THREAD: I made a series of images for an Instagram post I made about migrating to the fediverse. I figured I'd share with anyone else who wants to use, so I included some blank template versions too. DM if you'd like the Adobe Illustrator file so you can make your own edits. And please,comment if I got anything wrong so I can correct it.
@cliffwade No, I took the optical drive out of my laptop and replaced it with a second HDD. That said I do have (and already had) a portable usb dvd drive just in case... I used to have a client who would contractualise financial models by burning two copies to CD, then both parties would sign both CDs with a marker pen, and each party would get one each. That went on for a long time after it became hard to find CD drives.
Sadly optical media standards don't grow with the need for more storage and whilst #TapeDrive|s do, modern versions of #LTO#Ultrium are absurdly expensive so unless one needs to backup Petabytes offline it doesn't make financial sense...
Personally I prefer the form factor of 3,5" #FDD|s but their abysmal capacity makes them rather useless these days.
Addendum: By "nobody is pushing hate speech," I mean that no company, owner of the Social Network, can deliberately and aggressively force posts with hate speech onto users solely for the purpose of selling more ads. This does not imply that there is no hate speech - unfortunately, this is a problem that also spreads in the Fediverse, and the tools are not always adequate.
@gcrkrause there is hate speech here, I know. What I mean is that there's no company pushing it just to sell more ads. Hate speech is a problem of any platform and we should find a way to stop it.
@gcrkrause I understand your point of view and think you're right. I have edited the post to clarify the point. Hate speech exists, and there are people who spread it, but there is no social network owner who spreads it deliberately just to sell more ads.
There's a lot of shit flying in the #Fediverse lately and a lot of times perspective seems to get lost. Yes, there are things we need to talk about, and yes there are things we will not agree on. And that's okay.
But leave the pitchforks and torches out of this.
Fedi admins put in the hours and effort and emotion into making fedi happen. Sometimes they make decisions we might not agree with. We should criticize, but we should not pile-on.
And to make this abundantly clear… regardless of how much you disagree with a person and how much you feel their decisions might be wrong:
👉 harassment is harassment, and is unacceptable
👉 calling for harm is calling for harm, and is unacceptable
👉 pile-ons are pile-ons, and are unacceptable
People who engage in that sort of thing are like locusts. They join a community, destroy it, and move on.
If you care about fedi, push back against that, even if it targets someone you disagree with.
Social networks are constantly battling inauthentic bot accounts that send direct messages to users promoting scam cryptocurrency investment platforms. I recently tracked down and interviewed a Russian hacker responsible for a series of particularly aggressive crypto spam campaigns this month that prompted several large #Mastodon communities to temporarily halt new registrations. According to the hacker, their spam software has been in private use until the last few weeks, when it was released as open source code.
A big thank you to @renchap for help with this research.
… why move SSH off 22 when you can just disable vulnerable credential exchanges? 🤨 Really, really never understood this. Like using fail2ban. If you're parsing logs, it's already gone too far.
Similar to running firewalls. Why open a port you don't intend to? Not even being facetious; and I've had occasion to mitigate Iran.
As YouTube seems to be going increasingly ad-heavy, have had many requests to do posts about how to get into #PeerTube.
PeerTube is an ad-free video platform on the Fediverse. You can follow and interact with PeerTube accounts from Mastodon etc. When a PeerTube account posts a video, it will appear in your Mastodon timeline just like any post, and you can like, share, reply etc.
PeerTube content still has a long way to go, and YouTube's network effect is unhealthily strong, but as YouTube keeps tightening its grip there are ever-increasing numbers of publishers and viewers looking for alternatives.
If you're a viewer, you can follow, watch and interact with PeerTube accounts entirely from within Mastodon etc. You don't need to be on PeerTube yourself, your Mastodon etc account is enough.
p.s. I run an account at @FediVideo which boosts interesting videos from PeerTube.
Also, if you just want to browse a PeerTube site, I run a server at https://fedi.video which federates nice safe accounts from across the Fediverse (no NSFW, no conspiracy theories, no bigotry etc).
I disagree with the current CEO of Mastodon about his stance on mid-sized instances. We don't want to be run in isolation, we are part of the Fediverse. "Normal users just want the default", he can repeat that as many times as he wants, it doesn't make it true because of that.
Diversity is the DNA of the Fediverse and Mastodon is just one part of the whole. Thousands of people spend their time and money to make it successful. Anyone who dismisses that and single-handedly tries to market the Fediverse as a Mastodon brand and use "crowding out" techniques to prevent users from even being encouraged to choose an instance from a diversity will ultimately fail.
I am super disappointed with the direction Mastodon Corporation is taking. If there is not enough headwind here soon, then sooner or later it will lead to a schism.
@jjk it's not some app that decided to default to some instance, it's the official app of a project that gets identified with the whole fedi deciding to make default an instance that has 1/10th of all active accounts on fedi.
And that's a problem. I wrote why this is a problem, with some history of a similar social network a decade ago that got badly hurt in similar circumstances: https://rys.io/en/168.html
@louis The most strategic thing Eugen could have done would’ve been to keep mastodon.social small and make it socially unacceptable for instances to grow beyond a certain size. That would’ve been a poison pill against the infinite growth death cult of Silicon Valley. Maybe not a permanent one but it could have delayed things a little. Instead we’re welcoming them with open arms and equating their interest with success. Like sheep flattered by the gazes of wolves.
@asahi95 yeah got tagged by one of these a while ago, and I reported it, but it was kind of weird that it didn’t ask me to specify why I was reporting it, kind of just said thanks 😂
Project Tapestry is a universal chronological timeline of your favorite social media services, blogs, RSS feeds & more. All updates in one place, in the order they’re posted with no algorithm deciding what you see or when you see it.
But we need your help! Check out our Kickstarter campaign to learn more about the project and the backer rewards we have planned, then make a pledge to help us turn Project Tapestry into a reality.
It took just four amazing days for #ProjectTapestry to become 100% funded on Kickstarter! To say we're floored would be an understatement. We couldn't have done this without you and we wanted to give a sincere thank you to everyone.
We'll be posting more details about stretch goals and a video overview of the DIY API behind Tapestry in the days ahead but for now, a sincere thank you from all of us here at the factory. You are the BEST!
Most Fediverse software supports image uploads, so there's no reason to use Imgur for image hosting. Hell, even on my small single-user server (atomicpoet.org), image hosting is easy peasy. Not only is Imgur not needed, they're an annoyance for those of us who are used to seeing images natively on the Fediverse....
There's a social reading platform called @bookwyrm which is an alternative to Amazon's Goodreads. BookWyrm is part of the Fediverse, and BookWyrm accounts can be followed from Mastodon etc. You can find out more at:
They are currently trying to get BookWyrm translated into more languages, so that more readers can use it. If you speak a language other than English, you can help translate at:
I'm on the Rambling Readers instance and am gradually adding my previously read books alongside my current reads. This is me https://ramblingreaders.org/user/StephanieJane if anyone wants to link up!
We are in the process of developing a mobile application in 2024 🎉 :peertube:
Before starting the technical development, we felt it was important to understand the expectations of people who are watching #PeerTube videos.
We're looking for a few people to take part in a short 30 minutes video conference during the week of 15-19 January to find out more about your needs and opinions regarding the adaptation of PeerTube as a mobile application.
@peertube This is an excellent opportunity for the accessibility community to ensure that accessibility is baked into the design and development process. Not to mention the importance of alpha testing to ensure that the app is fully accessible prior to launch.
@BeAware My instance mastodon.green is allowing Threads. I hate Zuck but i am not stupid. Most big accounts that find Mastodon too confusing will move there. So it is nice to be able to interact with them. I like that my server lets me still choose to do that.
@RL_Dane@amatas I remember talking to people about Mastodon versus Facebook and I told them:
“The folks here, whoever they are, whatever they are, are a thousand times more ‘real’ than most of the posts I see and read on Firstname-Lastname social media.”
It’s absolutely true. It makes this an incredibly special place.
For me, the fediverse feels like a cozy little tavern. No one cares that you know nobody. You get your ale, sit somewhere and talk to everyone about everything. And suddenly it's 2am, you're dancing on the table with 3 complete strangers and when you fall into bed, you're already looking forward to the next evening.
@eff Do not underestimate this CSAM matter. As the recent attention from Facebook/Threads illustrates, big tech is starting to wake up to the danger the Fediverse represents to their regime of surveillance capitalism. The ostensible justification for attacking the Fediverse in the name of "rooting out child pornography" is a threat we need to take seriously.
@annaleen very nice, but definitely needs more analysis of whether BlueSky will be subject to @doctorow 's #enshittification curve or if whatever decentralization mechanisms it has can prevent that. thanks for sharing!
Our CEO, @mike just launched a new podcast series titled "Dot Social" to explore the evolution of the internet and how new open standards, like #ActivityPub, can forever change the web and the world of social media.
At the State of the Word address this week, Matt Mullenweg was asked about support for the plugin, and he commented that less than 5,000 sites had installed it. So he wasn't sure how interested people are in it.
So... if you have a WP site, let's start installing that plugin and making more sites available via ActivityPub! 😀
