[chiptune punky music]
Greetings, and welcome to a short episode of Veronica Explains!
I’m Veronica!
And today, I’d like to briefly talk about Mastodon, Twitter, and why I’m not posting
a big video telling **everyone** it’s time to roll your own social media network.
Now, I’m aware that talking about your social media habits is a great way to get attacked
online.
Everyone has opinions, and our society has a complex relationship between corporate media,
device addiction, and global connectedness.
So, this isn’t going to be a slam on Twitter, or folks who want to keep using it.
That being said…
[synthy chiptune music plays]
You can totally quit Twitter if you don't wanna use it.
If you're not happy on Twitter, you can leave!
You can quit!
You can shut it down!
You don't even "have to" switch to a different social network.
You can *literally* just stop.
If it's making you feel bad, STOP.
There’s life outside of Twitter, I promise.
That’s about all I want to say about Twitter at the moment, because frankly, the situation
is changing rapidly.
[music: chiptune version of Zadok the Priest]
In any case, I prefer Mastodon to Twitter, and if you’re watching this video, I’m
guessing you’re at least a bit curious about it.
So what is Mastodon?
Well, here’s the short version.
Mastodon is a social networking software built on ActivityPub, a decentralized protocol which
allows users of different services to communicate with each other in a wider network known as
the Fediverse.
Some folks consider it like an “open source version of Twitter”, and if that helps you
visualize it, fine.
I think there’s a lot more to it than that, though.
You can send posts, often called “toots”, on one server, and folks can view them on
other federated servers.
In other words, unlike Twitter, MySpace, Facebook, or GeoCities, Mastodon isn’t just “one
centralized platform”.
Different groups can host different servers, for whoever they want, wherever they want.
You might have a server for artists, a server for technologists, even a server for servers!
You might want to run a server in your home lab, in a cloud provider, or even on a Raspberry
Pi.
Unlike Twitter, the options on Mastodon are fancy, flexible, and fun.
If you want me to do a broader video covering Mastodon, let me know.
I’m just trying to keep this one brief, so from here on out, I’m going to assume
you already know what Mastodon is.
So now that stuff is… happening over at Twitter, a lot of folks are jumping ship to
Mastodon.
For what it’s worth, I jumped ship in April as things started getting a bit dramatic over
there on Twitter.
My reasons for preferring Mastodon are really quite simple.
Life is just too dramatic as it is, and I want my social networking to be a calming
force, and not an aggravating one.
Mastodon’s a great fit for me, and maybe it is for you, but should you spin up your
own instance, right now?
I don’t think so.
At least, probably not.
Right now, the Fediverse is growing rapidly, and in my mind that’s a great thing.
A lot of people are spinning up single-user instances of Mastodon, and that’s not terrible
by any stretch of the imagination.
But I worry a little bit that if you’re new to the whole thing, spinning up your own
instance is going to cause you to lose out on the possibilities of community-building
that comes from being on a smaller, shared instance.
At present, as of the time I'm filming this, I’m on a great locally-oriented instance.
I have an excellent local timeline full of folks I actually know, in real life.
I think it’s probably best for folks to try to join, or build, something similar for
their local community.
Or their specific affinity group online.
What I worry about, based on experience talking with other users over the last six months,
is that if too many folks build their own instances, the opportunity for community development
and friendly assistance from experienced users will be lost, and that'll cause the network
to stagnate.
Another issue, perhaps an even more complicated issue, is that being an administrator takes
work, particularly from a moderation standpoint.
You might be less worried about this if you're just planning a single user Mastodon instance,
but if you plan to host with your friends or community, you're going to have to have
a solid game plan for how you're going to handle moderation, disputes, and all the other
drama associated with running a social media network.
I do worry that in the current climate, with so many folks flocking to Mastodon this work
might fall by the wayside, and that'll cause the reputation of the Fediverse to suffer
in the meantime.
All that aside, I’ve been tempted periodically to spin up my own single-user instance, primarily
to avoid adding strain to my mods.
I worry about that sometimes as a person-making-stuff-on-the-internet, and if you’re in a similar boat, I think
it’s fair to consider the impact that you will have on the communities you participate
in.
Even so, we’re at a particular stage in Mastodon’s development, where I’m not
convinced we need *more servers*, so much as we need *more users who care to make it
a great platform*.
If I ever spun up my own Mastodon instance, I figure I’d be spending between $10-15/mo
on a virtual private server.
So, I just kicked that money to my local admins to help cover costs.
And I feel pretty good about that.
What’s exciting about this isn’t necessarily owning your own data- I mean come on, you
can own your own data just by typing all of your thoughts into a text document.
What’s exciting here is building actual community.
Twitter *did* enable that- plenty of activists and citizen journalists have built momentum
using the platform.
Mastodon feels like the earliest days of that, in the best possible way.
A return-to-form for online networking.
Almost like the BBS is back.
But remember, many folks who’ve been-around-the-block with BBSes say we need to make sure we don’t
end up with too many sysops.
And that resonates with me, as someone who cares more about the connections than the
cacophony.
Now, don’t confuse what I’m saying with “just join one of the big instances”.
Cause that’s not my recommendation at all.
Instead, my recommendation is to consider joining a smaller, more niche instance that
fits your vibe.
I think you’ll be happier in the long run, and in the end, isn’t that what’s most
important?
Now, I’m not saying I’ll never run my own instance.
After all, never say never.
And I’m not saying you “shouldn’t” do it- you do you.
I just think we should be careful about our steps here, as we build communities online
together.
And we should give some serious thought to building up a community instead of standing
up more silos.
Anyway, social media is weird.
If you want to stay on Twitter, be my guest.
If you want to throw your computer into the sun, be my guest.
Anyway, here’s Bop-It.
[Bop-It sounds]
[chiptune version of Zadok the Priest continues]
That's how you do it!
[laughs]
Oh, I'm such a nerd.