@phire @whitequark I've heard an experienced Twitch streamer recommend turning off the viewer count during streams for the same reason. even if you ARE intentionally trying to build a (semi-commercial) audience, if you wait to put on your best show until you can see that you have one, you never will.

@clarity the problem was feelings all along!

the problem with mastodon is not that an influx of casual recent ex-twitterers is threatening the safer space built mindfully by trauma survivors

nor that defensive nerds are scuttling the network's chances of sustainable adoption by aggressively gatekeeping regular people

it's that those two problems are the same problem seen from different perspectives, and for some fucking reason every post about what's wrong with mastodon and how to fix it only acknowledges one of them