p.p.s. The server mastodon.social is NOT a good place to sign up, for many different reasons (more info here: https://fedi.tips/its-a-really-bad-idea-to-join-a-big-server).
If you just want one alternative, https://mas.to is a much better option. It's reliable and has been online since 2019, and doesn't suffer from the problems of mastodon.social.
If you want to choose from a wide selection of servers, there are human curated lists of well-run reliable servers at https://fedi.garden and https://joinmastodon.org/servers
@FediTips@social.growyourown.services I am currently setting up a new account on mastodon.social and that's for all the things that post ignores, which is all the things that work worse on federated networks. For example, following hashtags does not show all posts with that hashtag on all instances, just those that your instance knows of, which counteracts the benefit of instances for certain topics. The smaller your topic, the more you are limited to the people on your instance and might be better off with a big instance.
@wildrikku@mastodon.gamedev.place
"following hashtags does not show all posts with that hashtag on all instances"
That's what groups are for, they show all the posts to everyone that follows them:
https://fedi.tips/how-to-use-groups-on-the-fediverse
"might be better off with a big instance."
If everyone joins the biggest instance, it will destroy the network. Mastodon.social is in danger of doing that.
If you really have to choose a large instance something like https://mas.to would be much better for the health of the network.
@FediTips@social.growyourown.services Groups are a worse way of the same problem topic-centered instances already have: They don't work as long as not enough people use them. I picked seven random groups that would interest me and six had under 100 followers, four had under 50. That's much worse than hashtags.
Regarding the dangers of buyouts etc, that's way too speculative for me. Mastodon is ridiculously small compared to all other social networks. But I mostly wanted to point out that your post ignores disadvantages.
@wildrikku@mastodon.gamedev.place
The groups on the list at the moment are brand new, the Guppe provider closed down unexpectedly a few weeks ago due to its domain being taken.
You can help the new groups get started by following what you're interested in and posting to them, that will encourage other people to take part too.
"Regarding the dangers of buyouts etc, that's way too speculative for me."
Mastodon gGmbH have already been offered VC money on several occasions (but turned it down).
@FediTips@social.growyourown.services Even if they had more members, I don't see how groups are supposed to work. I still would need to find the group, which I would most likely do via boosts, at which point I would also find accounts within the group (if I was a random user and not a weirdo discussing meta stuff).
I also don't see how the Mastodon network would not be in massive danger if Mastodon gGmbH went to shit. We'd still need a fork and all instances to switch, which is highly unlikely to happen. ...1/2
@wildrikku@mastodon.gamedev.place
You can find groups from normal searches on Mastodon. The new groups probably don't show up yet but they will do. Guppe groups used to appear very often at the top of searches.
Mastodon gGmbH is a lot more likely to go to shit if they control most of the network, as they would be able to sell themselves as a package.
There's also the problem of mastodon.social being too large to block. A lot of people aren't happy with the quality of its moderation and want to block it but can't.
@FediTips@social.growyourown.services Apparently we don't share our view of the Mastodon gGmbH, which you don't seem to trust at all.
We also seem to fundamentally disagree on moderation. I don't want my instance to defederate / block mastodon.social. Mastodon gives me tools to do so myself if I want and I'm on Mastodon because I want to be in control.
You know what would be more productive than argueing against big instances? Advocating for donations. I'd even say donate to the gGmbH so they're less likely to sell.
@wildrikku@mastodon.gamedev.place
It's not that I don't trust them or don't trust Eugen, it's that I don't trust that structure.
Sooner or later that structure will end up in the hands of bad people.
"We also seem to fundamentally disagree on moderation. I don't want my instance to defederate / block mastodon.social."
If most of the network ends up on mastodon.social, there will be far less incentive for them to make federated features. Development would be much easier if they stopped federating.
@FediTips@social.growyourown.services So, your argument is that if an instance grows too big, it will defederate itself by removing federation? Well that again sounds like you don't trust the Mastodon company. It's also a completely different argument than "too big to block".
Fedi.Tips
WildRikku