We are excited to share that we are beginning work on a new onboarding experiment for #Mastodon: Default Server Recommendations.
Our intent for this experiment is to recommend the closest server geographically that is in the correct language during the sign-up flow. We will be running this experiment on our iOS and Android apps only to start.
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@Mastodon ideally combined with personal interests, right? (as long as there are enough servers to choose from) 😎🌈👩💻🌳
@sunnythesheep @Mastodon for this experiment we are looking to partner with general-purpose servers. But this is just one experiment, not the only experiment! We’ll be looking at how we can help with special-interest server discovery soon.
@FediTips you should boost this to the admins of servers you have recommended on http://fedi.garden
I've posted about this on my other account @homegrown which is for people who run their own servers, and boosted it on here to get it a bit more visible. Hopefully that gets the word out to admins 🙂
@Mastodon good idea!
"Correct language": Does it mean the favourite language that people choose individually in their preferences (but for which they need an instance) or official language of a country/region? Asking for all the multi-language migrants, bilingual regions, and foreign-language prefering people.
(The reason we’re starting with the apps and not the web is because the necessary data to run this experiment is already provided through the app store. It is more complicated to do this right for the web, and we want to think carefully about how to do this in a way that respects privacy.)
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The experiment will be designed to ensure that server admins remain in control: meaning they will have the power opt-in and opt-out as needed, or reduce the percentage of sign-ups flowing their way.
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Starting now, we’re recruiting general purpose servers with open sign-ups. To be eligible, servers must:
- Run default Mastodon (for now)
- Agree to the Server Covenant
- Have existed for 1+ year
- Have shut-down & disaster plans
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@Mastodon besides geographical location, are there going to be any filters for like, interests or core topics etc?
A gardening and plant instance is going to have a different vibe from the software/hardware developer instance, etc.
It would be a neat to be a part of this, but only if relevant users/signups are being directed.
@colinstu it says "general purpose servers". So no special interests servers or topical servers are gonna be able to participate in this feature (at the moment).
@Mastodon This is a link to the server covenant:
https://joinmastodon.org/covenant
One important question – and one we’ve discussed together – is which definition of antisemitism are you going with? I’d appreciate it if you could state the decision you’ve reached on this publicly. Crucially, is it one that conflates opposition to Zionism, Israel, and the ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people with being bigoted against Jewish people or not? This is key in knowing whether only Zionist, pro-Israel, pro-genocide Mastodon servers will be featured in recommendations or not.
I feel like by asking this question you're — inadvertently — legitimizing zionism by implying that the conflation of antisemitism with antizionism is a credible definition of that word.
Personally, I assume that antisemitism means antisemitism unless I have reason to believe otherwise.
@potatoes_fall It’s not a credible definition of the word but it is a *legally accepted* one in certain jurisdictions and it is essential that we know what is meant – in this specific context – by a term that is so widely and so willfully misunderstood so we understand what exactly the effects of this initiative will be and whether we should be in support of it or in opposition to it.
@Mastodon do you mean entirely open sign-ups (i.e. prone to spam accounts) or accepting sign-ups that get manually approved by a human? 
For this experiment, that is correct. We are looking to partner with servers that have open sign-ups. But we've heard the feedback that spam is going to be a big issue for many servers to participate, so our team is going to discuss what we can do about that next week.
