We started this account less than 6 months ago. It's going pretty well – thanks to you: 4.2k followers, lots of interactions, questions, and comments. 🎉
A couple of weeks ago, the European Broadcasting Union (#EBU) asked us to write a guest article about our experience with #Mastodon / the #Fediverse, explain the basics, and point out the advantages. :mastodon:
Challenge accepted. 👍
So here's the finished post by @lxplm, hot off the #blog press. ⌨️
Reminds me of a reddit-post where a smallish game developer noted that while their game sold a fraction on linux than it did on windows, 95% of bug reports came from linux and almost all were applicable to improving the windows-version. Better yet: the bug reports were detailed and easy to replicate.
So they upkept the linux-version not for the sales, but for the feedback that allowed the improvement on Windows -- which in turn led to sales.
@dw_innovation@lxplm I think a reluctance exists because people have forgotten how to actually be social in a non curated sense of self. To actually make friends with strangers online, or to actually take the time to be part of a community by engaging with people on a level that may be less parasocial.
Nice to read "Fediverse"... but you still writing about Mastodon only.
A quick search in your article for
peertube
friendica
pleroma
calckey
funkwhale
pixelfed
gives NO result.
Please go back and try to find out, what the REAL advantage of the fediverse is.
I can help you a little bit:
For example #Peertube
Your own a Mastodon-Account. I own a Friendica- and a Peertube account (both on my own servers).
You can read my comment, which comes from friendica. You get my like, if i like your postings.
So, what the hell is peertube...
It is a very advanced Video-platform, fully federating in the fediverse and has similar features as youtube has.
A useraccount can have more than one channel (YT: one account = one channel).
Peertube has live-videos, live-chat, small video-cutting-features, you can update your videos, and you can automatically sync your YT-Channel.
Peertube has also Podcasting-Features for audio-only content.
And the best is:
You can follow my peertube-channel also from mastodon. You get every new video from my peertube-channel in your mastodon timeline.
If you like my videos, you can give a "star" and i receive it as "like" in Peertube.
You can easily share my peertube-videos with your mastodon-user to your followers... and your followers receive my peertube-video...
So you don't need a peertube-account just to consume, like, comment and share the videos you want.
You need only a peertube-account, if you want to share your videos via fediverse.
And if your own a YT-Channel... just mirror and keept it in sync with Peertube, and you have to only upload your videos on YT, and a short time later your fediverse-followers receive notifications for a new video... and can watch, like, share or comment it directly from mastodon, friendica, pleroma, calckey, akkoma... all the other micro/macro-blogging services from the fediverse... you've forgotten to mention in your article...
"This is called the 'Fediverse' approach, which also includes other services (e.g. alternatives to Instagram or YouTube)..."
A first draft actually mentioned Pixelfed and Peertube by name, but the post clearly has a different focus – and already offers more than enough Fediverse info for a less tech-savvy audience.
@lxplm@dw_innovation
I don't think, you are right.
It is a old-twitter-centristic mastodon-focus...
We had so often the problem, that newbies here in fediverse are complaining about "oh... only 500 chars for a posting" and "oh... only 4 images"... and "oh... i get each boost in my timeline... 20 times and more" "how can i write longer postings?", "i can not follow the discussion, i need a threadview"
And the thing is... it is ALL solved on other services than mastodon.
But journalists only write about mastodon... and people think "the fediverse is mastodon. An the Fediverse is bad, because mastodon has so many limitation".
A few month ago i got blocked by a user, because i told him, i'n NOT using mastodon... i'm using friendica... he did not understand, that there is more in the fediverse... because journalists only write about mastodon, mastodon and... suprise mastodon.
But let me repeat: I didn't write the post to get super techy or explain the entire Fediverse (that I understand pretty well according to a bunch of IT pros).
The idea was to get PSM to try out a new microblogging service. And Mastodon is a great choice.
Once 1000+ journos have joined, we can start explaining what Friendica is about. Or that Elk has a cool interface with cool features. Now's not the time. I think.
Fediverse is a peculiar type of networks we actually don't have a category for. It's federated and also wildly heterogeonous. And it makes it very hard to explain to people who don't already have context and experience for both. A guy trying to explain the Fediverse all in its entirety to the uninitiated looks something like this, see the image.
Except it's night, because he's been talking for 8 hours straight. And nobody is around because everybody thinks he's mentally ill and is speaking in tongues.
I know, because I am that guy.
Fediverse is hard to explain, but easy to understand once you're in. And Mastodon is a great "gateway drug" for this. You get a person on board first and then show them what they're actually in for.
Let me explain the whole fediverse in a few sentences:
You are a user. On some service. Your userid is user@domain. Similar to your email.
You login to your service. There are several services as you know mastodon, friendica, peertube or something else. It's like hotmail, gmail, gmx or your own mailserver. It's quite similar the same. The username is the same format on all services.
If you want to follow another user, type in the userid (you know, user@server) in your searchfield. Find it, press "follow".
Now you receiv all postings from this user in your timeline, and you can interact. Like the posting, share it or comment it.
You receive answers from other users too. If you like them, klick on the other user and follow him.
It does not belong which service the other one is using.
You can follow just users like in twitter/x or facebook or instagram. And you can follow also channels from peertube.
Imagine, you can follow a youtube-channel from facebook or an insta-profile from twitter/x... it's not possible? In fediverse you can. Follow a peertube-channel from mastodon or a pixelfed-profile from friendica. You can even follow podcasts from castopod or use a flohmarkt.
Give it a try an explore the whole universe in fediverse or just use basic functionality like you know from your former commercial network... but without annoying ads or algorithms.
So you see... no mastodon-centric explanation, no buzzwords or terminus technici... My explanation is open. And simple.
@jakob well... that's what I was talking about. It's not a few sentences, it's a tract. It's long-winded and makes no sense out of context. What service? As I know? Mastodon who? Wtf is Friendica? Login where? Why do I care?
In marketing, there's a thing called "elevator pitch". Point is, if you couldn't explain your idea to a person within around 15 seconds while you're standing in an elevator with them, you've lost them. This is the maximum attention span an average person will give you if they are not already interested. Your opponent doesn't give a shit and it's up to you to change it.
A sentence "Mastodon is like Twitter but federated - meaning you can roll your own but stay in touch with everybody else, it's a really fun and friendly place, try it, here's the invite link, plus there's way more in store than just Mastodon, you'll figure that out!" is something you can pronounce within 15 seconds. Your explanation lost me on a third paragraph, and I tried.
@drq
Change it:
Fediverse is like Facebok, X, Youtube or Insta, but federated. I use bla. Here is the Invite-Link.
No need to do it mastodon-centric... and... users are not stupid. They can use X, Facebook Youtube, Instagram, Tiktok in parallel... they have to login to the service, create useraccounts, remember the passwords and have to learn how all this commercial services work.
Fediverse is the same... but not commercial, ads-free an you can follow the other services too. try it. It's like following a youtube-channel from facebook without a google-account.
yes. let us develop an elevator-pitch for the fediverse... not for mastodon. I'm sure, you are also able to do it. Users are not that stupid as mastodonis try to convey... @lxplm@dw_innovation
@jakob That's what I'm trying to say: there's no elevator pitch for the Fediverse, much like there's no elevator pitch for the modern Internet in a pre-Internet era. There's just too much context to chew through.
So, better let a person you're pitching to eat the elephant in parts, pun intended. Mastodon is a good first part. You can pitch your favourite engine if you want to. Friendica, is it? Pitch Friendica, if that's what you're familiar with. But don't try to explain the whole game first thing. I tried it, numerous times, it doesn't work.
> Users are not that stupid
Nobody said "stupid". We don't use that word (until somebody does something actually blind stupid, of course :) Not everybody is a tech-whiz, though. There's people who don't know what a "file" or a "service" means. It's not because they're stupid, it's because their context is different from ours.
@drq@lxplm@dw_innovation
They are not stupid... But if you think for them "oh, that's too much information... a server, an account, different services... nono... i have to tell them only about on single option and tell them, thats enough"... YOU behold them as stupid...
If someone does not want free software, you can not even get them with an elevator pitch. If they are stuck in X, Facebook & co... they are stuck.
It's the same as someone is stuck on fastfood... mac donalds... and there is the excellent restaurant with a plenty of good, healthy and excellent food... and you will bring them to try this out and sell only "but try this new chips-restaurant. The chips are great"...
Yes... For me, Mastodon is only chips in a restaurant with a huge amount of different food....
@jakob You sound like a Stallmanite trying to explain why it's more correct to say "GNU/Linux" or "GNU+Linux" versus just Linux.
Yes. Technically, it's more correct. But that's it. Nobody cares. When you start talking about "GNU/Linux" or "GNU+Linux" people pick up and leave the room. Because it's tedious to listen to.
Being a bore is not a good recuitment strategy.
> If someone does not want free software, you can not even get them with an elevator pitch
If it were true, then what's the point in any of this? Fortunately, it's not true. Not a lot of people actually care about free software and all of that. But the Fediverse gets bigger.
@jakob as an adult person with actual life and responsibilities, I assure you: there absolutely is such a thing as too much information.
If you come at me on the street and start explaining to me that I'm eating wrong, and everybody's diet is wrong and here's the correct one, because this and that, I will leave. And if you persist, I will hit you. In the face.
It's not because I'm stupid, or unable to understand what you're saying, it's because I'm tired, I'm in a hurry, you are annoying and I don't give a flying fuck about your cause. Simple as that.
@dw_innovation Since you're posting mostly articles, do consider (cross-)posting to #lemmy as well, as it's way more set for these sort of posts. You can even post in to lemmy from mastodon by @-ing the community you want.
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