4 ms·

Honestly I don’t think mastodon will ever grow. The vast majority of Twitter users don’t even know what it is. And those moving will eventually begin to fall be

Honestly I don’t think mastodon will ever grow. The vast majority of Twitter users don’t even know what it is. And those moving will eventually begin to fall behind and miss out on what’s happening and ever silly end up on both platforms or just gravitate back to Twitter. 95% of those I follow are tech and prob about 10 are on mastodon and Twitter and no ones really talking about it. The average user who is following a bunch of celebrities isn’t going to move because 1 celebrity moved. They prob won’t even notice the celeb moved.

_ph_ 4y ago
This depends on several factors. First of all, whether there is a Twitter in a few months. Elon might have fired too many people responsible for critical parts of the system, there might be a technical collapse. Even if not, we will have to see how the dynamics of Twitter evolve. Yes, if Twitter can survive on people following celebrities, then it might survive anyway. But currently, Twitter is seen as a reputable place to be for all kind of organizations. Media, the government, sports teams. Everyone is on Twitter. I am trying not to judge Elons ideas at the current state of things, but trust is difficult to obtain, but easy to lose. Currently, we do see quite a trend for "tech" people to at least also use Mastodon if not outright to migrate. This is quite an important user group. We will see, how many others might follow.
berkes 4y ago
It has grown beyond six million users. How is that "will [not] ever grow"? Mastodon doesn't need to follow the "rules" of big tech, or corporations. Mastodon is a success the moment two people can successfully communicate with it. Or six million. Nothing else matters. There's no difference. There are no shareholders that want to see increasing MAUs. There are no investors that want to exit and therefore insist on ballooning the numbers. There are no employees that will loose their jobs when growth lags, nor advertisers that want to get ever more eyeballs else they leave for [other corp]. It really doesn't matter what any of those fictional "average users" does: whether they follow, stay, go back, whatever: as long as the people using mastodon now have a good time, and get value today, its a huge success. There honestly isn't anything else needed.

_ph_ 4y ago

This depends on several factors. First of all, whether there is a Twitter in a few months. Elon might have fired too many people responsible for critical parts of the system, there might be a technical collapse. Even if not, we will have to see how the dynamics of Twitter evolve. Yes, if Twitter can survive on people following celebrities, then it might survive anyway. But currently, Twitter is seen as a reputable place to be for all kind of organizations. Media, the government, sports teams. Everyone is on Twitter. I am trying not to judge Elons ideas at the current state of things, but trust is difficult to obtain, but easy to lose. Currently, we do see quite a trend for "tech" people to at least also use Mastodon if not outright to migrate. This is quite an important user group. We will see, how many others might follow.

berkes 4y ago

It has grown beyond six million users. How is that "will [not] ever grow"? Mastodon doesn't need to follow the "rules" of big tech, or corporations. Mastodon is a success the moment two people can successfully communicate with it. Or six million. Nothing else matters. There's no difference. There are no shareholders that want to see increasing MAUs. There are no investors that want to exit and therefore insist on ballooning the numbers. There are no employees that will loose their jobs when growth lags, nor advertisers that want to get ever more eyeballs else they leave for [other corp]. It really doesn't matter what any of those fictional "average users" does: whether they follow, stay, go back, whatever: as long as the people using mastodon now have a good time, and get value today, its a huge success. There honestly isn't anything else needed.