@taylorlorenz Here's my best shot: https://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/202x/2025/11/03/Time-to-Migrate from which
1/2 ”Have you noticed that social-media products, in the long term, can’t seem to manage to stay fun and safe and useful? I have. But there’s one huge exception, a tool that’s been serving billions of us for decades, and works about as well as it ever did. I’m talking about email.
@taylorlorenz if you go through US immigration, they're not going to ask to see your Mastodon account.
> Why decentralized social media is better, especially re: Mastodon
It matters that you’re here now
The draw for me to get into social media is that I pay to read TheAtlantic, like my mother’s mother before me. So I keep an eye open for people who write well there. 21 of the 934 people I follow at Twitter follow you at Twitter. I don’t follow you yet, but long ago I learned to feel glad any time I hear from you
Now you’re here too. It’s your words I’m looking for. You and Karen Swallow Prior and Heather Cox Richardson and Derek Thompson and so on. Thinking well and writing well
I’m in mid life. I don’t make time to watch video or look through photos. I’ve paid zero dollars to Substack. But I want to read great texts. And you put some of yours here
Where will you lead us next?
Is this the core of your question? Taylor Swift’s I’ve found the problem and it is me, as with G K Chesterton before her?
@taylorlorenz every other attempt at social media out there is essentially "what it we tried capitalism again! It's *our brand* of capitalism, it'll be different", whereas decentralized social media is "let's try anarchist social media this time. It'll take work on our part, but it won't have the same systemic issues as that other stuff".
It's run by volunteers and rich perverts who want to rule the world don't get a dime from it.
@taylorlorenz When your instance gets taken over by a fascist, you can just change your instance and still be in the same network with mostly the same people. Bonus point the fascist instance gets blocked if your instance admins have any integrity.
@taylorlorenz @JonChevreau so many of the replies here are reactive: lists full of "no" and 'not' and "free from". It's like digging q big hole, with all the thrown-out descriptors littering the ground outside. It still leaves a hole, though; none of it actually describes the pleasure and value we *enjoy* on Fedi. That's harder to describe, but worth the time.
Describe how one *enjoys posts* in their feed. The pleasure of chitchat, discovery, new like-minded peers , slow thoughtful conversation
@taylorlorenz
My take on it would be:
- no ads
- culture overall against AI slop
- no black-box algorithm
- you create a profile where the rules suit you, while still being connected to the rest of the network
- ... which means it somewhat reflects better how diverse we are. Not "one size fits all" behemoth.
- you can move if things change
- not designed to be adictive, milk your data and drain your wallet
@taylorlorenz I just made a mastodon account 6 days ago. I have way more options for how my account looks with skins and multicolumn layout right in settings (instead of a third party app), drill just got suspended and the response from the frazee was basically "oh, did I do that?". i'm not a fan of snotty little shits banning people for nebulous posts.
@taylorlorenz I'm somewhat new, this far what I notice is: the vibes are not off. On other social networks I feel like a consumer. I scroll. I'm even afraid to post at all. There is a lightness to the place.
@taylorlorenz @mudaste Say something like "I'm happy to answer this question repeatedly for multiple news channels as I'm sure we all appreciate having a common but diverse environment where many points of view can come from different sources..."
@taylorlorenz Amusement parks are great, but you're just a visitor passing through. A public playground is where you can meet your neighbours, kids grow up together, and the community decides if they want to add a swing set.
@taylorlorenz
The fediverse and its largest apps mastodon, lemmy, peertube and pixelfed have corpoverse cousins that they replace. In this case thats twitter, reddit, youtube and instagram.
On the fediverse all these platforms work together and you can comment with one on the other. You also have actual free speech, meaning you have no central moderation pushing an agenda. You can move freely between servers and even start your own with the rules you deem best.
Thats my pitch to onboard folks.
@taylorlorenz i would personally focus on how fedi, by its nature, is moderated by real people with a real stake in their community. i think much of why this platform is better than corporate platforms is moderation via social contract
I tend to argue with the infamous Enshittification cycle:
Commercial platforms are initially good for users until they capture the market. Then they make things worse for users in order to sell them out to other commercial interests. Then they make things worse for their business partners too in order to make more money.
Decentralized, non-commercial media avoid this trap:
They have no financial motive to make the user experience worse.
And if a specific instance does get worse, their users can move elsewhere and take their social media connections with them.
Thus, decentralized, non-commercial social media can actually get _better_ over time, while commercial "walled gardens" will only get worse over time.
@taylorlorenz Bottom-up governance means it serves you, not the other way around, and it's not profit-driven so there's no incentive for manipulation of users in the form of ads and algorithms.
@taylorlorenz @JonChevreau it's like browsing a mega-mall of professionals and niche hobbyists and artists and animal lovers and photographers and gardeners and solarpunks and writers and shit posters. Most importantly , very few choads. Like Twitter at its best but not commercialized and purely content driven.
Its like if you love pizza and have 1000 pizza shops to visit and choose from, instead of just one pizza shop that decides, one day, to start making lemonade.
It's monopoly vs diversity: fediversity.
@taylorlorenz It’s like email and phone numbers: you can interact with anyone regardless of the provider. Think a YouTube user chatting with a X user.
@taylorlorenz It's a bunch of communities of users that decide how to govern/moderate themselves, with no billionaire owner nor algorithmic manipulation.
By default, communities can talk and share with other communities, but if a community starts producing unsavoury or illegal content, like Xitter's CSAM image generation, a community can decide to cut off contact with the problematic community.
@taylorlorenz Dave Eggers answers those questions in his book, The Circle.
@taylorlorenz Imagine your social media posts are little articles in a newspaper. The newspaper decides what articles to promote and makes money off the ads around them. A person like Musk or Bezos can buy the newspaper and shape it to their liking.
Or imagine everyone had their own printing press and can publish their own papers, without any ad-based promotion. You’re free to move anywhere with your printing press and your subscribers are yours, and you can reach them wherever you set it up.
@taylorlorenz "It's a lot of fun, I make a regular donation to my instance host, and nobody's algorithm messes with my timeline"
@taylorlorenz It's like the FOSS (Free & Open Source Software) of social media.
Put in Audre Lorde's terms, it's not--like all the "mainstream" platforms are--"the master's tools."
@taylorlorenz it feels smaller, in a good way. Less performative, easier to choose the people with whom you interact. Larger platforms naturally become hierarchical, this place is more of a community as long as you're not trying to speak *at* people (my experience, anyway)
@taylorlorenz I really struggled to boil this down in a quote toot but I'll try for a boiled down answer here: it's ELON proof
and custom emojis
@taylorlorenz Because billionaires are sociopaths and cannot be trusted.
Keep it simple.
@taylorlorenz if nothing else its a blissful respite from the corporate and advertising hellscape that predominates the majority of the internet.
@taylorlorenz i have a take with respect to police work and surveillance. With decentralized networks, digital surveillance becomes unnecessary and criminal circles can be tracked in the traditional way, by infiltrating their Mastodon servers.
Finding criminal networks in a large centralized network requires scanning every single message and networks s can't be found so easily because the volume of random interactions and noise.
@taylorlorenz there's less censorship because content policies and their enforcement are made by your peers, not by corporations whose primary goal is profit and who are strongly incentivized to silence dissent of all kinds
@taylorlorenz every marginalized group has its own social norms which do not fully agree with anyone else's. corporate venues force everyone to be homogenous, so nobody gets to express themselves, which can become a serious problem when the topics being discussed pertain to major injustices.
@taylorlorenz fediverse platforms are like a table at the local weekend market: anyone can set one up, dirt cheap, little to no infrastructure, small audience, supported by other folks doing the same thing. Perfect place to sell your watercolours or canvas for support for adding speedbumps on that residential road that Uber has been directing drivers to take at 60km/h.
It's not Wal-Mart, it never will be, it doesn't want to be. It's different, and for a bunch of folks it's a lot better.
I usually lead with the concept that the infrastructure of the fediverse is controlled by its community, not a corporation.
The critical part is understanding that the constellation of servers where all this is hosted is owned (or atleast paid for and administrated by) people and not profit-seeking corporations.
@taylorlorenz
Social media with:
No ads
No algorithm
No oligarchs
@taylorlorenz Think writing and books. Humans have had writing for millennia, books for centuries. But it was the printing press that democratized the written word. The pamphlet and broadside replaced the tome and codices. With the passing of the monastic requirement of manual copy, suddenly the voices recorded were not solely those at the pinnacle of power. Decentralized, in a very important way, means all of us.
Your trust in posing the question to us makes the case: on the fediverse one may crowdsource knowledge without a commercially focused algorithm polluting the interaction with wasteful content.
@taylorlorenz No ads. That’s it.
@taylorlorenz No one can ever own it or sell it.
@taylorlorenz I would compare it to email. No one company owns all the email providers, but they all talk to each other.
@taylorlorenz No algo pushing content; community-based content moderation vs top-down; open-source, auditable software
@taylorlorenz Key item is: a platform not owned by billionaires, but by volunteers who aren't out to exploit you.
Actually one of the things that is better is that it's moderation is also decentralized. Thousands of people, users and server admins, contribute in an organic way to keep the content mostly civilized.
The fact that is not run for profit means no ads, & no algorithms to drive engagement. Those algorithms direct us towards content designed to enrage, because that has been found to (generally) be more engaging. It also brings out the worst in people, provoking angry reactive responses, rather than carefully considered ones.
Whilst instances vary & more work is required on the part of users to curate their feed, the result is often a much kinder & more respectful place. Robust discussions can & often do still occur.
And the fact is that we simply don’t care about follower numbers. There are some people I often chat to because we follow the same hashtags, but haven’t got around to following. It’s about people & connections, not statistics.
@taylorlorenz If you research washing machines online, Mastodon won’t start trying to sell you one.
@taylorlorenz You know how someone bought Twitter and it turned to 💩 overnight? That can't happen. I don't get ads every 5th post. Everything else is gravy after that.
@taylorlorenz No ads. My IG had become an insidious place just trying to sell me things and shuffle me through content. It wasn’t “social media” any more. Since coming here my screen time is down, my notifications are down, and my pick ups are down and yet I feel more connected to news, people, and myself. Funny how that works.
@taylorlorenz I compare it to email: no one can insert ads in your email. No one can force you to watch ads before reading your email. No one can buy emails.com and make it so everyone only gets Nazi emails. Why? Because email is just a protocol. No one owns email, and there are thousands and thousands of servers.
Mastodon is like email for social media.
@taylorlorenz I mean I, a random person, got to talk to a sitting US rep today, despite not even being his constituent, which is one of the things people love about social.
Works here to.
Nobody owns Mastodon, and there is no algorithm. In this era of algorithmic information warfare amplifying and suppressing everything, it is great to find a place where you are not constantly being manipulated by billionaire owners.
Why not corporate #socialmedia?
1. Algorithm - pushes specific ideology, causes depression in young adults, distorts reality.
2. Owners propagandise their ideology (see above)
3. Certain voices are censored, just like in communist China. YouTube kicked off Aljazera news. TikTok US censors anti- #ICE sentiment, anti-genocide voices.
4. At election time, owners and the wealthy change the outcome of actual elections with social media.
If you haven't seen the outstanding #fediverse promo video by @_elena (4m)
Highly recommend it;
@taylorlorenz No censorship. No paranoia that comes with wondering whether your posts are being suppressed. No algorithm changes that limit your reach.
@taylorlorenz I like the ability to community build. Like a mesh of relationships and connections I am a part of, as opposed to the influencer-follower paradigm of commercial social platforms.
Toots are little touches that connect, not commodities to be consumed.
@taylorlorenz As an American it is safer for me, also I get to see more of the world than just U.S.
@taylorlorenz Social media is too important to leave in the hands of one of the billionaire assholes that can shadowban or kick you off with a whim if you annoy them or go against one of their pet causes.
There's no black box algorithm that the billionaires can nudge to affect your thinking or mood (as Facebook admitted experimenting on us with)
You're not held hostage to network effects after enshittification.
They're not trying to monetize your outrage and misinformation.
@taylorlorenz Well, for me it's quite simple, really.
On other networks, I feel manipulated by algorythms that may or may not have hidden agendas (but somehow it seems to me they always end up having them, sooner or later).
Here, I don't.
And that's absolutely freeing.
@taylorlorenz
* it's easier to "find your tribe" of people sharing common interests or geography - broad by server, narrow by following hashtags.
* Can only speak personally, as a woman I''ve experienced by far the least harassment/spam on Mastodon of any platforms and any abusive accounts reported have been dealt with very promptly. Feels 'safer' than other platforms.
@taylorlorenz
No American (or other) CEOs, nor algorithms, to tell you what to think !
It takes more work on Mastodon to find what you want, but it's not actually hard. You just don't spoon fed similar things once you view a category of content.
And once you get going, you will get the information you want in your feed, and are always free to explore to find (and instantly add) new content/interests.
But NO SINGLE ENTITY controls your content.
@taylorlorenz the fediverse feels like the neighborhood of better days. When you ask for help, you get it. When you need support, you get it. You can share and discuss your thoughts, learn and improve. This is media becoming social. This is how it should be.
Community not business. This is the real thing.
@taylorlorenz Billionaires don't own it, and they never can.
I reckon the federated nature allows each instance to balance the social media aspects appropriately:
- funding
- moderation
- connectivity
These are all determined instance by instance.
So if one finds a good instance that supports their style, and contributes $ to its upkeep, then it will provide everything one could want.
@taylorlorenz The open social web brings the same benefit the open web once did: nobody owns it, so nobody can take it away. On centralized platforms, your speech exists at the pleasure of a private entity's business model — they can change the rules, throttle your reach, or shut you down overnight. The fediverse puts that power back in your hands: you own your presence, you choose and build your own community with no intermediaries, and no single entity can pull the plug on you, or them.
@taylorlorenz - On the fediverse, you're not the product. The sucker product.
@taylorlorenz some points
You aren't being manipulated by the platform or coerced into impulsive behaviour, although you can still trap yourself into it.
It's often a bit of a mess but it's "our mess", the sense of ownership has some legitimacy.
It only dies when people don't want it any more, not when investors want their payday.
The "low virality" means anyone is as big a deal as anyone else.
It's slower, but it's also more relaxed.
Being bad for marketing has its upside.
- no ads.
- no ad tracking!
- no billionaire owner.
- no "responsibility" towards shareholders (read: line must go up)
- the different platforms interact!! You can follow someone's photo sharing account (say, pixelfed - "Instagram", kinda) from your Friendica ("Facebook," kinda) account. #interop is cool
@taylorlorenz it's not owned by billionairs, it's not owned by anyone. if more time, get to the community of communities thing, how orgs can own their content on it and not depend on others, and still be part of the network, as anyone else.
i think people focus too much on the added complexity, not enough on what this complexity buys us.
Looking to grow your income through smart trading? 📈
CaltexChain Trading Investment Company offers reliable investment opportunities with professional guidance.
If you’re interested in getting started or want more details, send us a message on WhatsApp:
+1 (804) 208-9874
@taylorlorenz Here's my best shot: https://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/202x/2025/11/03/Time-to-Migrate from which
1/2 ”Have you noticed that social-media products, in the long term, can’t seem to manage to stay fun and safe and useful? I have. But there’s one huge exception, a tool that’s been serving billions of us for decades, and works about as well as it ever did. I’m talking about email.
2/3 Why does email stay reasonably healthy? Because nobody owns it. Anyone on any server can communicate with anyone else on any other and it Just Works. Nobody can buy it and make it a vehicle for their politics. Nobody can crank up the ad density or make things worse to improve their profit margin.
@taylorlorenz
3/3 Mastodon’s like email that way. Plus it does all the Post and Repost and Quote and Follow and Reply and Like and Block stuff that you’re used to, and there are thousands of servers and anyone can run one and nobody can own the whole thing. It doesn’t have ads and it won’t. It’s dead easy to use and it’s fun and you should give it a try.
@timbray @taylorlorenz Plus one on the email analogy. Email is about as complicated as Mastodon. Email has its problems just like mastodon but it’s still a remarkably useful and resilient tool that no one company controls. I can email anyone from any email provider. I can’t say the same for social media.
@taylorlorenz "Nobody controls the network. It's like email. If GMail loses their mind and starts inserting Republican propaganda everywhere, you might have to switch to Hotmail, but you can still use email. You can still email the people you used to email. It's not like you have to keep using GMail hating it more and more every day because this one single company is the only way you can email anybody."
@taylorlorenz You get to keep a sane distance from Satan’s merchants on earth for one thing
@taylorlorenz I usually start by explaining the chronological feed with no publicity; then, that it's not a platform, but a software run in many different places, so there is no one owner; then, I circle back to the fact that there are no algorithms choosing what you see on your feed.
I have the feeling I'm not persuasive enough, so I would love to hear other strategies.
@taylorlorenz Profit isn't a motivating factor. Admins create and maintain instances because they want them to exist and other people to benefit from their existence.
I get why they call it a "decentralized network" but that description was kind of a turn off for me before I came here because I thought you were trapped in a little server with a few dozen people and what's the point of that?
The power is decentralized but the communication need not be. You can talk to anyone from any community. You can have all of those fun instances of cross pollination when different communities intersect.
The more the fedi grows the better this gets.
There are no ads.
There are no bots*
There is no secret algorithm controlled by strange billionaires and/or creeps trying to push agendas**
It's really fun and interactive and you meet great people, real individual people.
*Ya'll are such nerds you are going to bring up the good bots that we made and like, but you know exactly what I mean by this.
**ant propaganda doesn't count I'm not that rich either
@taylorlorenz Freedom. Free from algorithms. Free from the whims of an owner. It's people connecting as they see fit.
@taylorlorenz I see a lot of good responses. One contextual element is who is asking, and I think there are good answers that fit more for organizations. You can build a media platform that no one can take away from you. If you share a link to your post, no one will see a login wall. If i were an org, news outlet, or something like a very socially engaged regional music collective, i think the robust control of your platform actually means something important.
@taylorlorenz Because independent app developers can add features to decentralized social networking that vastly enhance the experience. Both the ability to follow hashtags and timed mutes are absolutely genius and are the reason I'm not on Bluesky. What new, totally kicksss things are going to be created for the Fediverse next week?
IMO the 'free speech' trope has been used to flood billionaires' platforms w hate speech & AI-generated deepfake porn that isn't tolerated on my Fediverse server
I'm here less for freedom TO spew whatever I want & more for freedom FROM algorithms, ads, & someone's profit motive determining what I see. I'm here for Solidarity & Movement Building & learning from people all over the world like @pluralistic & @popcornreel & @StillRise1967
Also for #CatsOfMastodon & #HashtagGames 🙆🏻♀️
@taylorlorenz No corporate overlord mining your data and then using it to dictate what's in your feed.
@taylorlorenz I own my social media feed and my community. It feels like a local pub with friends where I share rumours and stories. Not attention seeking circus club.
@taylorlorenz It’s a more authentic experience on here, they monitor bots and eradicate them, troll like replies trying to influence, steer your original post with a negative connotation just don’t happen. It’s less commercialised. A chair, chat and cup of tea, kinder experience.
@taylorlorenz
Facebook has for years blocked links to my own blog, and now to news websites. Mastodon doesn't do that, and you can also keep your content, so Meta can't delete it all including your photos and friend connections.
@taylorlorenz On the old centralized platforms, everyone's in the same building with the same landlord, if the landlord is shitty (of course they are) everyone suffers. On decentralized media, there are tons of buildings with different landlords, and you can even build your own house. If your landlord sucks, you move.
@taylorlorenz The most important part for me is that this is not yet another "cloud app" where one entity controls everything: your account, what you see, the client applications, etc., but a protocol, where you can use whatever compatible software you want, even multiple.
It makes feature rollout difficult, but it's a massive safety feature in my opinion. If Mastodon gGmbH did something highly unpopular, all this software can feasibly choose to ignore it. They *cannot* force it on everyone.
@taylorlorenz I would mention the ridiculous censoring that is going on on YouTube right now and how centralised platforms will, eventually, be hostile towards themes that advertisers don't like, which is obviously adult content but also mental health, LGBTQ, and lots of other topics an advertiser doesn't want to be associated with. Instead of saying "unalived" to appease the platform, you can just say "murdered" on a decentralised platform that doesn't have to cater to advertisers.
@taylorlorenz I like Jefferson’s phrasing: “it neither picks my pocket nor breaks my arm” Technology that is not working actively to harm me and my loved ones is very appealing to me.
@taylorlorenz as a platform it is not and can never be adversarial or extractive to you as a user, the way twitter, Facebook, instagram, TikTok and others are or will be.
A lot of people complained when Instagram first switched from a chronological feed to an algorithmic one.
But I think the way forward for the fediverse is communities moving here wholesale like the forkiverse server did.
I don't think people will make accounts here otherwise unless they're the kind of nerd who's interested in this (in which case selling it is easy) or they have network effects which take a long time to build up.
@taylorlorenz Imagine a world without politicians, billionaires and bosses running everything, abusing everyone.
No ads and no algorithm.
Add a high signal to noise ratio.
On arrivsl you can move into the neighborhood you like best, and pay the rent you can.
Now take that world online, make it a social network, better, a social community.
You get Mastodon
@taylorlorenz It's the only social where you aren't the product. You aren't being force-fed content to promote someone else's interests.
@taylorlorenz
Non-profit, no algorithm, no ads. Decentralized means that you control how and where (mobility) you interact with the network, and there is not a single point of failure as there is within centralized social media.
@taylorlorenz “your words”. Not “your words as long as they conform to this week’s ketamine fuelled fetished cravings of the owning billionaires”
@taylorlorenz @tchambers You're not forced to use a specific website or a specific software to look at it, and then use it. Explaining what's federation and what's decentralization is very complex, especially to someone who uses internet passively - without knowing how it really works.
I always say that Fediverse is very difficult to be communicated, rather than used. You can't avoid explaining what "decentralization" really means. Despite blackout and similar stuff are more frequent, they don't see it as an immediate concern.
I always say that communicating Fediverse is like talking about U=U (Undetectable Untransmittable) referred to HIV prevention.
It's a very important concept for everyone's sex life. As it means that if you live with HIV and are in constant effective treatment, even without condom you can NEVER transmit virus to anyone. This destroys all 40 years old stigma we have, theoretically.
But you can't really explain this concept of UNDETECTABLE without explaining (at least the basis) of what VIRAL LOAD is. A concept that you can't give for granted.
@taylorlorenz Let me give this a try from a non-admin perspective.. 🤔
The Fediverse is a place on the internet where you can still meet interesting people from all over the world. Instead of uploading your contacts and following the same people over and over, on the Fediverse you discover new interests, info, help and support and everything you need in a HUMAN social network!
Sorry if it's a little long but im sure you can make something out of it! 💕
@taylorlorenz I just think it's great that you can get together with a few of your friends and run a Mastodon server for a few bucks a month.
Together, you are an independent entity, you set your own rules, but you are also part of something bigger, you can connect with many communities and individuals that the fediverse is made up of.
And that is pretty neat.
@taylorlorenz Not beholden to one person’s ownership, as in there’s no Elon who’s going to take over and change the whole Fediverse, or even Mastodon
Chronological timeline.
You drive the algorithm instead of it driving you
It's organized at its root level around what I want to see. That's the part nobody seems to get.
don't appeal to high mindedness
sell it
- no ads
- choose a server that fits your style, no one-size-fits-all straightjacket
- zero privacy defilement
- immunity to some racist edgelord techbro coming in, buying the thing, and turning it into bigot and ignorance paradise
Depending on the audience you could also mention the ants? Or don't it's fine.
@mastodonmigration @futurebird @benroyce @taylorlorenz Come visit Fedi, we have ants and grandmas!
@lauerhahn @futurebird @benroyce @taylorlorenz
Don't tell then about all the cats. Let's keep that a surprise.
@taylorlorenz
What each user sees on the Fediverse is up to them. No billionaire can force their views into your feed, because your feed is opt-in. Likewise, they can't stop you from seeing what you want to see. If your instance blocks things you want to see, you can switch to another instance; there are many.
@taylorlorenz Because people here have to put energy into interacting with each other. And that makes us happy.
@taylorlorenz For me it's simple: people are nicer, people are smarter. IDK why, maybe 'cuz there's no algorithm amplifying the most outrageous hot takes, and no billionaire owners shoving their agenda down our throats. IMHO "free expression" means different things to different people. You can spout Nazi garbage on Mastodon if you want, but you probably won't get a wide audience. But if you have a reasonable comment to contribute to a conversation, there's a good chance you'll get heard here.
@taylorlorenz You can meaningfully have a say in content moderation policies.
Reporting bad actors usually leads to a more pro-social outcome.
I think there are many but that feels important.
@taylorlorenz Curious what finally won you over?
For me, it was an opportunity to reboot my relationship with social media in general, approaching it fresh, but having nearly 20 years of knowledge about all the ways it can go wrong.
I don't talk about decentralization. I just focus on my feed showing me only what I choose to follow, and enjoying the interesting people I've met here since 2022.
Do you trust big tech controlled apps then let them divide into their respective camps
@taylorlorenz No ads. I think that's a highly convincing argument for many people & it's directly tied to decentralization: The fediverse is basically social media before algorithms & thanks to decentralization, if anyone wanted to add any kind of algorithmic reach functionality, everyone else would be free to ignore it - and without an algo, there's no business case for advertising in the 'verse.
Ok. An Instagram influencer was complaining about the awful comments she keeps getting and that make her want to stop. I told her it's partly because of the platform. Meta loves drama, it makes people to consume more time there. So they do not have reasons to stop bad behaviour.
On Mastodon people do not harrass others, at least on the Finnish bubble I'm in. If they would, they would be kicked out.
In Finnish school the kids that are being heavely bullied need to changed the school. Here it's the opposite. The bulliers need to find a new instance for themselves and that may be difficult.
My decision to switch was based on the motivations of the people running it. Commercial social media is motivated by commercial priorities. The point of the fediverse is connection for connection's sake.
@taylorlorenz You formulate your own algorithm using hash tags. Nothing is suggested to you. There are no ads. Thus, on your feed, you see only what you want to see and connect only with the people and businesses you want to be connected with. Yet, you can still scroll and snoop around the entire space if you want to.
@taylorlorenz How would you? When your bluesky is 1000% more active
@taylorlorenz
(Part 1)
because believe it or not, groups of people need some isolation from each other. People are angry and want to kill each other because they were all put into the same social forum on facebook, twitter etc. There are simply incompatible world views that if forced to co-exist, people literally they want to kill each other. Also don’t forget what Facebook did in Burma (different topic).
@taylorlorenz It's like the public radio of social networks, user supported social network.
@taylorlorenz No ads
No algorithms
Just people talking to each other
@taylorlorenz as others have said, you control who you see posts from. You only see things that the accounts you follow post or boost.
And zero Nazi tolerance
@taylorlorenz no algorithm: sequential timeline that updates when there are actually new posts. I can check in and know when I am 'caught up' and can go back to life.
@taylorlorenz
You pick your mods. You pick your rules. You pick your community.
@taylorlorenz Number one for me is, 'You are not making some rich **** even richer.' Secondly, you have better, more meaningful conversations.
@taylorlorenz You control what you see in your feed and you control what you post. No propaganda, censorship, games, surveillance or trolls. How is that not better in every way?
@taylorlorenz Monopolies are bad and there's no reason why "posts" need to be owned by a monopoly. Fediverse is good for the same reason why email is good.
@taylorlorenz
Its nice Twitter.
No adverts or algorithm.
No one owns it.
It's like lots of mini Twitters that can talk to each other.
Each mini Twitter has its own rules and interests.
You should join the one that best suits you.
The most concise way I describe the difference between commercial algorithm based platforms versus the fediverse.
In the former, you are presented with the illusion of a town square, it propagates content based on spectacle and “engagement”
In the latter, people are the algorithm as members of distinct communities, moderated by real people.
To answer this, we should first understand why people don’t think it makes sense. Someone I know that dislikes big business, and uses X said: “I struggle to understand the basics of a decentralized social network, it seems oxymoronic except for extreme nerds”.
Take that as you will, but hopefully it is useful feedback.
@taylorlorenz we are in control- not the algorithms.
Other platforms thrive on conflict. Mastodon does not because people do not like it and it’s people who drive Mastodon timelines, not algorithms.
@taylorlorenz
- Community-driven, not profit-driven
- chose instance with rules that suit you
- follow many other services/websites from the one account (Pixelfed, Lemmy, etc.)
@taylorlorenz I compare it to email, with how people or organizations control their own servers. Then ask what they think email would be like if one company controlled all of it. And how much they would charge.
On decentralized social media (like Mastodon) there's no Algorithm making sure you see the optimal toxic engagement bait.
All you get for posts is do people like it recently?
Its like the good old days before big tech had their Algorithms dialed in to make you as addicted as possible.
No ads, no algorithm, admins who care (if you pick the right instance), a sense of community and control. You have it here, rather than the billionaires
@taylorlorenz By proving to them that crowdsourcing can still beat AI-fluff, perhaps? And you're well on your way 👾
@taylorlorenz It *starts* with community (does not seek unsustainable growth, by default). Because hosts depend on the community to fund it, it can’t grow so big as to be exploited (limits to growth are useful to sustain meaningful community connections).
While it can be used for commercial purposes, the control rests with people, not corporations. In that sense it's true social media, rather than a profit-making enterprise disguised as something else.
@taylorlorenz At the risk of quoting a monstrous human being, "Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.…"
@taylorlorenz
This post right here:
https://mastodon.social/deck/@AlSweigart/116019045298109492
Because Mastodon is lots of severable, community-edited, non-profits linked up.
@taylorlorenz let us know how we can help - we think a lot of people are pretty tired of having their data mined, conversations sold, and commercial companies injecting inauthentic content into their timelines. Maybe that’s just us? Happy to have a chat if it would be useful.
@taylorlorenz You own your timeline. Like early days when social media worked.
In https://theweeklymiscellaneous.co.uk/posts/2025/10/an-autistic-persons-guide-to-mastodon/ I end up describing it as:
Mastodon distributes power. No one admin has control over the whole network, and while an admin temper-tantrum can disrupt the network, it cannot engulf it in the way that it can engulf Twitter or Bluesky. Instead, it is entirely possible to avoid the tantruming admin while still being on Mastodon.
This changes the incentives involved. Mastodon is easier to run out of a furry’s basement, so there is no incentive to raise huge amounts of venture capital money (and be beholden to what venture capitalists want). If anyone wants to enshittify their Mastodon server, users will pack up and move servers - this makes Mastodon incredibly resistant to enshittification. Since advertising is a form of enshittification, this means Mastodon is entirely ad-free - and by extension, it is surveillance-capitalism-free, because why do all that spying if you can’t have ads?
(1/2)
@taylorlorenz Real quick off the top of my head I usually say the Fediverse is not controlled by Billionaires, can't be bought/sold or controlled, isn't filled with ads, doesn't track you or try to sell your information, isn't filled with Nazis (they are on their own servers and I never see them because they are blocked) and there's not an algorithm trying to feed me crap I don't want to see.
@taylorlorenz well, I think that isn't about the quality of the free speech (there are tons of instanced banned from main federation networks) but the difficulty to apply censorship, of course, instance admins are individually more vulnerable by State or corporate pressure than the owner of csam dot com/x , but there are too many of them making it more resilient
@taylorlorenz someone with a profit motive is not incentivized to hijack your brain. I engage with things on Mastodon/fediverse in a much more controlled, healthier, self-driven way than I ever did on Twitter, Instagram, etc.
@taylorlorenz
Your choice and control. Nobody is trying to manipulate you or make you buy something. You can just hang out with the others.
@taylorlorenz Maybe frame it as similar to solar power?
Imagine a community solar grid as the Fediverse. So if the electric grid (corporate social media) goes down or gets enshitttifed by Nazis, you are protected from that since your instance runs on community grid without an owner and the rules are set by that community, so you can kick out bad actors.
Also, similar to social media, the solar communities can be connected together and share energy (information) and if one community goes down or turns bad (becomes a nazi bar) you can disconnect it easily and preserve your community.
Just thinking out loud…
@taylorlorenz
- Top of my list: it's not profit driven. That changes the entire incentive structure of everything.
- It's my data and I can move it elsewhere freely if I don't like my server.
- No algorithm burying my voice.
- It generally just self-selects a different userbase. Less performativity, less clout chasing, less drama. We aren't sexy or popular, and that attracts different kinds of folks.
- If I don't like how it works, I can (and have!) changed how it works.
@taylorlorenz It allows users in countries with heavy censorship/oppression to network with people outside their country and to discuss topics freely by allowing Tor users to access the network, which is unlike X or Bluesky
@taylorlorenz WRT freedom of expression: Government of the people by the people for the people, not government of the people by oligarchs for oligarchs.
Mastodon is only part of the Fediverse in the same way Gmail is part of email, not the totality of it. Alternatives exist: Tusky, Megalodon, Phanphy etc.
@taylorlorenz Use simple examples:
What if an instance admin dislikes you?
-> Fediverse: Get banned from one instance; change instance; reconnect to your friends.
-> X: Get banned from X; be lost.
What if the owner of a server wants to spread their world view or influence elections?
-> Instagram: Algorithm changed; Propaganda gets boosted; noone sees other opinions
-> Mastodon: People curate their timelines and decide what they see
@taylorlorenz We're like a global NPR : each instance (thousands. of all sizes) is its own local radio station producing or relaying all kinds of content (local, national, global content), with free access to any other station's content through a voluntary federation. No ads, no corporations, no skeezy Nazi screwing with your feed to force a disruptive fascist content down your throat when you just want to tune into the ant station or climate change or German elections or jokes or cats or get live updates on the ground from Minneapolis. We exist beholden to no one man or corporation. And there's still a refreshing earnestness here. The meanness of X is not our vibe.
@taylorlorenz decentralized = no single entity will control the entire network.
No oligarchy control, almost impossible to shutdown, hard to manipulate via algorithm tweaks or short: real people interact, not corporate puppets
@taylorlorenz imagine picking and choosing what to read rather than having if rammed down your throat with 'suggested content ' that you can't avoid, where you are the algorithm.
@taylorlorenz Nothing new really--just that we make the algorithm with boosting often and following widely. The effort I spend in getting into streams of content is worth the satisfaction of enriching multiple aspects of my life. Knowing that a billionaire cannot ensh*ttify this is also a big plus because the present-day game plan seems to be billionaire + media outlet = ashes.
@taylorlorenz easy. I can explore whatever shows up on my feed without worrying about it showing up in my ad portfolio. It took time for this is sink in. My curiosity or lack of ability to understand what a link is before a click it no longer punishes me by assuming that I am now into whatever that was. It's like getting out of an abusive relationship when they question everything I do.
@taylorlorenz We’re not force fed an oligarchs’ interests.
@taylorlorenz Basically, "having a small Twitter or Facebook". Most of these do not have ads, manipulative algorithms, or hidden agendas.
Like a any web application, tech savvy people are in charge of hosting it, but its easier nowadays.
Being decentralized like a spider web, you can still interact with people from other Mastodon servers, or even people from Threads. That's "The Fediverse".
Some may focus on particular interests or groups, making it easier to interact with other people.
An oligarch with extreme views cannot buy the whole thing and turn it into a data mining, propaganda shit show. See X.
With Mastodon if someone turns an instance into something you do not approve of, you can move your entire acct to a new instance w/out losing followers.
Mastodon is the anti-influence platform
On the social web we are
- free from the influence of megalomaniacs or any one person
- free from the influence of VCs and profit motivations
- free from the influence of algorithmic manipulation
Plus as a bonus, you can follow a friend's "Instagram" from your "Twitter" account ✨
@haubles @taylorlorenz dear madam, thx for the info. Just wanted 2 inform: I can not open a insta account anymore. Most probably because I commented my former boss' insta pictures (she was or is also model). I swear it wcharming only(after me being below her in companie's hierarchy. But I can not ask insta (META) what the (/$/&§§"!$§"/%$) is going on there. Wt i want to tell is that META can not be reached en by german federal offices...just 2 let u know 🙂 cheers Jan CT BECKMANN Diploma eng.
@haubles @taylorlorenz and even a friend's "TikTok" 🤓
@haubles @taylorlorenz that first one really isn’t true though. The fediverse has harmful parasocial and group dynamics just like every other social space. And the concentration of power in instance admins sure adds to that.
I take your point, but as you say: that’s a people problem not a technology problem. that is true of people wherever they form groups, on and offline. The fediverse is different because unlike other social networking platforms, you can vote with your feet if you find yourself in a social space that doesn’t suit you anymore, by leaving and taking your followers and followings with you.
There’s certainly more we can do as a community (and as the Mastodon org) to make our technology more resilient to toxic human dynamics. One thing we want to do is make it a lot easier for anyone to host a Mastodon instance, so if you can’t find a space that suits you, you can make your own. And we’re working on that this year! Another thing we’re considering (but is not on our roadmap right now) is adding post migration, which will make it a lot easier for people to pick up and leave when a space doesn’t suit them anymore.
We’re not trying to “fix” people here, but we are trying to make technology that is resilient to our worst habits and impulses instead of actively exploiting and compounding them. How do you think we should try to address this?
@haubles it's true that you can move instances when you want, but that's also a very clunky process that puts a lot of people off. and then there's the whole anxiety over losing connections because of how instances are or aren't federating with each other. So I don't think "you can just move" is as simple as people often claim it is.
And it's not just an issue of having to move instances. The relationship people have with their admins can also be a very unhealthy parasocial one.
@haubles I think this is very much a problem caused by the low level design of the fediverse. The way instances work in ActivityPub leads to a few people in powerful positions and that's very much an effect of the technology, not a purely social one.
@aesthr these are good points, and thank you for your feedback! As I said, we definitely want to make account migration and instance hosting better and more accessible. Stay tuned :)
*BOOSTS HARD FOR MAXIMUM CLOUT*
*ALL-FATHERS LET THE CLOUT FLOW THROUGH ME ONE LAST TIME*
@taylorlorenz Content moderation is decentralized and therefore more localized and spread out. Dispute redressal feels much more interpersonal than on corporate platforms.
@taylorlorenz It's by and about the people.
the magic of this place is that it gives the people all the power over what info, ideas and art gets attention. not governments or billionaire owners of media or corporate platforms. (not sure they'd want to hear that)
the problems with social media come down to the algos, not social media itself. that's what we're proving. the algos push a tabloid culture cause they know we'll pay attention to junk, even if we'd never share it. so they push the junk and our culture dets debased.
It’s like having a neighborhood as well as the global connection, and the health of the neighborhood depends on you and the neighbors.
@taylorlorenz
It might be useful to reference the recent news on censorship on TikTok and BlueSky and Threads and Instagram.
I like my instance's rules, but if they ever change, I can keep my name and followers and just switch instances to one where I can continue as I have been. I don't have to worry about who owns the gated garden I'm allowed to interact in or how they feel about our demented dictator's whims from minute to minute.
It's more stable. It's also more international. I know what other people think around the world.
@taylorlorenz no elon , no zuck by technical design?
@taylorlorenz 1 - There is no "algorithm" - you see posts from those you follow, unless you choose to explore.
2 - Your platform of choice does not make money by selling your personal information.
@taylorlorenz It is all about choice. As a reader, I see only what the people I follow post, plus what they boost. Not what some marketing algorithm thinks I should see. As a writer, it is about being assured that my followers have a chance to see my posts. No guarantees, but I’m not paying to be seen.
@taylorlorenz There's no central entity that can control what you see, when. And even if a single instance tried to do that, its users could just migrate to another instance.
@taylorlorenz It's like the difference between a town and a shopping mall.
@taylorlorenz You have a global reach and audience through federation, but you're still moderated by your local, familiar community - which you yourself have a complete freedom to choose on your own, not some faceless machine algorithm or billionaire whims.
@taylorlorenz you control your own timeline with no ads and no algorithm
@taylorlorenz no one can buy the whole network and trash it
@taylorlorenz No single person can break Mastodon, the way Elon was able to break Twitter. No change can be made by fiat, everything requires community buy in.
@taylorlorenz Youtube works for Google, X works for Musk, Facebook works for Zuckerberg. But Mastodon works for us. No one else's interests or desires come before ours.
@taylorlorenz there's no algorithm, so you get to see what your friends post without having your attention attacked. They don't arbitrarily change the platform to boost engagement time. There's no ads.
@taylorlorenz No algorithm, no advertising. Completely customizable content.
It's like, imagine if a single company owned all the TV stations and news outlets?
