It's been eight years to the day since Lance Ulanoff, the storied Tech and Social Media Expert and an award-winning tech journalist, decided that Mastodon won't survive because William Shatner couldn't find him on here.
Eight years on, Mastodon stubbornly survives:
rys.io/en/177.html
Please join me in celebrating the annual Mastodon Won't Survive Day, right here on fedi. 
🧵
#Mastodon #Fediverse #MastodonWontSurvive
Eight years on, Mastodon stubbornly survives
Eight years ago Lance Ulanoff had a problem. William Shatner could not find him on Mastodon. His distress is understandable, relatable even. Who wouldn’t want to be found by Captain Kirk himself! TheSongs on the Security of Networks
Questa voce è stata modificata (1 settimana fa)
reshared this
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •As it happens, one of the oldest Mastodon instances – octodon dot social – is going to close down very soon.
This is a sad milestone, but it also shows the resilience of the broader network – people migrated, and relations remain.
That tiny volunteer-run instance survived longer than Google+ – a gigantic behemoth of a social network, backed by one of the largest tech companies in the world, and pushed down on everyone and their dog through mandatory integration with YouTube.
2/🧵
Oblomov reshared this.
Daniël Franke
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •reshared this
Oblomov reshared this.
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •I will probably never get tired of having a hearty laugh on Mastodon Won't Survive Day.
Ulanoff's piece is such a great example of "tech bubble journalism" – where anything that does not fit in the round hole of Silicon Valley VC-fueled business models must necessarily be outside of the realm of possibility (and imagination).
Not only he completely ignores the existence of broader fedi, but he also compares Mastodon to Peach – a centralized social network that quickly fizzled out.
3/🧵
reshared this
Oblomov e Nemo_bis 🌈 reshared this.
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Peach fizzled out because it was trying to replicate the monopoly-based walled-garden business model of already existing social networks.
The problem is: that space is already overcrowded. To really have a shot at that, one would need resources comparable to the resources of the biggest players in that space. And even if you do have such resources, this might still not be enough – as the fate of Google+ illustrates.
Fedi is playing a different game; decentralization is a superpower.
4/🧵
Oblomov reshared this.
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Because fedi is not VC-backed, it does not need to generate hockey stick growth, and it is not going to end up under immense pressure to enshittify when early investors start demanding their payouts.
Because it is decentralized, it can try all sorts of things all at once. You want shorter posts? Or longer posts? Or an experience focused on photos? Or short videos? You want quote posts, or do not want them?
There's an instance for that™.
5/🧵
Oblomov reshared this.
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •This is not to say everything is honky-dory and our job here is done.
There are loads of things Mastodon-the-software-project needs fixed or implemented, there are loads of things other fedi software projects need.
And there is still the cultural problem of racism on fedi that drives Black and Brown people away.
But all of this is fixable, and we all have agency here, in ways a VC-funded walled-garden ripe for enshittification is not.
So we have that going for us.
6/🧵/end
reshared this
Oblomov e Ann(in)a reshared this.
Wojsław Brożyna 🌞🌲🏴
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •moggie
in reply to Wojsław Brożyna 🌞🌲🏴 • • •You're not that likely to see it unless you are a target of it (or you help run an instance), because most of it occurs in DMs or as replies to specific people. It's commonplace for different groups of people to have extremely different experiences on Mastodon, and for those experiences to be largely invisible to others, just because of the way the core systems work.
So absolutely believe people who tell you they've been subjected to racist harassment, even if you have never seen that.
@wojslaw @rysiek
nellie-m
in reply to Wojsław Brożyna 🌞🌲🏴 • • •@wojslaw
It’s absolutely real.
What I’ve seen several times:
- people sign up on m.social, the absolute largest server, federating with almost every other instance out there
- they get harassed by people on some small server: everyone can set one up easily
- others on instances that already block them or haven’t federated yet don’t get to see it
- new person on m.social doesn’t realise that, is appalled that nobody seems to support them
- leaves fedi
Jess👾
in reply to nellie-m • • •Yeah, just because white people don't notice it doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Racists are VERY good and experienced at harassment and abuse of Black people in ways that white people who aren't paying attention never see or never notice.
It's the same as the MeToo stuff. You have two options when you see dozens or hundreds of minorities reporting the same thing: say there's some race wide/gender wide etc. conspiracy to imagine abuse that doesn't exist... For some reason? Or you believe that they're accurately describing the abuse and harassment they receive and understand it simply happens in places you can't or don't see it.
@nellie_m @wojslaw @rysiek
nellie-m
in reply to Jess👾 • • •@JessTheUnstill @wojslaw
True.
And in this case, I think the fact that Mastodon doesn’t backfill contributes to that. It took me quite a while to understand that not everyone sees all the comments (unless you visit the original page, which is a clumsy way to work with it).
So both for newbies on m.social (or other large servers, although unfortunately very many start there) and for people from small servers reading their posts, it’s not at all obvious what’s going on.
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to nellie-m • • •@nellie_m I *think* back-filling has been finally implemented, but I can't find the source right now. I'll link once I do find it.
@JessTheUnstill @wojslaw
nellie-m
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •@JessTheUnstill @wojslaw
That would totally make me do a happy dance! I’m not aware of it though. As far as I can see, in spite of people volunteering to work on it, issue nr 34 (which is closely related) remains.
github.com/mastodon/mastodon/i…
Maybe you were thinking of FediFetcher?
github.com/nanos/FediFetcher
Backfill statuses from remote accounts when first subscribed · Issue #34 · mastodon/mastodon
GitHubMichał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to nellie-m • • •Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •@nellie_m @JessTheUnstill @wojslaw ah there we go!
Add Fetch All Replies Part 1: Backend
github.com/mastodon/mastodon/p…
The back-end side of the fix has been implemented.
Okay, so I was wrong that it did get fixed, but at least work is being done on it.
Add Fetch All Replies Part 1: Backend by sneakers-the-rat · Pull Request #32615 · mastodon/mastodon
GitHubnellie-m
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •@JessTheUnstill @wojslaw
oh wow, thanks 😃
nellie-m
in reply to nellie-m • • •@JessTheUnstill @wojslaw
found another thread on this 🙂
seems it’s already being tested in the wild! Exciting!
social.growyourown.services/@F…
Fedi.Tips
2025-03-12 12:09:01
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to nellie-m • • •Jon
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Mastodon: 14 perspectives on a breakthrough month - A Change Is Coming - Medium
Jon Pincus (A Change Is Coming)Polychrome
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •FediThing 🏳️🌈
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •There is something about volunteer-run open infrastructure that keeps going even when corporations disappear. It can break through the limits of the profit motive.
For example, there's a tradition in the amateur radio community for helping in natural disasters, they have a parallel self-funded low-price communications infrastructure that doesn't need phone lines or internet or satellites or expensive gear (or even power lines if it's battery-operated). Corporations cannot provide this because it isn't profitable, so if the worst happens governments and communities often turn to amateurs.
Michael Vilain
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •liebach
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •signal ≋ dadalo 🌊
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Mastodon
Mastodon hosted on mastodon.socialMichał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to signal ≋ dadalo 🌊 • • •@deep sure, this is a fair question to ask. And one important part of the answer is: it's the racism.
Seriously, fedi has a huge problem with racism, and that drove swaths of wonderfully creative Black and Brown people away. I was there, and I saw it.
If we can fix that, that's going to help a great deal.
Susan
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to Susan • • •Feral Thoughts
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •@augenblicke_art
The invisiblization of the global south on Mastodon, and on the rest of the Fediverse, is a huge issue.
union.place/@feralthoughts/114…
Feral Thoughts
2025-02-19 12:37:44
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 reshared this.
Eat_Your_Paisleys
in reply to signal ≋ dadalo 🌊 • • •I think Bluesky is having an effect
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to Eat_Your_Paisleys • • •Walter van Holst
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Michael Vilain
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •If someone is lauding The Great Orange One trumpeting something either in a Rose Garden or at his latest meeting with the Kremlin, I ask that person "What does Putin's Dick taste like?" It worked wonders in my final days on Facebook and oldTwitter to clean out people in my timeline.
However, I wouldn't be so rude as to question this "tech" journalist's and ask about any of his kinks.
JollyOrc
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •when Google+ fizzled out, @dredmorbius, me and a bunch of others set out to figure out where to move. There was a wiki, and the spreadsheet can still be accessed here: docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d…
Turns out that most of the central-instance-options are gone or totally enshittified, whereas as the fediverse options are still there and thriving and actually got at least a bit better on the parts that were marked as lacking in the spreadsheet.
Social Network Comparison Table
Google Docsreshared this
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 e Oblomov reshared this.
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to JollyOrc • • •JollyOrc
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Robert W. Gehl
in reply to JollyOrc • • •@jollyorc @dredmorbius Somewhat similar to this spreadsheet, some students and I built an archive of alternative social media sites, with screenshots and terms of service statements, back in the mid-2010s:
socialmediaalternatives.org/ar…
The Social Media Alternatives Project
socialmediaalternatives.orgreshared this
Oblomov reshared this.
Harald Wagener
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •reshared this
Oblomov reshared this.
Sebastian
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Good. That's maybe because I've started my Fedi adventure on that instance and it was pretty much impossible to follow anyone, because they blocked EVERYTHING.
Had to migrate to make Mastodon usable for myself.
Aljoscha Rittner (beandev)
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Yeah, but social.tchncs.de is still alive (8 years and few months). 😊
Instances will disappear, but a lot of others will start and will be available for a long time.
Simon Zerafa
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •@jerry
Looking for another project? 😁
/Me Runs away ...
*_jayrope
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to *_jayrope • • •pfm 🧘
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Elena Rossini ⁂
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Oblomov reshared this.
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to Elena Rossini ⁂ • • •Elena Rossini ⁂
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Daniël Franke
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •reshared this
Oblomov reshared this.
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to Daniël Franke • • •Martin
in reply to Daniël Franke • • •@rysiek@mstdn.social @ainmosni@ainmosni.eu
Daniël Franke
in reply to Martin • • •Martin
in reply to Daniël Franke • • •Liminal witch 🧙♀️ Sarah
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to Liminal witch 🧙♀️ Sarah • • •Oblomov reshared this.
Rocketman
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to Rocketman • • •Rocketman
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •AndiS 🌞🍷🇪🇺
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Darn, I only joined 7 years ago. Although I left and moved to #Friendica only about two years after that because I felt too restricted on Mastodon.
But still, Mastodon and the wider Fediverse overall are still the only social Media out there period!
Happy Fediverse won't survive day for me!
P.S. Surprisingly I don't use Arch Linux :wink:
@Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to AndiS 🌞🍷🇪🇺 • • •Furbland's Very Cool Mastodon™
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to Furbland's Very Cool Mastodon™ • • •Furbland's Very Cool Mastodon™
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •fair enough. no harassment intended with those mentions, I just wanted to link to those (almost certainly abandoned) accounts so people could see that:
1. the toots on his first account are hilarious
2. his second account appears to be exclusively to promote things he's written
I trust Fedi enough not to go after him, and if they do I will be disappointed
Furbland's Very Cool Mastodon™
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •DeeAnn Little
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Scratchy
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to Scratchy • • •@Itchy that goes to the fedi admins and moderators, the heroes we all need and hopefully deserve.
I'm just shitposting.
Scratchy
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •LanceUlanoff
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •reshared this
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 e Oblomov reshared this.
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to LanceUlanoff • • •Torf und Schnee
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •naught101
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •𝔱𝔯𝔷𝔶𝔤𝔩𝔬𝔴
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •D.Drem
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Hexpat
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to Hexpat • • •@High_Expat2025 well, you found my post, and that's already a different instance, so you are already exploring them.
If you want to see the timelines from the perspective of other instances, you can either just visit their main landing page (many will have a timeline there), or set up an account if you want to check the inside view so to speak.
There's a bunch of places that offer a list of instances to check out, for example:
fediverse.party/en/portal/serv…
Themed servers - Fediverse.Party - explore federated networks
fediverse.partyHexpat
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •I knew I could see things from other instances by switching my fed to “Federated” or “All”. I guess I was unclear how to really explore those instances so I’ll try visiting their landing pages and see what’s what.
Thanks for taking the time to reply.
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to Hexpat • • •Sitrom Rogir
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Rev. Onan Canobite, SubGenius
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •I founded dobbs.town in 2018, glad for all the support and enthusiasm that keeps it going.
Just as a life well lived is not solely dependent on how long that life is, the slack generated by fediverse is not solely dependent on big numbers. Not in the sense of excluding people as a positive, but in the sense of the better agreements and arguments happening here no matter how many or how few are here.
DOBBS.TOWN
Mastodon hosted on dobbs.townFrjttr
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •lemgandi
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •spiegelmama
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •reshared this
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 e Oblomov reshared this.
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to spiegelmama • • •Coralla
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •EthicalProfessor
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •"As I write this, the four latest pieces of his in TechRadar are pushing Microsoft hype like there is no tomorrow. All four published within the last two days.
That is the level of journalistic excellence and rate of creative output I know I could never even dream to attain."
Pushing MS hype is hardly a measure of journalistic excellence.
It's stenography.
argv minus one
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Mustardon ~ IWRY 🐲🍑
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Papamoscas Cardenalito
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •McWabbit 🍋🌻🍉
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
in reply to McWabbit 🍋🌻🍉 • • •Hugs4friends ♾🇺🇦 🇵🇸😷
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •beaiouns
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •afx
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •Marti Abernathy
in reply to Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦 • • •@jdp23