←back to thread

461 points GavinAnderegg | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0.953s | source
Show context
PaulHoule ◴[] No.42151244[source]
My take is that Bluesky is a nicer place than Mastodon.

Personally I think politics are terrible on microblogging platforms for the reason that you can't say very much in 140 characters or even 1400 characters.

A common kind of profile on that kind of platform is: "There are good people and bad people and I'm one of the good people"

It is very easy to other people and share memes that build group cohesion while driving other people away. Really making progress requires in politics a lot of "I agree with you about 90% but there is 10% that I don't" or "Well, I negotiated something in the backroom that you'd really hate but headed off a situation you would have thought was catastrophic but you won't appreciate that I did it so you and I are both better off if I don't tell you" and other sorts of nuance, you don't want to see how the sausage is made, etc.

To stand Mastodon (where you would have thought fascists were taking over the world a year ago if you believed what you read) I have to have about 20 or so block rules.

I see some people with the same kind of profiles on Bluesky but see a lot less othering in my feed because the "Discover" feed on Bluesky filters out a lot of angry content. My rough estimate is that it removes about 75% of the divisive political junk. That

(1) Immediately improves my feed, but also

(2) Reduces the amount of re-posted angry political content (it's like adding some boron to the coolant in a nuclear reactor) and

(3) Since angry political memes don't work anymore people find a different game to play

My guess is the X-odus folks are less agreeable than average for the same reason why people who "left California" to go to Colorado or someplace else are less agreeable. Those who go are less agreeable than those who stay. On the other hand, a certain amount of suppression of negativity could stop it from spreading and might not even be noticed as "censorship".

replies(17): >>42151452 #>>42151589 #>>42151611 #>>42152500 #>>42153028 #>>42153370 #>>42153572 #>>42153647 #>>42153687 #>>42153903 #>>42153950 #>>42154060 #>>42155427 #>>42155672 #>>42155823 #>>42156515 #>>42161532 #
ASalazarMX ◴[] No.42151611[source]
The most crucial decision when joining Mastodon is choosing the most friendly instance. I have a strong interest in interacting with cybersecurity professionals, so infosec.exchange was perfect for me, either browsing subscribed or local posts. Browsing all is something I do only when I'm bored, because many posts are not what I'd like to see. You can always migrate your account if you want.

https://instances.social/

That being said, BlueSky is simpler and easier because there's no real federation yet, and even if they have a "Discovery" algorithm, you get many options to control what you want to see. It's feels great, like Twitter before their 2012(ish?) IPO.

replies(4): >>42151706 #>>42152061 #>>42152582 #>>42165945 #
JoshTriplett ◴[] No.42152582[source]
> The most crucial decision when joining Mastodon is choosing the most friendly instance.

Consider using a self-hosting service, like https://togethr.party/ , to have your own instance on your own domain. Much like email, you should never be beholden to another party for your identity; your hosting service should be an invisible detail that can change without anyone interacting with you needing to notice.

I've watched several instances shut down over the years, and have never once regretted the decision to have an instance on my own domain. My social network handle is now the same as my email address, with an extra @ in front.

replies(3): >>42153179 #>>42154223 #>>42155803 #
1. AndyMcConachie ◴[] No.42155803[source]
Fediverse instance software is immature. I self host lots of stuff but I've tried 3 times to self host a fediverse instance and stopped all three times. I get things running, but the amount of care and feeding software like Mastodon requires is unacceptable for someone like me who doesn't have time to babysit server software.