Here's the problem.
Recent growth on mastodon.social is greater than the growth rate of November 2022.
But growth on other servers, like mstdn.social, has flatlined.
This has been confirmed to me by numerous Mastodon server admins.
Very concerning!
Here's the problem.
Recent growth on mastodon.social is greater than the growth rate of November 2022.
But growth on other servers, like mstdn.social, has flatlined.
This has been confirmed to me by numerous Mastodon server admins.
Very concerning!
@selea There's a few problems:
1. There was any wizard to help people find the *best* server -- it was just 10,000 servers and hope for the best
2. People don't know what "decentralized" means, so they go for the server that they perceive gives them the biggest network effect
3. People are being sold on "Mastodon as a Twitter replacement", not on "Fediverse as a Big Social replacement", which means federation is something people don't figure out until they register.
And it is because they claim that people are confused when they are going to chose a server.
I personally, think that changing the word "server" to "community" during the signup process would make the process easier for new users (I think/hope).
@pettter @fediversenews This data was from before the default-server switch.
@oblomov It will probably accelerate the trend.
@atomicpoet @fediversenews OTOH if I'm reading the plots correctly this trend seems to have preceded the “mastodon.social by default” change in the app, so it's probably unrelated, although the change would do nothing to improve things there.
@redegelde @Gargron If you care about decentralization, of course it's bad.
@atomicpoet is this bad? Also logical with the new onboarding system @Gargron made. Goes to his own, so it grows
@rkd993 No, not the "Mastodon" platform. The Fediverse.
@atomicpoet @fediversenews we need to get politicians and mainstream media on the #Mastodon platform. Somehow need to make it the new platform of choice. If we could do that the #MuskTwitterDisaster would die off. It's such a toxic mess.
@atomicpoet @fediversenews is that worrying from a scientific perspective, should we expect in a system/network like Mastodon that all nodes grow at the same pace ? Will a large Mastodon.social not also lead to growth of other nodes in the end ?🤔
@ErikJonker We now know, based on 50 years of Internet use, that unless you put designs in place, the natural evolution is centralization.
Centralization is "easy" at first. But then it becomes oppressive -- as we've already experienced with Meta, Twitter, and others.
@atomicpoet @fediversenews
this says 219k
https://mastodon.social/about
@m3t00 That's MAUs, not accounts.
@atomicpoet @redegelde @Gargron
Right. And this is why a feature you spoke of yesterday is so badly needed. 👇
@DrSprockets There's lots of mastodon handles: mastodon.online, mastodon.cloud, mastodon.world, etc.
@atomicpoet@mastodon.social @fediversenews@venera.social
Could it be that just like me and new here, the mastodon handle seems a bit more familiar than the mstdn one? I not being the sharpest knife in the drawer just chose simple and familiar until I find my sealegs!
@atomicpoet @fediversenews
@atomicpoet
Seems it's time for newish mastodon.social users to move to other instances.
If you've got the hang of Mastodon then consider the benefits of diversity and move to support diversity if you can readily.
Time to find out how to move and what it results in.
:bongoCat:
@maegul @oblomov @darnell @Gargron @Mastodon That's already been tried: it was called Diaspora*.
It was decentralized, but they really don't like interoperation with other platforms.
@oblomov @darnell @atomicpoet @Gargron @Mastodon
Thought experiment:
If all of the #fediverse were to fade away and we were left with just #mastodon as a non-profit and it's app and mastodon.social as a big centralised twitter clone ... it wouldn't be the absolute worst thing in the world. In fact it'd be kinda nice, especially given that the software is OSS and people could be putting up small community focused servers for whatever reasons.
It isn't insane for masto to think this way.
@oblomov @darnell @atomicpoet @Gargron @Mastodon
Yea, it's a nice idea, except #gargron has little influence over other generic instances.
My general read on #mastodon's movements lately is that it's taking it's brand and product a tad more seriously now, which involves stretching out and flexing it's muscles a bit more. It's so big though that a little push from mastodon is huge for the fediverse.
mastodon's reality: App + mastodon.social + software stack = a brand, full product & UX.
@darnell @atomicpoet @Gargron @Mastodon
one thing I think would be useful would be to at least include one or two generalist “local” instances in the loop, although that does present the issue of knowing where the user is (and giving them the option to change selection if the guess was wrong), but that might complicate things a bit, UX-wise.
@atomicpoet @oblomov One simple solution to this that maybe @Gargron could consider: have the #Mastodon app cycle through numerous different instances (say 100) as the default sign up instead of just @Mastodon.
This would make on boarding easy for the user as well as promo decentralization at the same time. Of course, the other admins would have to agree to receiving a lot of traffic.
Plus it would be helpful if those instances had “mastodon” in their name to avoid confusing new users.
@atomicpoet @ErikJonker switching node should be made easy then as well
@narF Yes
@atomicpoet I think you meant "wasn't" in your first item?
@atomicpoet @fediversenews I'm on the Mozilla.social waiting list
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