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How do things stand on account portability? If I sign up at a mastodon server, build an audience and network there, but later if the server admin changes its po
by mathnmusic 5y ago
How do things stand on account portability? If I sign up at a mastodon server, build an audience and network there, but later if the server admin changes its policies in unfavorable directions, can I migrate to a new server with all my contacts and reputation intact - even without the old admin's cooperation?
- commoner 5y agoMastodon has a "profile move" feature that moves all of your followers (on instances that support the protocol) to your new account. However, it will not move your toots (posts). All of your account data can be exported, and everything except for toots (and media) can be imported. https://docs.joinmastodon.org/user/moving/ https://docs.joinmastodon.org/user/moving/
- FalconSensei 5y ago> However, it will not move your toots (posts). I would say that moving the posts is what worries me more about moving the account. I can refollow everyone, but I can't post hundreds (or thousands) of posts in their original datetime
- pangolinplayer 5y agoPost is called a toot? Tf
- outside1234 5y ago"Truth in advertising"
- commoner 5y agoThe bird app (Twitter) calls them tweets, so the Mastodon service decided to call them toots. But, they did rename them to "posts" earlier this year: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26882318 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26882318 I guess this isn't reflected in joinmastodon.org yet. Each instance can also choose to call posts whatever they want: https://www.reddit.com/r/mastodon_social/comments/9mhzu8/how_do_i_change_the_name_of_toots/ https://www.reddit.com/r/mastodon_social/comments/9mhzu8/how...
- Kye 5y agoLong story short: Eugen didn't know toot had another meaning in some places. Toot is the sound a mastodon makes.
- FalconSensei 5y agoI only discovered the other meaning on the post they made about the renaming. For me it always was mastodon and trumpet sound
- warning26 5y agoYup -- either the devs don't know what that means in English slang, or they have a very juvenile sense of humor. Either way, that alone seems like it would present a pretty serious obstacle to anyone taking Mastodon remotely seriously.
- er4hn 5y agoI'd argue that is a benefit. Imagine if people took Twitter and the Twitverse less seriously
- lmm 5y agoIt's a benefit for society, but it's a big negative for the project. Twitter wouldn't be half as popular if it didn't stroke the egos of its users.
- infogulch 5y agoImagine a "Tweet to Fart" extension in the same vein as "Cloud to Butt". Lets see: "How could you refart that fart?! :angry_face: That's a terrible fart." Maybe I'm just juvenile but that might be funny enough to make twitter usable again. In other words, I don't really mind "toot". It casts the medium with a healthy perspective on itself.
- micromacrofoot 5y agoThey recently stopped calling them toots (I liked the absurdity of it personally). Don't think that decision has made it through to the UI yet though.
- wrycoder 5y agoBoo
- gargron 5y agoHi, yes, you can move your followers to another account, and export/import other contacts. Perhaps not entirely without the old admin's cooperation though.
- mmoya 5y agoPost migration is tracked in https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/issues/12423 https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/issues/12423.
- remram 5y agoYou can without the old admin's cooperation, but not if the old admin actively tries to stop you.
- rglullis 5y agoHonest question: is this something that is stopping you from joining/getting more active/build an audience? If it is, have you considered running your own instance?
- mathnmusic 5y agoI run my own instance in a convoluted way - I added ActivityPub source and sink support to my own webapp. But every user deserves account portability, not just those who know how to deploy and maintain a Mastodon instance.