Their recent €600k+ grant to Mastodon is a great example of what public investment in open digital infrastructure can look like. It strengthens the Fediverse, a real alternative to X. As I’ve argued in the #LeaveX campaign: we already have a viable social media alternative to X (1) and what we lack is sustained funding and political commitment. (2)

Thus, if more EU countries invested in improving Mastodon, how quickly could it become Europe’s de facto public square?

While most European politicians still prefer X for their official communication, reducing technical barriers could attract a more diverse audience, including the people our representatives want to reach, like journalists and the general public.

By the way, it's interesting, though not surprising, that the Sovereign Tech Agency has almost four times as many followers on Mastodon as on Bluesky. It would be great to see them highlighting posts and profiles of some awesome open-source projects active on the Fediverse.

#Mastodon #Fediverse #Bluesky #SocialMedia #EU #OpenSource