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I am a little younger than the days of decentralized social media, but I caught the tail end of it. To me, Mastodon feels like an “email address” for social med

I am a little younger than the days of decentralized social media, but I caught the tail end of it. To me, Mastodon feels like an “email address” for social media. I think a lot of people are so used to centralized platforms that it seems crazy to have it be decentralized again. I suspect as Mastodon grows, there will be more servers that become popular and will likely host the bulk of people, in much the same way that gmail pulled in the bulk of email users—but it will still be possible to have other “addresses” too. The idea is starting to grow on me.

mmastrac 4y ago
Technology Connections put it well https://hachyderm.io/@TechConnectify@mas.to/109529844854465065 https://hachyderm.io/@TechConnectify@mas.to/1095298448544650... > "Imagine you signed up for a sort of reverse-email address where your sent emails landed on a public page that anyone who knew your address could read if they wanted to and even follow you for more."
- beowulfey 4y ago
  Yes! I think the reason people struggle with Mastodon is they implicitly understand that picking a server is, whether they want it to be or not, a reflection of their online persona, and they don’t know how to find or gauge servers to see if they might “fit”. I think universities should immediately make official instances for students and faculty. At least in academic twitter circles having an official institutional home would probably help a ton with migration; it would feel like a natural place to be.
JumpCrisscross 4y ago
> Mastodon feels like an “email address” for social media And it’s waiting for its AOL and Gmail.
- rchaud 4y ago
  which is why email is a bad analogy. email adoption was fast because it was a gamechanger compared to faxes and telegraphs. ISPs offered inboxes, as did universities and offices, years before Hotmail arrived. Additionally, people got email because they wanted to communicate with friends. People get on social media mostly to escape boredom, not intentionally communicate with stranngers.
- Tijdreiziger 4y ago
  And people who host their own email server complain all the time that Google and Microsoft centralized email and set their own (often opaque) rules on what gets delivered. Therefore, 'Gmail for Mastodon' would seemingly just swing the pendulum back towards centralization.
  - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
    > 'Gmail for Mastodon' would seemingly just swing the pendulum back towards centralization Nobody outside a select few want to host their own server. And nobody wants to research which server to join, before they’ve experienced an ounce of product benefit, nor how to back up their data. This was always going to be centralised to a degree. But Gmail/Outlook with some Proton/Fast is distinctly better than Twitter, Musk or no Musk.

mmastrac 4y ago

Technology Connections put it well https://hachyderm.io/@TechConnectify@mas.to/109529844854465065 https://hachyderm.io/@TechConnectify@mas.to/1095298448544650... > "Imagine you signed up for a sort of reverse-email address where your sent emails landed on a public page that anyone who knew your address could read if they wanted to and even follow you for more."

beowulfey 4y ago
Yes! I think the reason people struggle with Mastodon is they implicitly understand that picking a server is, whether they want it to be or not, a reflection of their online persona, and they don’t know how to find or gauge servers to see if they might “fit”. I think universities should immediately make official instances for students and faculty. At least in academic twitter circles having an official institutional home would probably help a ton with migration; it would feel like a natural place to be.

JumpCrisscross 4y ago

> Mastodon feels like an “email address” for social media And it’s waiting for its AOL and Gmail.

rchaud 4y ago
which is why email is a bad analogy. email adoption was fast because it was a gamechanger compared to faxes and telegraphs. ISPs offered inboxes, as did universities and offices, years before Hotmail arrived. Additionally, people got email because they wanted to communicate with friends. People get on social media mostly to escape boredom, not intentionally communicate with stranngers.
Tijdreiziger 4y ago
And people who host their own email server complain all the time that Google and Microsoft centralized email and set their own (often opaque) rules on what gets delivered. Therefore, 'Gmail for Mastodon' would seemingly just swing the pendulum back towards centralization.
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  > 'Gmail for Mastodon' would seemingly just swing the pendulum back towards centralization Nobody outside a select few want to host their own server. And nobody wants to research which server to join, before they’ve experienced an ounce of product benefit, nor how to back up their data. This was always going to be centralised to a degree. But Gmail/Outlook with some Proton/Fast is distinctly better than Twitter, Musk or no Musk.