I think the number of follows does not represent the number of actual readers. E.g. I know you from your long-form posts on Django and such, and considering cur

I think the number of follows does not represent the number of actual readers. E.g. I know you from your long-form posts on Django and such, and considering current buzz might log in to Mastodon just to give you a follow and go back to never checking it. That, plus Mastodon does not benefit from central spam account squashing authority. Of course, the discrepancy of follower/actual reader numbers also exists in case of Twitter, but if I had to bet I'd say it has the potential to be stronger on Mastodon.