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Saturday, November 12th, 2022 05:46 am
mastodon - a very vague overview
I wrote this up on twitter a few days ago: much better for long form. I'm going to edit with some updated information but feel free to ask me anything or correct me so I can clarify/fix.
Six days on #mastodon and I'm not sure what to think of it now. I like it, but some caveats. I've also been reading the API and github documentation and source which has influenced me. If you haven't joined yet or have but are still screwing around wondering what the heck:
1.) Do not think of mastodon as social media; if you're familiar with mailing lists, mentally recalibrate to this: a fancy live-action mailing list using a messageboard structure with some vague IRC features.
2.) There is no concept of 'private' as understood in social media.
a.) The owner of your server can see everything you post no matter what.
b.) Possibly the owner of any server who has someone following you who is reading your posts. I still reading API calls so hold that one.
c.) There are four settings for posts: Global, Unlisted, Followers Only, and Direct Message. Let me break down what that means but look at Followers-Only there. That means WHO FOLLOWS YOU. Not WHO YOU FOLLOW.
You cannot only post to those that YOU follow.
- Global - everyone who exists on a Mastodon server can can potentially see it and boost/reply/etc .
- Unlisted - same as above, but your post will not appear a public feed line your local server or federated.
- Followers Only - This is NOT 'who you follow' aka your friendlist/circle/etc.This is WHO FOLLOWS YOU. There is only one way to specifically select like that.
- DM/Mentioned people only - This will ONLY go to people you # in the post but you only have 500 characters and names count
Refresh our definitions here: FANCY MAILING LIST. But with loose affiliations to other mailing lists. Okay now we'll talk about follows and posts, the local timeline feed and the Federated timeline feed.
3.) Feeds, Timelines, and All The Things
a.) Home - that is your personal feed, equivalent to your friendslist on LJ/DW, your roll on tumblr, and home on twitter.
b.) Local - this is the posts of everyone on your server.
c.) Federated - next tweet because this one takes time.
Federated is: all the public posts of everyone on your own server's friendslists in a single feed, including yours It is not ALL THE SERVERS or ALL THE USERS. It is individuals from multiple servers who are being followed by someone on your server. It can also be servers that are on a relay if your server subscribes to that.
That means that everyone on your server can also see every public posts of every single person you are following on the Federated feed and you can see the posts of theirs.
4.) The community you choose actually is really goddamn important depending on what you want.
a.) If your server is tiny, the Local feed is going to be tiny and the Federated feed will follow.
b.) What you see on the Federated feed is very dependent on what everyone on your server is interested in. In other words, if you pick a FurrysUnite or WeOnlyLikeBach servers, your Federated feed may not be heavy on variety.
5.) Lets talk about Mastodon As Fancy Mailing Lists: each server is its own country run by its own admin with its own rules, regulations, and quirks.
a.) Admins can backend block entire servers. You can't see the people on it, follow them, see their posts, and same for them.
b. ) There are levels of blocking below Disappearing an Entire Server, sure. But you seriously seriously need to research your community first to find out what those are and ideally, a list of blocked/block-lite servers and why they're blocked.
c.) Just like with mailing lists, you are subject to an Owner who is making the rules, blocking the sites, and all the things we took as life lived back in mailing list days, but now with the fun of many of these and implicit crossposting, and hey, that.
4.) Your posts are at least implicitly subject to the rules of any server that has someone following you. So yes, your post may be fine for WeAreCoders and DestielIsOurLife, but maybe not so much on CrazyAdminServer where you have a follower and yeah, you're blocked from that server
Mastodon isn't like any social networking site out there, but it's not the Old West of Collective Internet Memory, either. Decentralization does not mean you personally will have any more control than you do right now on twitter or tumblr or lj or dw or anywhere else. You don't.
Decentralization means control is now in the hands of not one corporation or person, but many of them. Primarily whoever owns your server and who they delegate to run it, and secondarily to the admins and staff of other servers.
So I can't say this enough: if you join, recalibrate your brain to "mailing list but fancy, modern, and interconnected with other mailing lists". A mailing list run on someone's home server or space they personally pay for on a web server.
The first rule: Sysadmin is God.
Note: I'm on the Fosstodon.org server: https://fosstodon.org/@seperis
Six days on #mastodon and I'm not sure what to think of it now. I like it, but some caveats. I've also been reading the API and github documentation and source which has influenced me. If you haven't joined yet or have but are still screwing around wondering what the heck:
1.) Do not think of mastodon as social media; if you're familiar with mailing lists, mentally recalibrate to this: a fancy live-action mailing list using a messageboard structure with some vague IRC features.
2.) There is no concept of 'private' as understood in social media.
a.) The owner of your server can see everything you post no matter what.
b.) Possibly the owner of any server who has someone following you who is reading your posts. I still reading API calls so hold that one.
c.) There are four settings for posts: Global, Unlisted, Followers Only, and Direct Message. Let me break down what that means but look at Followers-Only there. That means WHO FOLLOWS YOU. Not WHO YOU FOLLOW.
You cannot only post to those that YOU follow.
- Global - everyone who exists on a Mastodon server can can potentially see it and boost/reply/etc .
- Unlisted - same as above, but your post will not appear a public feed line your local server or federated.
- Followers Only - This is NOT 'who you follow' aka your friendlist/circle/etc.This is WHO FOLLOWS YOU. There is only one way to specifically select like that.
- DM/Mentioned people only - This will ONLY go to people you # in the post but you only have 500 characters and names count
Refresh our definitions here: FANCY MAILING LIST. But with loose affiliations to other mailing lists. Okay now we'll talk about follows and posts, the local timeline feed and the Federated timeline feed.
3.) Feeds, Timelines, and All The Things
a.) Home - that is your personal feed, equivalent to your friendslist on LJ/DW, your roll on tumblr, and home on twitter.
b.) Local - this is the posts of everyone on your server.
c.) Federated - next tweet because this one takes time.
Federated is: all the public posts of everyone on your own server's friendslists in a single feed, including yours It is not ALL THE SERVERS or ALL THE USERS. It is individuals from multiple servers who are being followed by someone on your server. It can also be servers that are on a relay if your server subscribes to that.
That means that everyone on your server can also see every public posts of every single person you are following on the Federated feed and you can see the posts of theirs.
4.) The community you choose actually is really goddamn important depending on what you want.
a.) If your server is tiny, the Local feed is going to be tiny and the Federated feed will follow.
b.) What you see on the Federated feed is very dependent on what everyone on your server is interested in. In other words, if you pick a FurrysUnite or WeOnlyLikeBach servers, your Federated feed may not be heavy on variety.
5.) Lets talk about Mastodon As Fancy Mailing Lists: each server is its own country run by its own admin with its own rules, regulations, and quirks.
a.) Admins can backend block entire servers. You can't see the people on it, follow them, see their posts, and same for them.
b. ) There are levels of blocking below Disappearing an Entire Server, sure. But you seriously seriously need to research your community first to find out what those are and ideally, a list of blocked/block-lite servers and why they're blocked.
c.) Just like with mailing lists, you are subject to an Owner who is making the rules, blocking the sites, and all the things we took as life lived back in mailing list days, but now with the fun of many of these and implicit crossposting, and hey, that.
4.) Your posts are at least implicitly subject to the rules of any server that has someone following you. So yes, your post may be fine for WeAreCoders and DestielIsOurLife, but maybe not so much on CrazyAdminServer where you have a follower and yeah, you're blocked from that server
Mastodon isn't like any social networking site out there, but it's not the Old West of Collective Internet Memory, either. Decentralization does not mean you personally will have any more control than you do right now on twitter or tumblr or lj or dw or anywhere else. You don't.
Decentralization means control is now in the hands of not one corporation or person, but many of them. Primarily whoever owns your server and who they delegate to run it, and secondarily to the admins and staff of other servers.
So I can't say this enough: if you join, recalibrate your brain to "mailing list but fancy, modern, and interconnected with other mailing lists". A mailing list run on someone's home server or space they personally pay for on a web server.
The first rule: Sysadmin is God.
Note: I'm on the Fosstodon.org server: https://fosstodon.org/@seperis
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From:But I'm also at a point in my career where I don't need to market myself professionally. I have the equivalent of tenure, and my next job isn't going to come from my writing online, it's going to come from my existing professional network. Which is a nice place to be, but it's definitely impacted how I approach things. Avoiding my social life bouncing into my work life is more of a concern than self-promotion.
I'm looking at this as a place to maybe have interesting conversations with people I don't know yet, which, much as I <3 DW and have no plans to leave, isn't so much a thing around here in recent years.
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From:Literally the only reason I'm on linkedin is that I work for teh state and they offered us the linkedin classes for free (?) through our state email if we joined. That was fun but then I went back to college so now I just go to randomly friend or approve a link to my coworkers. Some are here on the H1-B I think? So I try to make sure I have them since if they get laid off or riffed or something, it looks better if they have a large network and hopefully expands their opportunities to find another employer. A lot of my contractor coworkers got very screwed the last time something like that happened and I had no idea this might help; now I do.
I'm looking at this as a place to maybe have interesting conversations with people I don't know yet, which, much as I <3 DW and have no plans to leave, isn't so much a thing around here in recent years.
That is what it is perfect for. It really does fill the combination of professional/personal interest light social niche that I didn't realize I really really wanted until I joined. It's not All About The Thing, but more All About the People Who Do This Thing, which is actually a very important distinction. It's a really nice vibe.
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From:I'm having fun exploring! And it's nice to be able to dip in and out of conversations, especially when I'm on the road for work and spending nights sitting alone in hotel rooms.
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