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I browsed my first website in 1994. It was weird and took forever to load. Over time, I got a bunch of bookmarks and kept discovering new sites on a weekly basi

I browsed my first website in 1994. It was weird and took forever to load. Over time, I got a bunch of bookmarks and kept discovering new sites on a weekly basis. These days, I browse HN, proggit, Twitter, Reddit and Metafilter regularly. If Twitter really does nerf their APIs, I'll have to stop visiting it because principles, and it will take 20% of my current Web universe with it. Not sure if my other hotspots will take its place, or if I'll finally start turning away from the Web.

snthd 8y ago
https://joinmastodon.org https://joinmastodon.org ?
- TekMol 8y ago
  I tried Mastodon recently and got the feeling it's only crazy people :) Maybe I just don't find the right people. On Twitter, I can look up people I'm interested in. Like "That company is doing something cool, let's follow the CEO on Twitter". But on Mastodon? Is there anybody 'normal' on there who posts substantial stuff?
  - dcbadacd 8y ago
    Probably, but really hard to find. I think alternative social media will only take off with very good integration with other social media we have now.
  - krapp 8y ago
    That's the problem of network effect - the 'normal' people are already posting on the 'normal' social networks with their 'normal' friends. Most likely don't want to leave for other networks because what they have works for them. An alternative to the mainstream doesn't appeal to people who don't reject the mainstream, and another social network alongside what they have might seem redundant.
  - horsemans 8y ago
    There are plenty of unique and interesting posters on Mastodon. mastodon.technology is full of vintage computer experts, BBS operators, people working to revitalize Gopher as an alternative to the ad-saturated web, and more. And that’s just one instance. There are other instances where people congregate to discuss art, music, books, and punk rock. There’s a Star Wars themed instance, there’s safe places for sex workers and LGBTQ posters, and all you have to do is care about one of these things to find a whole world of enthusiasts. Searching http://instances.social http://instances.social gives you a huge list of registered instances. But if you think people are divided up into “normal” and “not normal” (and your definition of normal is “some CEO”) then yeah, maybe Mastodon isn’t right for you.
    - ianamartin 8y ago
      I'm pretty sure the instance dedicated to sex workers got shut down because of SESTA/FOSTA.
      - aussiegeek 8y ago
        No, they have just been having traffic issues, DDOS and of course can't use any US based services. One of the founders wrote about it yesterday https://medium.com/assembly-four/my-six-week-rollercoaster-ride-172eb58ba80e https://medium.com/assembly-four/my-six-week-rollercoaster-r...
        ianamartin 8y ago
        Glad to hear that's back up. The last thing I heard about it was CloudFlare giving them the boot.
    - TekMol 8y ago
      full of vintage computer experts, BBS operators, people working to revitalize Gopher That's what I meant with 'crazy people' :)
      - AsyncAwait 8y ago
  - rocky1138 8y ago
    You can follow me! I'm not crazy! (I think...) https://kwat.chat/rocky1138 https://kwat.chat/rocky1138
    - TekMol 8y ago
      Looking at the about page of kwat.chat, it says it is based on GNU Social. Can you use Mastodon to follow people on kwat.chat? Does Mastodon use GNU Social or does it support it somehow?
      - rocky1138 8y ago
        Both of them use the OStatus protocol, so people can follow anyone on any of the services. Mastodon is a new implementation of the OStatus spec.
- jwilk 8y ago
  Which Mastodon instances do you recommend? (I don't have energy to run my own.)
- james_pm 8y ago
  Or https://micro.blog https://micro.blog? Feels like Twitter 9 years ago, and you can just hop on board with your own blog at your own domain as long as it has an RSS or JSON feed. Clients for iOS and Android are being built by indie developers - icro for iOS is great and there's also Dialog for Android now.
chx 8y ago
https://spidr.today https://spidr.today is an intriguing news aggregator: > SPIDR is an AI-powered news aggregator that uses textual analysis to group similar news together > The aim is to provide fast access to relevant news from different viewpoints Comments, vote up/down is available.

snthd 8y ago

https://joinmastodon.org https://joinmastodon.org ?

TekMol 8y ago
I tried Mastodon recently and got the feeling it's only crazy people :) Maybe I just don't find the right people. On Twitter, I can look up people I'm interested in. Like "That company is doing something cool, let's follow the CEO on Twitter". But on Mastodon? Is there anybody 'normal' on there who posts substantial stuff?
- dcbadacd 8y ago
  Probably, but really hard to find. I think alternative social media will only take off with very good integration with other social media we have now.
- krapp 8y ago
  That's the problem of network effect - the 'normal' people are already posting on the 'normal' social networks with their 'normal' friends. Most likely don't want to leave for other networks because what they have works for them. An alternative to the mainstream doesn't appeal to people who don't reject the mainstream, and another social network alongside what they have might seem redundant.
- horsemans 8y ago
  There are plenty of unique and interesting posters on Mastodon. mastodon.technology is full of vintage computer experts, BBS operators, people working to revitalize Gopher as an alternative to the ad-saturated web, and more. And that’s just one instance. There are other instances where people congregate to discuss art, music, books, and punk rock. There’s a Star Wars themed instance, there’s safe places for sex workers and LGBTQ posters, and all you have to do is care about one of these things to find a whole world of enthusiasts. Searching http://instances.social http://instances.social gives you a huge list of registered instances. But if you think people are divided up into “normal” and “not normal” (and your definition of normal is “some CEO”) then yeah, maybe Mastodon isn’t right for you.
  - ianamartin 8y ago
    I'm pretty sure the instance dedicated to sex workers got shut down because of SESTA/FOSTA.
    - aussiegeek 8y ago
      No, they have just been having traffic issues, DDOS and of course can't use any US based services. One of the founders wrote about it yesterday https://medium.com/assembly-four/my-six-week-rollercoaster-ride-172eb58ba80e https://medium.com/assembly-four/my-six-week-rollercoaster-r...
      - ianamartin 8y ago
        Glad to hear that's back up. The last thing I heard about it was CloudFlare giving them the boot.
  - TekMol 8y ago
    full of vintage computer experts, BBS operators, people working to revitalize Gopher That's what I meant with 'crazy people' :)
    - AsyncAwait 8y ago
- rocky1138 8y ago
  You can follow me! I'm not crazy! (I think...) https://kwat.chat/rocky1138 https://kwat.chat/rocky1138
  - TekMol 8y ago
    Looking at the about page of kwat.chat, it says it is based on GNU Social. Can you use Mastodon to follow people on kwat.chat? Does Mastodon use GNU Social or does it support it somehow?
    - rocky1138 8y ago
      Both of them use the OStatus protocol, so people can follow anyone on any of the services. Mastodon is a new implementation of the OStatus spec.
jwilk 8y ago
Which Mastodon instances do you recommend? (I don't have energy to run my own.)
james_pm 8y ago
Or https://micro.blog https://micro.blog? Feels like Twitter 9 years ago, and you can just hop on board with your own blog at your own domain as long as it has an RSS or JSON feed. Clients for iOS and Android are being built by indie developers - icro for iOS is great and there's also Dialog for Android now.

chx 8y ago

https://spidr.today https://spidr.today is an intriguing news aggregator: > SPIDR is an AI-powered news aggregator that uses textual analysis to group similar news together > The aim is to provide fast access to relevant news from different viewpoints Comments, vote up/down is available.