Erin Kissane
This week, I went over to Bluesky and asked people who'd left Mastodon why they left, and lots of people told me. I grabbed the replies and crunched them and wrote up a summary. I think it's really interesting and often kind of wrenching.
https://erinkissane.com/mastodon-is-easy-and-fun-except-when-it-isnt
Eugen Rochko
@kissane @Haste "If I were Eugen Rochko, I would die of stress." Not that far off the truth! I resonate with a lot of the points in the post. Frustrating that even as we improve the UX people throw around so many (sometimes outdated) tips that it makes newcomers feel overwhelmed anyway.
EVHaste
@kissane This article is fantastic, Erin! And what a cool experiment to do.
I actually almost bounced off of Mastodon originally because of the two highest frequency feedback points here. I'm really glad I pushed through it but I really, really get why most people don't.
Tagging @Gargron , since you basically did a bunch of free product work for the Mastodon team. :)
Erin Kissane
@Haste Thank you! I had to try three times—my first two instances blew up after I wandered off because it was so quiet.
Eugen is probably so sick of seeing my name come up at this point, but I tried to express my very real sympathy in this post.
EVHaste
Yeah, that's a bummer. I try to provide gentle, private feedback to the unsolicited-tip dogpiles.
My hope is that if, culturally, we got to this point where providing alt-text is part of the Mastodon identity (which is rad af), we should be able to do the same thing for the new user welcome and not dogpile folks for perceived CW transgressions, etc.
Erin Kissane
The tl;dr (because TL! it's TL) is that, for this group:
- people feel stressed and anxious when they get yelled at for breaking rules and norms they didn't know about
- it's hard to find people and conversations, and specifically hard to follow people across instances
- people want better organic and algorithmic ways to connect with each other
- instance-picking stresses people out, and a lot of the sign-up and settling-in processes are confusing and/or too much work for unknown returns
Erin Kissane
Rather than trying to head off the unusual unpleasantness about clout-chasers and the ritually/technologically impure, I will just say this:
I wrote this up for fedi people who are actively curious and interested in other people, and I'm not going to worry too much about how it lands for those who aren't.
Erin Kissane
something I didn't have room for in the post itself is that a non-tiny group of people have had instances blow up on them over the years, leaving them starting over again and again—this is especially destructive for newer folks, who don't always understand what's happening
Yohan Yukiya Seseㆍ사요한・謝雪矢
@kissane The only solution for this is #NomadicIdentity (a.k.a. #AccountPortability) which #Streams and #Hubzilla have for years.
Streams is #PublicDomain, other projects can probably take the code and implement it. (I'm not saying it is easy, but at last they probably don't have to reinvent the wheel or start from scratch.)
Streams and Hubzilla are #fediverse software too.
corey🧶🌁🚲
@kissane Thank you for your work on this. Like many Bluesky/former Mastodon users I had a really tough time with the sign up and paralysis over which instance to choose. The first one I chose (mastodon.social) was huge and overwhelming. I didn’t even understand the fediverse AT ALL at that point. Fast-forward to late last year, when Twitter changed hands. I changed my instance to a regional one (made much more sense) and have been pleased with it. /1
Erin Kissane
Lastly! I squeaked this post in under a rapidly dropping door—I'm going to be really busy for a day or so and then offline for awhile. If you ask questions after today and don't hear back, that's probably why!
Please be cool with each other and don't make me come back to screaming fights in my replies. <3
Erin Kissane
I said "lastly" but then my replies become almost immediately overwhelming. It's great that a lot of people like this/want to argue about it/are thinking about it!
But I am just one brain so I'm going to miss a lot of things, apologies.
Ali
@kissane Yeah, this. Over the years I have had a couple of instances just disappear, and it has taken a few tries to find an appropriate instance. At this stage I think it works better for me than twitter ever did, but I can see why folks find getting established and sticking round a non straightforward experience.
TL Jordan
That was it for me, even though I haven't left Mastodon, and I don't intend to leave.
I'm only trying Bluesky because someone gave me an invite code. That person also tried Mastodon, but they couldn't stand the HOA vibe/etiquette policing.
It's nice to have a place not named Twitter that (hopefully) won't be shutdown over some admin or moderation drama [mastodon.lol], or be the target of a defederation campaign [mastodon.social].
I'm damn tired of moving instances over bullshit.
Yohan Yukiya Seseㆍ사요한・謝雪矢
Simplest answer: Only posts your instance have seen.
The question is, what are the methods your instance is using for its federation?
For example, there are relays out there which push posts to instances subscribed to it.
There are also setups wherein an instance fails to receive posts from another instance because they have a configuration that is preventing them from fully federating (even though both admins claim they haven't silenced or blocked each other).
I am personally not aware of any #fediverse software with a built-in code that searches the "entire" fediverse network. I think that would be very taxing. It's like being a search engine at that point.
Tekk
@robotmonkeys @kissane if I search for a specific hashtag does it show me posts in the instance I am in or across fediverse?
jonathankoren™
@Tekk @kissane same way you find them anywhere else. Look at who gets boosted and people you know and who they follow. My experience is that you need only one or two seeds to create a decent follow list.
I say that as someone that managed to import a partial list from Twitter before it was shut down, but honestly I try not to look back, and instead find all new people.
Tekk
@robotmonkeys @kissane I’m new to the fediverse. And the 1 thing that is confusing to me is, you say you can follow others and read posts across instances. But how do you find those people? Where do you go to see them or to follow them or to read posts. Something like Instagram or Twitter has an algorithm that shows you things that it thinks you might like. here you have to go looking.
jonathankoren™
@kissane I really think the whole instance thing is needlessly stressful. Masto makes a big deal about it, but honestly it doesn’t really matter. You can follow people across instances just fine. The only thing that matters from a new user perspective is number of characters per toot and bespoke emojis.
Instance picking felt like I had define my identity by one thing. Then it turned out, it doesnt seem to matter, which is exactly what you’d wonder if the instance was well run
kaia
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