Huh. Just chatted in person with someone who's been on #mastodon for a while, now, who honestly thought that all the Mastodon domains were run by Mastodon.
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@fastfinge I guess thats a form of success--that someone's joined without needing a whole explanation of how it works.
@treehugger They were brought over by political activism and a fandom space. This is the sort of person who doesn't even own a computer and just uses their phone; they would've just glazed over one, if an explanation was even offered, so they could get on with the things they actually came for. -
@fastfinge How did the person react when you told them, that the servers are run by several thousand people mostly with their own money? Have you also told that there is more than only Mastodon, but some dozen other systems as well?@heluecht I didn't get into the other software part of things. I was more concerned with helping them understand that racist harassment from users on another instance isn't something they just have to deal with and move on, or if it turns out that it is, they should move somewhere better. Last I heard there admin had been convinced to use the FediNuke Blocklist. seirdy.one/posts/2023/05/02/fediverse-blocklists/
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@pwloftus Me, too! Sadly, my admin is a bit of a jerk. But every time I change instances, the guy is still here! LOL
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Huh. Just chatted in person with someone who's been on #mastodon for a while, now, who honestly thought that all the Mastodon domains were run by Mastodon. And having a different domain was, like, just a vanity thing to look cool. It only came up because they were complaining about an issue they were having, and they were on a smaller server (not naming it for anonymity), so I suggested contacting their server admin about the problem. I was surprised when they answered "Dude nobody at big companies reads those reports. It just all goes to AI or whatever." It took some actual convincing to get them to believe that the server they're on does, in fact, have a living breathing human admin who can be talked to.
Anyway, folks, support your #fediverse server admins and moderators. With money, where you can. They're almost certainly getting messages from users who think that reporting things to an admin here is exactly like reporting stuff to Facebook or Google. IE: screaming at a giant faceless entity who's never going to care or do anything about whatever your problem is.@fastfinge@fed.interfree.ca Guess it's time to boost my old post about this issue again.
RE: https://transfem.social/notes/adhk91r22eiv0h80 -
@ben_hr @fastfinge I dunno, have you seen how many em dashes I use?
@futzle @ben_hr @fastfinge lol same, was accused on another platform this year of “bots hacking and taking over my account when I’m offline,” AI and misunderstandings about AI have wrecked so much
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Huh. Just chatted in person with someone who's been on #mastodon for a while, now, who honestly thought that all the Mastodon domains were run by Mastodon. And having a different domain was, like, just a vanity thing to look cool. It only came up because they were complaining about an issue they were having, and they were on a smaller server (not naming it for anonymity), so I suggested contacting their server admin about the problem. I was surprised when they answered "Dude nobody at big companies reads those reports. It just all goes to AI or whatever." It took some actual convincing to get them to believe that the server they're on does, in fact, have a living breathing human admin who can be talked to.
Anyway, folks, support your #fediverse server admins and moderators. With money, where you can. They're almost certainly getting messages from users who think that reporting things to an admin here is exactly like reporting stuff to Facebook or Google. IE: screaming at a giant faceless entity who's never going to care or do anything about whatever your problem is.add a paragraph to the docs about "mastodon is *not* like reddit"
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Huh. Just chatted in person with someone who's been on #mastodon for a while, now, who honestly thought that all the Mastodon domains were run by Mastodon. And having a different domain was, like, just a vanity thing to look cool. It only came up because they were complaining about an issue they were having, and they were on a smaller server (not naming it for anonymity), so I suggested contacting their server admin about the problem. I was surprised when they answered "Dude nobody at big companies reads those reports. It just all goes to AI or whatever." It took some actual convincing to get them to believe that the server they're on does, in fact, have a living breathing human admin who can be talked to.
Anyway, folks, support your #fediverse server admins and moderators. With money, where you can. They're almost certainly getting messages from users who think that reporting things to an admin here is exactly like reporting stuff to Facebook or Google. IE: screaming at a giant faceless entity who's never going to care or do anything about whatever your problem is.@fastfinge to be fair, I am only on beige.party to be cool.
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Huh. Just chatted in person with someone who's been on #mastodon for a while, now, who honestly thought that all the Mastodon domains were run by Mastodon. And having a different domain was, like, just a vanity thing to look cool. It only came up because they were complaining about an issue they were having, and they were on a smaller server (not naming it for anonymity), so I suggested contacting their server admin about the problem. I was surprised when they answered "Dude nobody at big companies reads those reports. It just all goes to AI or whatever." It took some actual convincing to get them to believe that the server they're on does, in fact, have a living breathing human admin who can be talked to.
Anyway, folks, support your #fediverse server admins and moderators. With money, where you can. They're almost certainly getting messages from users who think that reporting things to an admin here is exactly like reporting stuff to Facebook or Google. IE: screaming at a giant faceless entity who's never going to care or do anything about whatever your problem is.@fastfinge One has to be patient. They've never known SocMed that isn't driven by algorithms.
I'm a political person, too. My start in Social Media was Yahoo groups and Forums. I joined face to play games. I dumped it for Twitter, then dumped the dead bird when Melonhusk moved in. What rarefied air are these people breathing? You don't need to be a nerd to enjoy Fedi.
Come on in, folk...the water's fine.
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Huh. Just chatted in person with someone who's been on #mastodon for a while, now, who honestly thought that all the Mastodon domains were run by Mastodon. And having a different domain was, like, just a vanity thing to look cool. It only came up because they were complaining about an issue they were having, and they were on a smaller server (not naming it for anonymity), so I suggested contacting their server admin about the problem. I was surprised when they answered "Dude nobody at big companies reads those reports. It just all goes to AI or whatever." It took some actual convincing to get them to believe that the server they're on does, in fact, have a living breathing human admin who can be talked to.
Anyway, folks, support your #fediverse server admins and moderators. With money, where you can. They're almost certainly getting messages from users who think that reporting things to an admin here is exactly like reporting stuff to Facebook or Google. IE: screaming at a giant faceless entity who's never going to care or do anything about whatever your problem is.@fastfinge Oh that is just sad…
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@fastfinge One has to be patient. They've never known SocMed that isn't driven by algorithms.
I'm a political person, too. My start in Social Media was Yahoo groups and Forums. I joined face to play games. I dumped it for Twitter, then dumped the dead bird when Melonhusk moved in. What rarefied air are these people breathing? You don't need to be a nerd to enjoy Fedi. Come on in, folk...the water's fine.@Tooden This has been my frustration with fedi for a while. The majority of us, and I include myself in this, are tech nerds. And tech nerds are historically not good at communicating with non-tech-nerds. But social media is all about communicating! I think this is the primary reason fedi struggles to grow. We make it seem harder than it is, and we kind of blow off people who want to have conversations about things not related to our specific interests. See the way folks interested in sports get treated around here: mostly, they get yelled at and told they shouldn't like sports at all because it's corporate or bad for the environment or politically distasteful. Anyway, let's talk some more about the 47 hard drives I just purchased for my 12th server. -
Huh. Just chatted in person with someone who's been on #mastodon for a while, now, who honestly thought that all the Mastodon domains were run by Mastodon. And having a different domain was, like, just a vanity thing to look cool. It only came up because they were complaining about an issue they were having, and they were on a smaller server (not naming it for anonymity), so I suggested contacting their server admin about the problem. I was surprised when they answered "Dude nobody at big companies reads those reports. It just all goes to AI or whatever." It took some actual convincing to get them to believe that the server they're on does, in fact, have a living breathing human admin who can be talked to.
Anyway, folks, support your #fediverse server admins and moderators. With money, where you can. They're almost certainly getting messages from users who think that reporting things to an admin here is exactly like reporting stuff to Facebook or Google. IE: screaming at a giant faceless entity who's never going to care or do anything about whatever your problem is.@fastfinge That's crazy to me. Though maybe it was because my instance has signs ups that must be manually approved, so right away you know you're talking to an actual person.
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@fastfinge That's crazy to me. Though maybe it was because my instance has signs ups that must be manually approved, so right away you know you're talking to an actual person.
@silver_huskey I think even that's going to become less clear as more and more big corporate websites start requiring age verification. Just because your account needs some sort of manual approval is already not really triggering people to think "There's a human in charge somewhere". They're just thinking "Probably some exploited and underpaid contractor in another country has to verify my identity somehow." -
@silver_huskey I think even that's going to become less clear as more and more big corporate websites start requiring age verification. Just because your account needs some sort of manual approval is already not really triggering people to think "There's a human in charge somewhere". They're just thinking "Probably some exploited and underpaid contractor in another country has to verify my identity somehow."
@fastfinge This is true! I guess even the "tell us why you want an account" section wouldn't be enough. Though most services never really ask why.
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@Tooden This has been my frustration with fedi for a while. The majority of us, and I include myself in this, are tech nerds. And tech nerds are historically not good at communicating with non-tech-nerds. But social media is all about communicating! I think this is the primary reason fedi struggles to grow. We make it seem harder than it is, and we kind of blow off people who want to have conversations about things not related to our specific interests. See the way folks interested in sports get treated around here: mostly, they get yelled at and told they shouldn't like sports at all because it's corporate or bad for the environment or politically distasteful. Anyway, let's talk some more about the 47 hard drives I just purchased for my 12th server.
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Huh. Just chatted in person with someone who's been on #mastodon for a while, now, who honestly thought that all the Mastodon domains were run by Mastodon. And having a different domain was, like, just a vanity thing to look cool. It only came up because they were complaining about an issue they were having, and they were on a smaller server (not naming it for anonymity), so I suggested contacting their server admin about the problem. I was surprised when they answered "Dude nobody at big companies reads those reports. It just all goes to AI or whatever." It took some actual convincing to get them to believe that the server they're on does, in fact, have a living breathing human admin who can be talked to.
Anyway, folks, support your #fediverse server admins and moderators. With money, where you can. They're almost certainly getting messages from users who think that reporting things to an admin here is exactly like reporting stuff to Facebook or Google. IE: screaming at a giant faceless entity who's never going to care or do anything about whatever your problem is.@fastfinge A story is told that a man gets harassed on Mastodon social media and complains to friend. “I can’t eat, I can’t sleep,” says the man. “I feel constantly miserable.”
“Report post to Admin is best medicine, my friend,” says the friend.
The man looks at the friend for a moment. “Ah,” he says. “That won’t help.”
“Why not, sir?”
The man shrugs. “I am Admin.”
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@Tooden This has been my frustration with fedi for a while. The majority of us, and I include myself in this, are tech nerds. And tech nerds are historically not good at communicating with non-tech-nerds. But social media is all about communicating! I think this is the primary reason fedi struggles to grow. We make it seem harder than it is, and we kind of blow off people who want to have conversations about things not related to our specific interests. See the way folks interested in sports get treated around here: mostly, they get yelled at and told they shouldn't like sports at all because it's corporate or bad for the environment or politically distasteful. Anyway, let's talk some more about the 47 hard drives I just purchased for my 12th server.
@fastfinge @Tooden The biggest deal, from my vantage point is that tech nerds (often, not always) dislike algo-fed timelines whereas the research indicates that really most (90%) people like that. I think people come to fedi and it feels like a lot of work right up front (CHOOSE an instance, PICK people to follow) and there's no short way in. I spend a lot of time making tech topics clear to tech novices and almost no one I talk to in my rural location has ever even heard of Mastodon.
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@fastfinge to be fair, I am only on beige.party to be cool.
@fastfinge @Tattooed_Mummy i think you mean that beige party is made even cooler by your presence
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@fastfinge @Tooden The biggest deal, from my vantage point is that tech nerds (often, not always) dislike algo-fed timelines whereas the research indicates that really most (90%) people like that. I think people come to fedi and it feels like a lot of work right up front (CHOOSE an instance, PICK people to follow) and there's no short way in. I spend a lot of time making tech topics clear to tech novices and almost no one I talk to in my rural location has ever even heard of Mastodon.
@fastfinge @Tooden That said, I definitely love it here, am on a small instance and always get a reply back from my instance moderators if I report a spammer or something similar. This is what I wanted and I'm delighted to have it, but I can see how it's not for everyone which is maybe fine?
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@fastfinge @Tooden That said, I definitely love it here, am on a small instance and always get a reply back from my instance moderators if I report a spammer or something similar. This is what I wanted and I'm delighted to have it, but I can see how it's not for everyone which is maybe fine?
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@fastfinge @Tooden The biggest deal, from my vantage point is that tech nerds (often, not always) dislike algo-fed timelines whereas the research indicates that really most (90%) people like that. I think people come to fedi and it feels like a lot of work right up front (CHOOSE an instance, PICK people to follow) and there's no short way in. I spend a lot of time making tech topics clear to tech novices and almost no one I talk to in my rural location has ever even heard of Mastodon.
It’s also a learning curve for someone without connections to the site. If no one knows you, and you don’t post often, people think you’re a bot or a scammer, and can be reluctant to follow or reply.
