Sho Kuwamoto
Question to you all.
In general I’m finding the conversation here fun, but I am not able to reach the same audience here when talking about figma, which accounts for a lot of what i did on twitter.
Is it just a matter of (a) me rebuilding my network here, or (b) are there fewer designers here or (c) is mastodon just not a place to talk about work in terms of overall vibes?
Sho Kuwamoto
@alysonsee maybe I should say it like this: I want to ask questions to people who use #figma. Where can I find them?
I’m starting to use hashtags more. Is there anything else I could be doing?
alysonsee
@skuwamoto I’ll give a more direct answer below. But let me offer how to think about discovering content and connections in general. There are many nodes (instances) on this decentralized platform. (For example, yours is mastodon.social, priryo’s is linernotes.club, and and mine is libranet.de.) It would overwhelm the system to ensure that all posts travel to all nodes. Instead, posts travel selectively, through the connections and interactions made between the users on different nodes. More specifically, first by the “follow” relationships of users and then secondarily by commenting on or resharing a post by another user from another node. Once it has arrived at a new node, a post is discoverable by all users on that node.
For example, I saw your post because I follow @priryo and priryo reshared your post. That means your post was first on linernotes.club and would have been pulled into the feed of any linernotes.club users who follow the hashtags on your post. When priryo reshared your post, it traveled to the nodes of all of priryo’s followers and ended up in both the feeds of priryo’s followers as well as the feeds of users in the followers’ nodes that follow the hashtags on your post. The lessons here are …
- Hashtag your posts. (For example, let’s add #newhere to grab the attention of those who help newbies get oriented.)
- Follow hashtags.
- Follow people from other nodes.
- Comment on their posts. Not only does it help posts travel but it contributes to a culture of mutuality and listening more than speaking.
- Reshare others’ posts. Especially those who might not otherwise have a megaphone. Especially if the post has hashtags. Strike a balance here so that you aren’t resharing so often that people don’t get to know you and so that you aren’t overwhelming your followers feeds with content they cannot filter.
Now, to give you a hopefully more direct answer about finding #figma fans. Do any of these these look like the kind folks you are interested in following?
alysonsee
alysonsee
@skuwamoto @RoyGBiv Thanks! I might not succeed at making decent comparisons because I was barely on Twitter and only years ago. But my impression is that there was a lot of drive on Twitter to get one’s message/brand out and pass clever one-liners around. The content was intended for a wide audience and the interaction was fast-paced. This place has been more like a neighborhood bar. You’ve got regulars and people who drop in, and you can float between conversations. The topics tend to be more intimate/personal; and even when they are political, the exchange is slow enough that it feels like a roundtable conversation.
In a way, that intimacy is kinda built into the ActivityPub protocol (which is what the Mastodon platform implements). There’s no algorithmic advantage to “likes”, and messages don’t travel to everyone instantly. They only travel through direct engagement. That can take time as people slowly discover each other and join in conversation threads that were started days, weeks, or months ago. Plus message size is generous. So, there is no need to be pithy. I choose to comment much more than I reshare because it gives me the chance to empathize and connect with the person posting. And, if you haven’t noticed, I’m not terse. So, the ability to wax on suits me. 😀
Mind you, this all may change. It’s not that the old way is the best or right way. But it’s what those of us who have been around awhile found to work. The newcomers will certainly influence and change the culture. So, once new folks have had a chance to grieve the old site and get their bearings here, who knows what this will all be like in a few months?
Roy G Biv
@alysonsee @skuwamoto I found your follow up post very helpful, thank you! How would you describe “what we do here” if not post for a following/audience? Appreciate the help🙂
Roy G Biv
@alysonsee @skuwamoto I really appreciate this information and the time you took to post it. A friend and I are figuring out this platform right now, slowly but surely, and I am absolutely fascinated. I’m already enjoying the control (instead of algorithms), seemingly friendly/helpful users and the quality of the conversations here: especially compared to what I’m used to on social media. Thank you!
alysonsee
Roy G Biv
@alysonsee @skuwamoto hoping for the best, this really seems awesome. It’s interesting to think that there’s separate communities with separate rules, who all can share the same posts. How does that work? Say my community has a rule about no political discussion or something, but I reblog a post (or just post) about a political figure to my instance. How would that work, would I be removed and told to join somewhere else?
alysonsee
Roy G Biv
@alysonsee @skuwamoto This is mind-blowing. I was just reading about Pixelfed, so much to wrap my head around right now. Feels strange to be so excited for an internet platform but it really feels like a new era could be underway. I can’t believe I didn’t know about this years prior but I’m happy to be here, & very grateful for all of the information you’ve shared! I’ve been sharing each reply w/ a friend and learning as we go. Thank you for entertaining my questions👍
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