With all the tiktok drama I have been telling people Mastodon is still here and kicking!!
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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
I know it will sound weird, but I dislike the name. Mastodon. It evokes very negative words and concepts in my brain.
This is not a strong argument, but it is one I haven’t seen in the other comments. -
@futurebird @Phosphenes @bovaz @aurochs
I think part of the NORC-ness of Fedi is that the Venn diagram of people who've been around long enough to grok the value of privacy, & of people older than N, is a circle.You can bring a GenX to the facts about privacy & freedom from the oligarchy's algorithms, but you can't make them give a $#!+.
Y'know, like horse... water... drink.
@kelvin0mql As a GenX, I can't be made to give a shit about anything I don't have a stake in, and every stake I have ever had in anything was later taken away, without compensation or apology. Even now, I fully expect my race to retirement to be like Xeno's Paradox. When I'm 67, they'll raise the age to 70. When I'm 69, they'll raise it to 72. When I'm 71, they'll raise it to 75. When I'm 74, they'll arrest me for serial arson and armed robbery, and raise it to 78.
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@bitpickup oh wow who are they?
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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 Other than leaving friends and family behind, I'd say it's because it is harder to get down in the mud and wrestle with the pigs here. To me, that's a desirable feature, not one to "fix."
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@bitpickup oh wow who are they?
(that answer didn't fit to well, depending on the platform that displays it)
Like to say "Erik's father"
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@mattdm @futurebird @aurochs Wouldn't an easy way to setup bots that boost according to your algorithm largely do it?
@dalias @mattdm @futurebird @aurochs it is somewhat nicer to be able to pin it to a tab than have it mixed in with your main timeline.
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@dalias @mattdm @futurebird @aurochs it is somewhat nicer to be able to pin it to a tab than have it mixed in with your main timeline.
@vathpela @mattdm @futurebird @aurochs I think you can use lists for this: can't you set list members not to show up in your home feed?
Not that it wouldn't be nicer to have a more direct way to achieve these things that doesn't require making unconventional use of other Mastodon features.
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@vathpela @mattdm @futurebird @aurochs I think you can use lists for this: can't you set list members not to show up in your home feed?
Not that it wouldn't be nicer to have a more direct way to achieve these things that doesn't require making unconventional use of other Mastodon features.
@dalias @mattdm @futurebird @aurochs I'm really not sure - but yeah the question isn't if you can do it here, the question is if it's easy and approachable.
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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 Other consideration is that it might work better to match users with ActivityPub options that are a better fit for their style. Example:
I bounced off Mastodon (twice even), but liked Friendica. Friendica's features were more in line with the experience I liked coming from Facebook (long form, ability to hyper curate contacts and permissions, groups functionality). My partner bounced off Friendica and Mastodon, they liked Pixelfed because it was similar to Insta (heavily picture focused). My friend hated all three of those they attached to Piefed because they liked Reddit. But we all follow each other and other Mastodon users.
The features and experience available from each of the commerical centralized social media platforms differs, and thus we cant expect people to successfully onboard into a social option that isn't omnivorous. When you see someone leaving a commerical platform, you have to take into account why they were using that specific one and whether Mastodon even offers the functionality that they liked. (Foot note: and none of us cared about "what the algorithm chose to show us". We cared about the nature of how we could interact)
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@taylorlorenz please stop telling people about Mastodon. They might actually listen one day and all come here and ruin it for us hahaha
@phocks @taylorlorenz LOL yes
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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 you love this app yet you only use it for promotion and never engage with the users here? Are we too nice? Do we need to be more drama slop focused?? Jk, keep that shit on Twitter and Reddit.
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@bitpickup @OrionKidder @taylorlorenz Maybe she has already paid some money (to Mastodon).
I don't think just setting up an instance will attract more users from other place, but thank you for mentioning. It's indeed very cheap. If one day my current instance somehow discontinue, I would consider setting up one on my own.
Personally I see this as a place to make new friends. I don’t expect people I already know to use it for they think there’s no clear benefit.
@RadND
You didn't get my point.People subcribe to NY Times for access to publications and comment section. In the fedi @taylorlorenz can do the same, let people create profiles for a subscription fee. That includes access or early access to publications.
For single user instances check out friendica, it's a trillion times more powerfull than mastodon.
Journalist's should setup their own friendica server and a mastodon instance for their supporters, castoPod for their podcast.
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@taylorlorenz please stop telling people about Mastodon. They might actually listen one day and all come here and ruin it for us hahaha
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Answering this in the off chance you read replies 🤪
Biggest barrier to courting new users: we are culturally hostile here to influence peddlers and people who are trying to broadcast and don't want to interact. (ie, we treat them like the person invited to the small cocktail party at the house, who jumps up on a table and starts yelling).
Technically, users are used to being force fed content (through viral algorithms and suggested content)... i.e. passive (like TV). Mastodon is not built like that, which means people don't know how to find things they like or people to follow.
Finally (deliberately so), Mastodon is not built to tickle the endorphins... i.e. "likes" "followers" "virality" and that often turns people off, who really would like to use social media like a gambling junkie uses a slot machine (pull the lever, hope for a big payoff!). Fundamentally, non-addictive to that kind of thing.
I don't know if we want to fix any of that, though 🤪
@taylorlorenz @ai6yr Yeah and also there's the racism. The lack of safety features like limiting replies. But if we solved the racism we'd have solved the other safety issues too because Black people don't hang around when it's not safe for them.
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Answering this in the off chance you read replies 🤪
Biggest barrier to courting new users: we are culturally hostile here to influence peddlers and people who are trying to broadcast and don't want to interact. (ie, we treat them like the person invited to the small cocktail party at the house, who jumps up on a table and starts yelling).
Technically, users are used to being force fed content (through viral algorithms and suggested content)... i.e. passive (like TV). Mastodon is not built like that, which means people don't know how to find things they like or people to follow.
Finally (deliberately so), Mastodon is not built to tickle the endorphins... i.e. "likes" "followers" "virality" and that often turns people off, who really would like to use social media like a gambling junkie uses a slot machine (pull the lever, hope for a big payoff!). Fundamentally, non-addictive to that kind of thing.
I don't know if we want to fix any of that, though 🤪
@ai6yr @taylorlorenz It is refreshing for me that it is not status or achievement (tick) centric. Gives wider scope for critical thinking.
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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 i am so glad I didn't get tiktok account now.
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@OrionKidder @bitpickup @taylorlorenz additionally pressuring people to open their own instance from the start will inevitably lead to poorly moderated instances, or people giving up and leaving dead instances, which does not help anyone.
Hope you don't mind if I don't feel addressed by your statements as they don't refer in any way to what I expressed.
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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 The ability to make custom Feeds is my favorite thing about BlueSky! Overall tho, they seem to be a "power user" feature; the vast majority of people only use the "default" ones (chronological "Following", and an algorithmic one that's trained by your interactions and interest tags) and fewer still actually build their own.
I think they're a great feature, but I don't think they'd draw many younger users.
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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?
Recommending Mastodon as a TikTok replacement is nonsensical; like saying "I'm sorry your Honda Accord has died, but you can get a street sweeper."
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@Beldarak @taylorlorenz on my phone, I've been using Tusky. I found multiple apps for Mastodon on Google play, and just went with the one that seemed to have the best rating at the time.
Yeah, I really don't think chosing the app is a big barrier.
To me the biggest obstacle is chosing an instance, understanding how instances interract with each others and the begining when you're stuck in your very small bubble and have to extend outside of it.
For the longest time, I tought Mastodon had very few users and was a very dead platform. I had no understanding that I actually couldn't see the whole thing. I'm still a little confused about that
