Is the spirit of Mastodon that the site, rather than the user, decides what the user sees? That wouldn't make them much better than the commercial platforms. I

Is the spirit of Mastodon that the site, rather than the user, decides what the user sees? That wouldn't make them much better than the commercial platforms. I absolutely want users to be in control of their feed, so I welcome projects like these. (I'm not actually on Mastodon but on Friendica, but I follow a lot of people on Mastodon.)