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I cant imagine a thoughtful, informed person with a common denominator of morality actually endorse adtech social media and surveillance capitalism (irrespectiv

I cant imagine a thoughtful, informed person with a common denominator of morality actually endorse adtech social media and surveillance capitalism (irrespective of political views). People of all stripes and colors got trapped there, pure and simple. But the escape hatch is now open thanks to amazing vision and work by pioneers. They mostly happen to have certain "views". Altruism is strong with that crowd. But that is actually irrelevant in the scheme of things. The big issues of our time will come to be debated in the fediverse and people will re-engage as this post already hints. The precise manner remains to be seen. Polarization and online strife cannot be wished away. Moderation will have to become a true civic skill. But its pretty obvious that having to fight manipulative algorithms and dark patterns and "being the product" will never work better in this respect than the what you see is what you get fediverse.

busterarm 3y ago
I don't know. I think everyone on Hacker News would consider themselves to be "thoughtful, informed people with a common denominator of morality" but most people here are using some kind of big social media. Even if it's LinkedIn. Even here we pay the "small price" of Y Combinator posts being boosted and comment-free in our feeds. And any time subjects like homelessness or rent control or zoning come out, most of HN loses their effing minds and the seething anger (about rent prices in NY/SF) and hatred of the poor washes over the whole thread like a tidal wave. The way I see it, Mastodon is just the place where all of the smug, self-righteous people have gone -- to the benefit of the rest of us.
- nologic01 3y ago
  Some early adopters of mastodon have high expectations that the absence of adtech will create a utopia. Ofcourse that wont happen. Online platforms had problems way before adtech. Some also have plain wrong experctations e.g regarding privacy. You also have enormous inertia and network effects to overcome for people to switch. Many simply disengage or opt for the least bad option. In any case most flavors of the fediverse not ready for mass market from a ux perspective. What is interesting about the fediverse at the current stage is that it has established beyond doubt the viability of flexible new patterns for how to organize social platforms. An enormous step but it will require many more before its the new normal.

busterarm 3y ago

I don't know. I think everyone on Hacker News would consider themselves to be "thoughtful, informed people with a common denominator of morality" but most people here are using some kind of big social media. Even if it's LinkedIn. Even here we pay the "small price" of Y Combinator posts being boosted and comment-free in our feeds. And any time subjects like homelessness or rent control or zoning come out, most of HN loses their effing minds and the seething anger (about rent prices in NY/SF) and hatred of the poor washes over the whole thread like a tidal wave. The way I see it, Mastodon is just the place where all of the smug, self-righteous people have gone -- to the benefit of the rest of us.

nologic01 3y ago
Some early adopters of mastodon have high expectations that the absence of adtech will create a utopia. Ofcourse that wont happen. Online platforms had problems way before adtech. Some also have plain wrong experctations e.g regarding privacy. You also have enormous inertia and network effects to overcome for people to switch. Many simply disengage or opt for the least bad option. In any case most flavors of the fediverse not ready for mass market from a ux perspective. What is interesting about the fediverse at the current stage is that it has established beyond doubt the viability of flexible new patterns for how to organize social platforms. An enormous step but it will require many more before its the new normal.