Rich Felker
Hot take that shouldn't be hot:
Younger generations are not "not on the fedi because they don't remember a time when the internet wasn't a bunch of platforms controlled by corporations".
When they're not on the fedi, it's because the fedi is full of olds with condescending attitudes towards them, and they've already found ways to survive and communicate with more like-minded people despite the platforms being shit.
Rich Felker
@poemproducer Becuase assuming a condescending explanation is an asshole thing to do.
AGF : poemproducer
@dalias why not both
astroPug
Yep.
I suspect we also just don’t have the requisite fandoms.
I see that the StarTrek fandom is somewhat represented here, but many other things, anime, games, music, etc. just doesn’t seem to have that same reach or critical mass (yet, I hope).
Whimsy. We need more whimsy!
More shitposting.
The “kids” in my circle watch Dungeon Meshi, Jujutsu Kaisen, and Arcane and I keep asking “who’s that? What’s that?”
And I realize I haven’t kept up at all with new anime. Oh wait, they’re also into Frieren, I forgot.
Rich Felker
Slight clarification: this doesn't mean they know it's full of condescending olds. Probably most just don't think about it much or at all or even know about it, because it's not culturally compelling. But generational hostility is going to reduce the chance of it becoming culturally compelling.
Tak!
@dalias It's funny that the fediverse has a reputation for being old now, when I joined the stereotype was that it was all 17-year-old transbian furries
Tom Walker
@dalias Younger people are mainly not interested in primarily text-based social media, because they (generalising) do not want:
1. Text-first
2. Public by default
Rich Felker
@tomw That's widely repeated but I'm not clear if there's good evidence for 1. 2 is probably true. The only reason I came to prefer 2 back on :birdsite: was that I knew whatever I posted was readable by platform owners anyway, even if nominally private, and I preferred having it be nominally public to remind me and not have platform owner have an upper hand. I wrote about this some back on the hellsite.
Rich Felker
@Axomamma The post is based on a real thread I read, as well as experience over the past few years.
Axomamma
@dalias Oh, come the fuck on. Can we please stop with this bullshit? "Oh, my feelings are hurt because I'm not being catered to." That is only happening in your fevered imagination.
Rich Felker
@Axomamma That is not what concern trolling means. Concern trolling is telling someone else what's good for their interests when you're actually opposed to their interests. Fuck off.
Axomamma
@dalias It's concern trolling, and it is tiresome.
Tom Bortels
The truth is simpler than the conspiracy: they're not on the platform because that's not where there peers are, and there's no advertising or other evangelism constantly telling them they'll miss out if they aren't there.
And - that's fine. I have to admit, I'm very confused by the attitude that if everyone isn't on mastodon it's somehow a failure, or indeed that we even want everyone here. Big crowds bring trouble with them. We left a lot of those people behind on purpose. Is that condescending? Then fine - we condescend. The world isn't made for you, I hope you find somewhere else you are happy.
Rich Felker
@tbortels Fuck off, I'm here to welcome ppl not tell them it's fine if this place isn't for them because we're assholes.
Rich Felker
@tbortels 🖕 to the retirement community HOA.
Jess👾
@dalias Yup, just ranted about that the other day. I hate the smug shitheads. https://infosec.exchange/@JessTheUnstill/113805590589628648
Jess👾
@dalias The other day after the Facebook targeting of queers, and some more folks I know saying they're leaning FB and IG and going to BlueSky and TikTok, I asked if they'd considered Fediverse. Their reasons were - they'd tried it once, but didn't stick because:
1. Couldn't figure out how to pick a good instance
2. Couldn't figure out how to find interesting people to follow
3. the weird smug elitism and not people being positive and welcoming.
4. They were scared away by people demanding CW for weird CWs they didn't understand what they were supposed to cw and not. Same with alt text.
Not saying the accessablity stuff is wrong, but for someone new, it is a very weird culture shift that doesn't have much of an on ramp before jumped on you as a horrible person for not including it.
Jess👾
@dalias Also, racism. Every successful platform had a critical mass Black folks as early adopters. White people are always following around Black people to steal and appropriate their "new" and "interesting" content since it always seems novel to us. When we were accepting of racism and refused to even acknowledge that there was a racism problem and we didn't listen to Black people about critical for them to communicate and call out racism features like QT, they said fuck this, and went elsewhere.
squared99
For sure have seen this, but I also notice boosts of new users saying "Hi, I'm new here," receiving lots of welcomes, feditips, hashtags, etc., alongside posts from newer folks saying how much they love it here.
It's not just 'techy' people either. I've seen knitters find a home here, while some tech folks go 'meh' and leave.
Would be useful to understand the difference in initial experiences that tips it one way or the other to help improve onboarding.
Howard Chu @ Symas
@squared99 @JessTheUnstill @dalias some of the "we love it so much better here" posts come off as kool-aid drinking cultists. There's a huge percentage of posts that are just "wow mastodon is better than [whatever]" that comes off like insecurity and trying to convince themselves. Most people just want to connect to their friends & colleagues, not get buried in meta-discussion.
kurtseifried (he/him)
@dalias @briankrebs when this topic comes up I’m always reminded that there’s a few states like Hawaii that have banned outdoor billboards. https://www.hawaii-aloha.com/blog/hawaii-is-billboard-free/ I literally can’t even imagine what that must be like to not have that visual pollution all over the place.
On the flipside, you have things like Prime Video now introducing advertising, or messages at the beginning of your ad free experience that are advertising services and product, so I’m not clear on how their messages are not ads but anyways… I imagine for most people they barely notice because they’re so used to TV and all the advertising there.
freediverx
@kurtseifried @dalias @briankrebs
I’ve developed a zero tolerance for ads. I deleted Facebook ages ago and today I refuse to use Betflix and Prime Video—even for free—because of their forced ads.
If there were any content in those sights I considered “must watch” (there aren’t), I’d just pirate the fuck out of them.
Rich Felker
@freediverx @kurtseifried @briankrebs Most of us really need to up our 🏴☠️ game...
Rich Felker
@freediverx @kurtseifried @briankrebs Bundled stuff like that is a hard nope for me to begin with. I don't want to cross-link identifying information between ISP, mobile carrier, and particular 3p services, and I believe bundling a service with connectivity is in principle a net neutrality/common carrier violation I don't want to participate in. It also makes a perverse incentive against switching carriers, which I never want to deal with having again.
freediverx
@dalias @kurtseifried @briankrebs
I happily pay for content when it’s offered at a fair price and accessible in a convenient and distraction-free format.
Apple TV+ is already dancing on the edge of that value proposition (I get it for free with TMobile) with their UX that is 90% ads for its own content. The slightest tweak of their enshittification dial and I will drop them as I’ve done all the others. 🏴☠️
kurtseifried (he/him)
@freediverx @dalias @briankrebs also something this reminded me of is that I to pay for content, and end up having to technically pirate it because for example, on Netflix on mobile, you can only download an item for a limited amount of time, and there is a maximum number of times before it won’t let you download it anymore, so my son‘s favourite shows have expired off of his device for example. A lot of developers and business people clearly don’t have children, or they fail to look at reasonable and normal use cases for the content they provide.
Rich Felker
@villasbc I'm not saying they can't stand those ppl and don't know how to block. I'm saying there's not a compelling reason to be in a place where there aren't already ppl they want to engage with, mostly ppl who look down on them. https://hachyderm.io/@dalias/113814636850050027
Victor Villas
@dalias This sounds just as condescending to me 🤷♂️ as if teenagers didn’t know how to block, mute and generally build their communities. Whatever platform they’re using has very similar juvenoia levels
Rich Felker
@villasbc On the bright side, fedi is where most of the olds who aren't intolerable to be around can be found. 🙃
Rich Felker
Positive approach to this: show your kids (or someone else's) every caturday post until they start asking "what app is that?"
Rich Felker
ONLY THE FEDI HAS CATURDAY!!!!!
Haelwenn /элвэн/ :triskell:
Victor Villas
@dalias Hah yes and maybe that’s why as a zillennial I can’t see myself anywhere else, the average encounter here is so much better
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