Mastodon - alternative to Twitter

[Montero]

So I barely tweet.
But I get petitions and one floated past about the monopoly of a few on social media platforms. And mentioned Mastodon as an alternative to Twitter. So here it is FWIW

 

[Brian G Turner]

V e r y s l o w.

 

[Montero]

You dinosaur.

 

[M. Robert Gibson]

Anyone looking for a replacement for Facebook should check out

MeWe: The best chat & group app with privacy you trust.

Brilliant features with no BS. No Ads. No Spyware. MeWe is the Next-Gen Social Network.

mewe.com

It has all the same features (more or less) with none of the tracking and ad-slinging and messing about with the timeline
The problem is trying to get other people to join

If you're feeling adventurous, there are sites in the Fediverse

To the Fediverse!

To the Fediverse!

www.fediverse.to

such as diaspora.social or friendica – A Decentralized Social Network

Here are the wiki links

Diaspora (social network) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Friendica - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

By the way, I joined Mastodon about 4 years ago, and I've only tooted once, using the hashtag #sffchrons
There were no replies

 

[Mon0Zer0]

Is there a dedicated authors Mastodon, or an SFF mastodon equivalent does anyone know?

I just applied to join comics.town, but i'd ideally like an SFF Authors account too.

 

[The Big Peat]

Is there a dedicated authors Mastodon, or an SFF mastodon equivalent does anyone know?

I just applied to join comics.town, but i'd ideally like an SFF Authors account too.

There are writer and SFF orientated Mastodon servers, but I don't think you really need to have multiple accounts unless you plan on posting very different things from both.

 

[Dave]

So then, what is the best way to move an account from Twitter to Mastodon? I'm asking for a friend.

No, seriously, I doubt I'm going to join Mastodon, either with a personal account or the community group*, but other people are asking me and I have no idea about any of it.

So, any advice I could pass on? I've seen people creating special hashtags, so their followers can quickly find them again, but is there a way to create some kind of transferable spreadsheet lists? And this advice about making sure you are on the right Server for your business; how do you know which is the right server? Are there directories of the Mastodon servers with descriptions of their features? Is there a forum (other than Twitter) where people discuss this?

*This seems like a very good excuse to turn down the amount of time I spend on social media. (SFF Chronicles not included.)

 

[SilentRoamer]

Mastodon with its smaller built communities is not a replacement for Twitter - for a start its infrastructure is terrible and the site is just really really slow. It's basically Discord with some added cross server features.

 

[Fiberglass Cyborg]

I'm a bit dubious about the idea that Mastodon users pick one subject-specific server when they sign up, and only see stuff from that server. What if you are interested in more than one thing?! Crazy idea, I know.

 

[M. Robert Gibson]

A very brief, very simple overview of Mastodon (As I understand it)

It is open source software so anybody with their own web server can set up an instance - there is no one Mastodon site, there are many.
Each of these instances can connect to other instances, so if you sign up on one instance, and that instance is connected to several other instances, then you can follow and post to other people on those other instances. This is where the federated concept come in.

The fact that there are multiple instance is one of its strengths. No one company has access to all your data.

Also if one goes down, then you can sign up on another instance, although I think you'll lose your messages (I'll have to check). But this is also one of its weaknesses.

You can choose which instance to sign up to, but again the potential problem is if the owner of the instance can no longer run it for whatever reason, the instance will disappear.

This explains it a lot better

Mastodon Help - Guide

A thorough introduction to Mastodon

mastodon.help

One more thing. One reason why Mastodon is 'slow' is because of the exodus from Twitter and the majority are signing up on the most popular instance - mastodon.social - so that site is getting a lot of traffic
If you want to try it out, I suggest one of the small to medium instances. but choosing which one

 

[M. Robert Gibson]

Moving from Twitter to Mastodon

This is a useful article

How to Move From Twitter to Mastodon

Free the bird

www.tomshardware.com

Here's another one

Mastodon Beginner's Guide: The Trending Social Network as a Twitter Alternative

You can share photographs and videos, compose posts with a maximum of 500 characters, repost other people's stuff, and more.

www.gadgetany.com

 

[Biskit]

I've got myself a Mastodon account. It's not exactly a fast response, and it's been throwing unexplained errors as I've been trying to set up my profile. Watch this space, but don't hold your breath.

 

[M. Robert Gibson]

I've got myself a Mastodon account. It's not exactly a fast response, and it's been throwing unexplained errors as I've been trying to set up my profile. Watch this space, but don't hold your breath.

Which instance did you sign up on? mastodon.social is getting a battering thanks to the twitter exodus - twexodus? twexit?

I've just done a bit more digging and found these potentially interesting instances
writing.exchange with 3299 Users

Writing Exchange

A small, intentional community for poets, authors, and every kind of writer.

writing.exchange

mastodonbooks.net with 7 Users

Mastodon Books

Husband, father, grandfather, coder, endless book reader and life lover. I cannot imagine a better place to be. Please join us and share your favorite stories.

mastodonbooks.net

I suspect the owner of the latter would have a panic attack if there was a sudden influx of new registrations

 

[Biskit]

Which instance did you sign up on? mastodon.social is getting a battering thanks to the twitter exodus - twexodus? twexit?

I'm on mastodonapp.uk, which I did know in advance could be a bit slow.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

I think I’ll just return to my old favourite forums and enjoy the peace

 

[Dave]

I warned you not to make further political posts in this thread but some people refused to listen. This is the Technology forum. We don't discuss current affairs or politics. I've removed all of those posts and left only the useful advice about Mastodon and moving there from Twitter. Now I'm locking the thread.