app and I really think the decentralized model is the best for social media.
Still, people don’t want to join! What do you think Mastodon’s biggest barriers are to courting new users? What could be done to improve the product and grow the user base in a positive way?
@taylorlorenz the biggest barrier to join Mastodon is having more than two functioning neurons.
You know that's becoming rarer and rarer.
Ask yourself if you do really want the hordes of monocellular organisms to flood in? -
For better or worse mastodon has primary influence over what features are "really" a part of the fedi.
I feel they are far too adverse to change and stuck on pleasing existing users, not making the app, more accessible and popular.
There is this *false* idea that being popular is the same thing as being corporately captured, driven by a desire for profits, ads.
There are other good reasons to want your app to be fun and popular. Not esoteric and exclusive.
@futurebird@sauropods.win it still feels like those shouldn't be mutually exclusive. It's likely hard to achieve them at once without enough resources, but if a fedi project ever gets truly big it seems like the type of thing that would actually want to invest in doing this. Have sane easy to use defaults to keep a as a low barrier to entry as possible, but still allow easy tinkering and especially weird fancy features for those who want them.
Granted, building weird stuff on top of a system that was intentionally built with the idea to be very simple is a hard initative. But unlike corporate controlled systems, where each decisions needs to pass through a "is this good for profits through customer capture" filter, decentralized services can choose to add things just because they're cool and people will enjoy them.
@bovaz@misskey.social @aurochs@todon.eu -
@futurebird@sauropods.win @aurochs@todon.eu The analogy I keep falling back to when describing my ideal "social network platform" is a porch.
I choose what gets on my porch. I can see what's on the road over there, and what's on my neighbors porches. Maybe I'm interested in some of that, so I'd like it on my porch as well. But the stuff I definitely don't care about, definitely can't get on my porch without my explicit consent.
I think properly crafted human curation is a big part of that.Right now the people we choose to follow are doing that curation. And it works OK. If you follow enough people. If you weed out your list on the regular.
Most people do not want to do this just to see some social media posts and relax. I think it's a mistake to act like this is unreasonable. And it's a disservice to people posting great content here who are invisible. Why make good content if no one will see it?
I could be easier. It would make this a more welcoming place.
-
For one thing, if your app is popular it can be because the UI is easy to use and the design is excellent.
Equally important? You can only build diverse, resilient communities if you can bring a wide range of users together. That cross-pollination between otherwise desperate communities is the magic of social media for me.
I often call the fedi "a nice college town" and it even has an HOA (an HOA that gets huffy and offended if you point out they are acting like an HOA)
@futurebird @bovaz @aurochs I genuinely wonder as well whether Mastodon is necessarily always the best gateway for newbies joining the Fediverse?
For some people, it might be better to point them to Pixelfed.social to get them started. Or if they're moving off TikTok, perhaps even loops.video once it becomes a bit more mature? ( @dansup has done a great job with them IMHO, btw!)
Perhaps Piefed or Lemmy if they want to discuss a particular topic? -
@futurebird@sauropods.win @aurochs@todon.eu that sounds similar to misskey antennas, but those don't really work for me and I don't know why.
@bovaz
I was thinking the same. I thought those were very good when I trialled CalcKey
@aurochs @futurebird -
For one thing, if your app is popular it can be because the UI is easy to use and the design is excellent.
Equally important? You can only build diverse, resilient communities if you can bring a wide range of users together. That cross-pollination between otherwise desperate communities is the magic of social media for me.
I often call the fedi "a nice college town" and it even has an HOA (an HOA that gets huffy and offended if you point out they are acting like an HOA)
I understand the fear and revulsion some feel from the words
"we need to make the fediverse popular"
Most of the time when apps push to be popular it's about making money, it's about converting eyeballs to IPO as @pluralistic has so clearly described in his theory of #enshittification
And YET: "popular" also means more egalitarian "for everyone" --I don't need to see a conversation about 'Italian Football Bloopers', but I want it to be here too.
-
I think most people here find that kind of tracking and filtering a little creepy? But, it was also very convenient.
Over here we are like "follow two-dozen hash tags, and 300 people and then MAYBE your feed will be kind of interesting." Alternately? Here is the fire hose of your server's feed with 200 posts from the same person. Or the global feed which is just chaos.
Can we respect the art and craft of curating content? Can we make it a human thing?
Yep I'd like my own private bird dog algorithm to sniff out feeds that match my tastes. It could even run on my own desktop computer and not bother anyone else. Trading them like baseball cards does sound fun.
Regarding OP question about why Mastodon is still small:
1. Obvious network effects. Nobody's there so nobody's there. This will slowly improve. (But the people who *are* here are really interesting!)
2. Not a business so no marketing.
-
@futurebird @bovaz @aurochs I genuinely wonder as well whether Mastodon is necessarily always the best gateway for newbies joining the Fediverse?
For some people, it might be better to point them to Pixelfed.social to get them started. Or if they're moving off TikTok, perhaps even loops.video once it becomes a bit more mature? ( @dansup has done a great job with them IMHO, btw!)
Perhaps Piefed or Lemmy if they want to discuss a particular topic?Even if mastodon isn't the gateway they have power over what features are "standard" -- for example quote tweets existed for years before they were added to mastodon. But they are only now gaining traction.
I'm not on .social I'm on this little side server, but the choices there still mater. And maybe this is a weakness of the whole system.
-
Right now the people we choose to follow are doing that curation. And it works OK. If you follow enough people. If you weed out your list on the regular.
Most people do not want to do this just to see some social media posts and relax. I think it's a mistake to act like this is unreasonable. And it's a disservice to people posting great content here who are invisible. Why make good content if no one will see it?
I could be easier. It would make this a more welcoming place.
@futurebird
@bovaz @aurochs
I like the ideas in this thread! I have been planning to make a fork of GotoSocial with some sort of open-source algorithm (mostly because I can't keep up with my home feed). But, I thought that maybe this would be "not well received" by the people in the fediverse.
This thread has encouraged me to start (also the fact that I was laid off on Monday and so now have time to work on it). I like all of these ideas and will try to incorporate them (though I will start as simple as possible).
Thanks!
