Notices by Jorge Caballero, MD (datadrivenmd@fedified.com), page 3

- Curious residents went to ground zero to picnic and take artifacts, including the radioactive green glass known as trinitite and contaminated pieces of cloth that were used to make christening dresses. They learned the bomb was atomic about a month later.
- Cordova says no one from the movie ever contacted survivors.
- "We've done everything to reach out to the filmmakers from the time that they were filming until today."

source: https://www.axios.com/2023/07/20/j-r-oppenheimer-movie-new-mexico-hispanics

After spending some time over at Threads, it's pretty clear that their strategy is to offload the burden of content moderation onto the Fediverse, particularly as it relates to news and political discourse. To the extent that moderation decisions are harvestable via ActivityPub (very) they'll likely feed that data back into their algorithm. IOW: Mastodon and the Fediverse would be Threads' equivalent to Twitter's "Community Notes" (aka Birdwatch)— a free content moderation service that scales

2/ As I predicted a couple days ago: Threads will be the end of Bluesky and Twitter. I don't think it's game over for Mastodon, but it's naïve to look at 30 million signups with zero federation and claim that it validates slow decision making and feature-restricting to appease gatekeepers that are going to defederate anyway. /X

3/ Real talk: the way things are going, Mastodon *needs* Meta to follow through on its promises to become AP compliant in order to stand a chance long term. And, we better hope that Threads signups slow down enough to give Meta a reason to care about the European market because, at the current clip of signups, Threads could easily coast for 2-3 years without the EU. /XX

QTs + easier onboarding + engagement stats = the reason people are leaving Mastodon, and will use Threads instead.

As I and many others with experience predicted: Threads doesn't need to federate, so all the virtue signaling on here was a total waste of time. That effort should have been spent on bringing much-needed features to Mastodon.

And FTR, I tried to bridge the features gap:
https://felk.social
https://discover.fedified.com

But even so, the gatekeepers got their way. /1

@BlackAzizAnansi 🎯🎯🎯
 
https://mas.to/users/BlackAzizAnansi/statuses/110653819486329323

The only time things get more complicated around here is when you start venturing out beyond Mastodon-land, but if you're like the 85% of folks on the "Fediverse" then it's safe to ignore all the other chatter about WordPress plug-ins and RSS feeds and the ActivityPub protocol.

All that chatter is just us computer geeks doing what we do. Don't let that intimidate you, and don't let the well-meaning but misguided (and sometimes overly aggressive) how-to Fediverse accounts confuse you

/3

To the extent that there are trolls on here, they tend to live on a handful of instances. If you're newly-arrived and reading this, then it's *highly* unlikely that you're on one of those servers

You're more likely to encounter the Fediverse HOA Board- a small, self-appointed group that wastes their day monitoring the Global feed and "correcting" newcomers...a sad, toxic brand of digital NIMBYism

When they slide into your mentions remember: you did nothing wrong.

You are welcome here.

/4

There's also racism and misogyny, just like anywhere else on the internet- and life. And just like in real life, there are folks on here whose head is stuck so deep in the sand that they will swear on their children's life that this place is a post-racial, bigotry-free utopia. It is not, and you are not alone in thinking that they're delusional, ignorant, or both.

When they slide into your mentions remember: you are not imagining things, and others noticed that microaggression, too.

/5

And, there will be folks who will say something like "just mute or block" or "I haven't noticed that" or "That's not been my experience."

When that happens, you are right to be upset at what will seem as a dismissive comment that adds insult to injury. In a way, they're right, you should not hesitate to mute or block on here. But, in a more important sense, they're wrong: we cannot just ignore and normalize the aggressors and oppressors. And we won't.

/6

This place isn't perfect, but it is better than the hellsite. And it's getting better. And it will continue to get better. Folks on here genuinely want to do better, and it shows. And that's why I've stuck around despite plenty of opportunities to jump ship to another platform. That's why I continue to invest time and resources into this place. I see its potential. I hope you'll stick around long enough to not only see it, but help us realize it, too.

You are welcome here.

/x

Hey you. Yeah, you. We're glad you're here. Just wanted to say that

#Twitter #twitterdown

My tip for newly-arrived #Twitter expats: ignore the accounts whose entire brand is doling out advice about the Fediverse. This place really isn't as difficult to navigate as those folks would have you believe.

If all you want is a place to exchange ideas, follow experts, and get breaking news, then all you need to know is how to log in/out of your Mastodon account and where the "Follow" button is. If that's all you want, this place really is just like any other online social network.

/2

To the new folks here: welcome! Please ignore the self-appointed tone police. Their "helpful" prompts are a thin veneer over a toxic brand of digital NIMBYism that reflects their personal preferences *only*

Although they appear to be in everyone's mentions, they're actually a miniscule subset of the folks on this social network; you should feel free to mute and/or block them

Also, try to avoid accounts that offer "tips" on how to Mastodon the "right" way. You're here, and that's what matters

2/ A couple of things about the Content Discovery panel that are work mentioning:
- The stats used to determine what's trending are seeded using snapshots of *public* statistics made available *in aggregate* by servers that responsible for 70-80% of all fediverse activity.
- Trending Posts are ranked according to a simple formula that credits 8 points for every "like"/"favourite", 4 per boost, -1 per reply, and a time-based penalty. This is meant to prevent dogpiling while keeping trends fresh

3/ At this time, the suggested accounts are simply the same data that your Mastodon server is making available to you, repackaged in a way that makes it more likely that you'll actually see it.

In the near future, the suggested follows will be enhanced with data from https://discover.fedified.com to make it even easier for you to find great accounts to follow based on your interests (i.e. topic-based suggestions), which you can visit right now if you want more suggestions for #FollowFriday

4/ Another feature worth mentioning: if you want to follow the developing situation with the #Wagner group in #Russia, you can livestream trending tags.

Check it out at https://felk.social

The card design in there is still rough, but it will improve shortly. In fact, if you see the little box that says an update is available, go ahead and click it to get the latest version

5/ OK, but what if your Mastodon app offered real-time likes and boosts from virtually any Mastodon-compliant server? And you could actually see what's trending across the entire Fediverse. And stream trending tags. In real-time. All that *and* QTs. And one-click translation? All that and you didn't have to install another app or move servers? Sound good?

Then check out Fedified's friendly fork of Elk at: https://felk.social

@shoq @mattblaze Ironically, Tom Nichols was among the most vocal advocates against public health measures during the pandemic but only after he'd gained access to COVID-19 vaccination. I remember the shift clearly because our kiddo was too young at the time to get vaccinated and the majority of Black, Indigenous, and Hispanic persons had yet to gain access due to differences in demographic composition— the sort of stuff us actual experts were taking into consideration 😉

@shoq @mattblaze Yeah, nothing against him, just pointing out the irony of it all. All experts have blindspot. Part of being an expert is understanding (and accepting) that the list of "Things I didn't know that I didn't know" will never be empty. Best we can do is to keep tabs on that list and use it to improve the way we source raw data