Conversation

Notices

1. Embed this notice
   Eugen Rochko (gargron@mastodon.social)'s status on Monday, 08-Aug-2022 14:11:00 JST Eugen Rochko

   I've made a deliberate choice against a quoting feature because it inevitably adds toxicity to people's behaviours. You are tempted to quote when you should be replying, and so you speak at your audience instead of with the person you are talking to. It becomes performative. Even when doing it for "good" like ridiculing awful comments, you are giving awful comments more eyeballs that way. No quote toots. Thank's

   • ぐぬ管 (GNU social JP管理人) and ThatOneCalculator :calcdumpy: :calckey: like this.
   • Embed this notice
     Earthling (earthling42@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 29-Oct-2022 04:12:22 JST Earthling

     in reply to

     @Gargron I see the intention behind it but still it is some way to control how people use communication and the fact that it has ben misused often does not purely justify to solely abandon it.

     and yes - I also used it to speak to "may audience" often - but mostly to prove some posts wrong with adding facts directly to the related post

     sometimes it was to agree on posts by adding additional information to it and/or reactions which gave also the original poster more value

     just my 2 cents

   • Embed this notice
     June Casagrande (junecasagrande@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 29-Oct-2022 05:24:07 JST June Casagrande

     in reply to

     @Gargron Thanks for explanation. I've been missing that feature, but I see the wisdom of your choice now!

   • Embed this notice
     Ryan Schultz (ryanschultz@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 29-Oct-2022 07:45:35 JST Ryan Schultz

     in reply to

     • Floppy 💾

     @Gargron @floppy And thank you for not adding a quote feature! The difference between Twitter and Mastodon is like night and day. (I also became a Patreon supporter recently!)

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     Shoq (shoq@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 29-Oct-2022 11:13:02 JST Shoq

     in reply to

     @Gargron Respectfully, that feels as if it's based on a very early perception of quoting. It's now mostly used for highlighting and previewing something we want to talk about or comment about which the follower can see adjacent to your remark at a glance. And the engagement they generate is are far larger than mere replies, likes or RTs of something (which are not visible to the follower unless they focus to inspect them).

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     robreed (robreed@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 29-Oct-2022 11:42:01 JST robreed

     in reply to

     @Gargron Fwiw I always saw it as a way to credit the original post while staying out of the reply thread. A way to use the original as a jumping off point for a new post, maybe tangential, without hijacking the discussion or being argumentative. I understand how it can be co-opted but it doesn’t seem especially geared toward abuse. I don’t see it as a “problem” that’s it’s not here, but…

   • Embed this notice
     Quasselkasper (wolkenkuckuck@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 29-Oct-2022 16:38:45 JST Quasselkasper

     in reply to

     @Gargron sad but true.

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     Patrícia, mulher do Sul (pfreixo@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 29-Oct-2022 17:08:50 JST Patrícia, mulher do Sul

     in reply to

     @Gargron same here.

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     Luis Pinto ? (lpinto@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 29-Oct-2022 17:34:30 JST Luis Pinto ?

     in reply to

     @Gargron amen to that

   • Embed this notice
     Alisa Marie (l_isamarie@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 30-Oct-2022 06:41:01 JST Alisa Marie

     in reply to

     @Gargron This post is toxic behavior, denying user's a feature because you refuse to listen to them! Great way to highlight why a lot of FLOSS software has trouble with wide spread adoption!

   • Embed this notice
     starboy (sahn@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 30-Oct-2022 08:00:33 JST starboy

     in reply to

     @Gargron maar alles is performative

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     Dr Rena Maguire (stilljustrena@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 30-Oct-2022 18:37:14 JST Dr Rena Maguire

     in reply to

     @Gargron I think I really like this.

   • Embed this notice
     YoWatShiinaEsq (yws@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 30-Oct-2022 20:54:11 JST YoWatShiinaEsq

     in reply to

     @Gargron ah it makes sense. It’s true that QT often bred toxicity.

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     clauci2nd (clauci2nd@mastodon.social)'s status on Tuesday, 01-Nov-2022 22:43:15 JST clauci2nd

     in reply to

     @Gargron
     a great decision, allowing, promoting way better communication.
     thank you.

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     Jessica. ? (mlisrevenge@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 05-Nov-2022 04:42:30 JST Jessica. ?

     in reply to

     @Gargron
     I appreciate this and tout this as a feature that is worth switching for. Mastodon is about conversation with one another.

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     MinnesotaMinn (mnminn@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 05-Nov-2022 11:01:11 JST MinnesotaMinn

     in reply to

     @Gargron I support this decision

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     Agas Ramirez 🪄 (agasramirez@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 05-Nov-2022 11:32:17 JST Agas Ramirez 🪄

     in reply to

     @Gargron you're actually right. i was looking for an "RT" function, didn't find one, so i replied to the thread. Came to the realization organically before reading this toot.

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     lostprototype (lostprototype@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 05-Nov-2022 15:13:02 JST lostprototype

     in reply to

     @Gargron I cannot emphasize how much I appreciate this kind of thinking.

     Thank you for being a light in these dark times.

   • Embed this notice
     Joel Martinez (joelmartinez@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 05-Nov-2022 15:32:43 JST Joel Martinez

     in reply to

     @Gargron I think this is great insight and great product development. On reflection, this is exactly what that feature causes in my own behavior, so I'm glad to see principled product guidance here instead of blindly copying just because.

   • Embed this notice
     Sedat Kapanoglu (ssg@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 05-Nov-2022 16:21:23 JST Sedat Kapanoglu

     in reply to

     • Scott Hanselman ✅????

     @Gargron @shanselman people will just screenshot, then.

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     mary angela perna (maryangelaperna1@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 05-Nov-2022 21:16:45 JST mary angela perna

     in reply to

     @Gargron interesting….that’s probably smart. We’re all so used to twitter LMAOOO #twitterefugee

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     CleoMatra (cleomatra@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 05-Nov-2022 22:22:53 JST CleoMatra

     in reply to

     @Gargron Eyeopener ?

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     Sewzinski (sewzinski@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 06-Nov-2022 06:12:20 JST Sewzinski

     in reply to

     @Gargron I love this. Thanks.

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     ZorinFloof (zorinlynx@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 06-Nov-2022 06:55:30 JST ZorinFloof

     in reply to

     @Gargron This is probably the way to go. Nearly every time I've been QRTed on birdsite it's been to criticize. Criticize me to my face, not to your followers.

     If someone wants to criticize me by replying to my post and then retweeting it, fine. At least I had the courtesy of a reply to me.

   • Embed this notice
     Eugen Rochko (gargron@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 06-Nov-2022 06:55:31 JST Eugen Rochko

     in reply to

     • かき@GNUsocialJP

     I was just answering a question that multiple new people asked me, it's not like I *just* made the decision. Didn't expect this toot to blow up of all things haha. This has been my position since that feature was requested for the first time more than a year ago

   • Embed this notice
     robreed (robreed@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 06-Nov-2022 07:50:20 JST robreed

     in reply to

     @Gargron Making decisions is nec and good. Decision made, fair enough. But I can't help but point out that the justification for it is full of holes. Sure quoting can be used for ridiculing awful comments (I wouldn't call that good btw), but it can also be used to avoid pulling replies off-topic, muddying the discussion. I often used quoting to give people their space and avoid confrontation. There are also great features in Mastodon that can be abused. Tech is just a tool.

   • Embed this notice
     Shoq (shoq@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 06-Nov-2022 09:55:27 JST Shoq

     in reply to

     @Gargron But quoting IS replying. It's simply including the thing being referred to so people don't have to seek it. A bare reply is often ignored. If someone wants to abuse, they will, but I've never see it done by serious people. Perhaps we can have this debate on a #tag to see my point. I'm fairly confident most Twitter alums will agree.

     #QuotedPostsOnMastodon

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     Bricin (bricin@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 06-Nov-2022 09:59:15 JST Bricin

     in reply to

     @Gargron I’ve requested it a few times and while I understand the rationale I very much want the ability to see a post, boost the post, and say something about it ie “here is why I think this is interesting” and get engagement from my community.

     Maybe that is a different mechanism to avoid the negative behavior. Forward + comment sort of. Which is what I wind up doing manually.

     Thanks for taking the time on this entire project.

   • Embed this notice
     marcfbellemare (marcfbellemare@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 06-Nov-2022 10:37:03 JST marcfbellemare

     in reply to

     @Gargron Thanks for that. The QT function is the main driver of toxicity over at the Bad Place.

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     William Brooks is not extinct (wcbdata@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 06-Nov-2022 11:47:05 JST William Brooks is not extinct

     in reply to

     @Gargron
     Heroic

   • Embed this notice
     David Durant (david_durant@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 06-Nov-2022 12:32:47 JST David Durant

     in reply to

     @Gargron This is fascinating. I'm a big fan of quoting personally but I can fully understand why you've chosen not to include it. I wonder, with Mastodon being open source, whether we'll end up with a fork with someone implementing quoting as it's so popular. Potential compatibility across federated instances of forked versions may lead to interesting times.

   • Embed this notice
     Rajiv Pant (rajivpant@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 06-Nov-2022 12:54:46 JST Rajiv Pant

     in reply to

     @Gargron I hear you. You make a reasonable point.

   • Embed this notice
     Kevin Gamin (kevingamin@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 06-Nov-2022 13:37:02 JST Kevin Gamin

     in reply to

     @Gargron This gave me a different perspective on how to interact here, including this reply. Thank you.

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     Manish Vij (mvij@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 06-Nov-2022 14:11:00 JST Manish Vij

     in reply to

     @Gargron My audience has context, there’s a long history of shared humor. Replies only have local context.

   • Embed this notice
     Arnon (cautionwip@mastodon.social)'s status on Monday, 07-Nov-2022 01:41:31 JST Arnon

     in reply to

     @Gargron I’m not certain I agree with the idea that it will, of necessity, lead to toxicity, but I’m new here, and must admit to ignorance of other ways to do things. Ie. I could be blisteringly wrongheaded. In any event, happy to learn a different way to do things that has obviously been working for hundreds of thousands of people for years now.

   • Embed this notice
     ipofanes (ipofanes@mastodon.social)'s status on Monday, 07-Nov-2022 01:43:56 JST ipofanes

     in reply to

     @Gargron I think this is a wise choice.

   • Embed this notice
     Friedrich Moser (friedrichmoser@mastodon.social)'s status on Monday, 07-Nov-2022 07:04:44 JST Friedrich Moser

     in reply to

     @Gargron I think this was such a wise and wide ranging decision! Congratulations! And thank you!

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     FelixCLC (felixclc@mastodon.social)'s status on Monday, 07-Nov-2022 08:55:19 JST FelixCLC

     in reply to

     @Gargron provides context on the design choice. A counter point is overlapping audiences who may be interested in the topic, and where the quote is tangential to the original toot

   • Embed this notice
     okanogen VerminEnemyFromWithin (okanogen@mastodon.social)'s status on Monday, 07-Nov-2022 11:09:01 JST okanogen VerminEnemyFromWithin

     in reply to

     @Gargron
     This is an interesting perspective. I'll ponder it. I'm inclined to think not all quote boosts are evil, ill-intentioned, or inherently destructive, and in the event they are, maybe there are other controls available. But it's a valid position.

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     Belle (bellesapepper_37@mastodon.social)'s status on Monday, 07-Nov-2022 12:41:19 JST Belle

     in reply to

     @Gargron I truly like not having a quote a toot feature and agree it's toxic, instead of engaging a person. I still have a hold over saying "account" which imho dehumanizes the person sending a toot. Thank you for not having quote a toot available.

   • Embed this notice
     Till Sawala (tillsawala@mastodon.social)'s status on Monday, 07-Nov-2022 19:49:38 JST Till Sawala

     in reply to

     @Gargron This argument makes sense to me, though from experience on the bird app, I would sometimes use "quote" to highlight a post from a different community to my own followers, with a personal message why I consider it important. I might also, for example, translate a post from German or Finnish to my mostly English-speaking followers.

     Maybe making "quotable" optional could be an idea? But I also accept the idea that we need to use mastodon differently than what we may be used to.

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     lesighlepurr (lesighlepurr@mastodon.social)'s status on Tuesday, 08-Nov-2022 00:28:45 JST lesighlepurr

     in reply to

     @Gargron I was already wondering...

   • Embed this notice
     Jess Alter (jess_alter@mastodon.social)'s status on Tuesday, 08-Nov-2022 02:11:07 JST Jess Alter

     in reply to

     @Gargron

     Thank you so you so much for continuing to choose not to build this feature into this instance.

     I like Mastodon as it is. I don't want it to become "New Twitter".

     Besides, if one needs to "quote toot", then they can take an image and type in what it says on the image description.

     I consider that level of effort gives a person time to decide if it's true, helpful, important, necessary, and/or kind.

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     Sarah Perez 💙 (sarahp@mastodon.social)'s status on Tuesday, 08-Nov-2022 03:03:44 JST Sarah Perez 💙

     in reply to

     @Gargron is this still your position?

   • Embed this notice
     Leena (leenamurgai@mastodon.social)'s status on Tuesday, 08-Nov-2022 04:21:33 JST Leena

     in reply to

     @Gargron Thank you, this is a really great explanation. I don't suppose you have you a more complete set of musings about your design choices?

   • Embed this notice
     Crecente 🦣 (crecenteb@mastodon.social)'s status on Tuesday, 08-Nov-2022 06:52:11 JST Crecente 🦣

     in reply to

     @Gargron Love this decision!

   • Embed this notice
     ⚙️?Scott’s Robots?⚙️ (scottmonaghan@mastodon.social)'s status on Tuesday, 08-Nov-2022 11:15:45 JST ⚙️?Scott’s Robots?⚙️

     in reply to

     @Gargron when I quote-tweet on Twitter, it’s usually a “Hey followers, here’s why I think you’ll be interested in this” thing.

     Is there an equivalent here?

   • Embed this notice
     Helen Shaw (athenamediaie@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 10-Nov-2022 18:36:50 JST Helen Shaw

     in reply to

     @Gargron it does reduce the performative aspect of quote tweeting. Something we've all be prone to!, but talking to someone is hard more significant.

   • Embed this notice
     Scali (scali@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 11-Nov-2022 19:01:29 JST Scali

     in reply to

     @Gargron I'd quote-toot this if I could

   • Embed this notice
     Michel van Baal (michelvanbaal@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 11-Nov-2022 19:09:19 JST Michel van Baal

     in reply to

     @Gargron late to the party, but excellent decision ??

   • Embed this notice
     protto@mastodon.social's status on Saturday, 12-Nov-2022 09:52:11 JST Protto

     in reply to

     @Gargron I like all the thinking of Eugen

   • Embed this notice
     Samit (samitmalkani@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 19-Nov-2022 23:59:33 JST Samit

     in reply to

     @Gargron I don't agree with you 100% but I totally get where you're coming from.

   • Embed this notice
     Wendy Siegelman (wendysiegelman@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 20-Nov-2022 00:06:10 JST Wendy Siegelman

     in reply to

     @Gargron I think a nice compromise would be giving individual users the ability to opt in or opt out of functionality like quote tweets or allowing their posts to be findable by search. Another option would be allowing users to quote their own tweets so we can link related posts visually

   • Embed this notice
     Tucker Teague (tuckerteague@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 20-Nov-2022 14:08:40 JST Tucker Teague

     in reply to

     @Gargron
     I had similar thoughts recently. I wanted a quote function, but then I thought about it and about my experience on Twitter. Best not to have than IMO.

   • Embed this notice
     Lis (lis_copenhagen@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 20-Nov-2022 20:42:50 JST Lis

     in reply to

     @Gargron makes sense ?

   • Embed this notice
     Randahl Fink (randahl@mastodon.social)'s status on Monday, 21-Nov-2022 04:43:45 JST Randahl Fink

     in reply to

     @Gargron I feel you are overlooking the usefulness of quotes. I have used quotes on Twitter to qualify WHY the content I was retweeting was worth looking at.
     Simply just retweeting content may make people overlook the importance of said content. However, if you retweet content and write a qualifying comment such as "This is a very strong observation, because…" etc., that has real value.
     I agree with you, the feature can be abused, but would you not agree almost all features can be abused?

   • Embed this notice
     pjcoffey@mastodon.social's status on Saturday, 26-Nov-2022 05:48:27 JST PJCoffey

     in reply to

     @Gargron Just doing a bit of curation. Will delete if annoying!

     #Mastodon #MastodonQuoteToot #MastodonQuoteTweet #MastodonDesign #MastodonDocumentation

   • Embed this notice
     Cloaca Maxima (durru@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 26-Nov-2022 18:34:39 JST Cloaca Maxima

     in reply to

     Citar está feo, pero imposible no es.
     Mirad arriba.

   • Embed this notice
     Vin (grapevine@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 17-Dec-2022 00:12:41 JST Vin

     in reply to

     @Gargron this is probably my single biggest issue with this platform. maybe 10% of quotes get used like that, every other time it's either to boost engagement while providing commentary, to get more people involved in a discussion while not necessarily endorsing (as reposts are often interpreted), or just to ask a question that's too tangential to the original post

     quotes don't crush discussion. they promote it.

   • Embed this notice
     ednl 🇪🇺 (ednl@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 23-Dec-2022 11:31:30 JST ednl 🇪🇺

     in reply to

     @Gargron I disagree that this automatically or even frequently leads to toxicity. I have never experienced that on Twitter (but I kept a clean timeline). I think boosting is more invasive: blasting someone they don't follow onto their timeline without any explanation. I often want to share fun or interesting posts BUT with a little intro or commentary for context. I really miss quote posts.

   • Embed this notice
     fasol (fasol@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 24-Dec-2022 22:12:22 JST fasol

     in reply to

     • Arco Wagemakers

     @Gargron

     Cc @adrianus

   • Embed this notice
     Wraithe (wraithe@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 25-Dec-2022 00:44:04 JST Wraithe

     in reply to

     There’s a huge amount of discourse out there now with, in particular, #BIPOC people making what I think is a pretty solid case for uses that are absolutely not toxic.
     What’s interesting is that to me, this is in ways no different than quoting a section of an email - pointing out that I’m addressing a specific comment.

     https://mastodon.social/@Gargron/99662106175542726

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     Jeff Bishop (xrlq@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 25-Dec-2022 00:57:01 JST Jeff Bishop

     in reply to

     @Gargron there should be a quoting feature. Like anything else it can be used properly or improperly. Abusus non tollit usum.

   • Embed this notice
     Paul Dyson (pauldyson@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 28-Dec-2022 22:47:29 JST Paul Dyson

     in reply to

     @Gargron I always liked quoting as a way to intro people who follow me to something that has a particular rather than generic interest. E.g. this isn’t just an interesting post on coding but one from a not-so-well-known author I know has some particularly relevant experience.

     Is that performative? I suppose I think it’s a way of adding a little value above just passing the post on.

     Not a big deal and you obviously have thought carefully about it but I don’t think it “inevitably adds toxicity”.

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     doctorlaura (doctorlaura@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 31-Dec-2022 05:01:50 JST doctorlaura

     in reply to

     @Gargron I literally just replied with practically the same argument to someone else. What’s wrong with boost and reply? It’s one extra tap. One. Unless the goal is to make it all about you. Oh wait…

   • Embed this notice
     Tobia Alberti (tobiaalberti@mastodon.social)'s status on Tuesday, 24-Jan-2023 04:02:55 JST Tobia Alberti

     in reply to

     @Gargron Thank you for sharing the rationale behind this decision.

     Do you think the app will get its own “show confirmation dialog before reblogging” option in the future?

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     Didik Wicaksono ▶️??‍? (did1k@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 10-Feb-2023 09:13:10 JST Didik Wicaksono ▶️??‍?

     in reply to

     @Gargron got this toot from a blogpost by https://nerdschalk.com/how-to-quote-someones-post-on-mastodon/. Its a good decision, IMO

   • Embed this notice
     The Red Vegan (theredvegan2030@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 22-Mar-2023 09:29:52 JST The Red Vegan

     in reply to

     @Gargron ?

   • Embed this notice
     Brian M 🇺🇸 (snarkymanchild@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 05-Dec-2024 01:27:43 JST Brian M 🇺🇸

     in reply to

     @Gargron I really wish you'd change your mind on this. While quote posting CAN lead to toxicity, it's also an important way to share post with your followers and add your own to it. It can and does also lead to positive interactions. And the reality is, I can accomplish the same thing with screenshots but that won't give the original poster the opportunity to join the new conversation. Sadly, I think not having this is holding Mastodon back.

     #QuotePost