Dave Fernig @DaveFernig@qoto.org

"There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory mentioned, which states that this has already happened." (Doug Adams)

Light relief. Puffins -Sumburgh Head, Shetland, 2008
More at http://www.dcscience.net/shetlands_album/index.html

Hi! mastodon.social is being slow right now, as far as I can tell because there's twice as many people using it at the same time as ever have; I'm working on making it go fast again, but in the meantime, do remember to invite people to joinmastodon.org instead of directly to mastodon.social. People don't have to be on the same server to follow you! Thanks!

Maybe it looks nice, but it means we'll have pretty bad weather tomorrow. #Polesia #RuralLife

Today's law and policy post on how the contest between platforms is an example of a contest often seen

https://davidallengreen.com/2022/11/hierarchies-vs-networks-in-the-age-of-musk-and-mastodon/

Because I'm on a German server my trending topics are #keinVergessen and #niemalsVergessen. This is because 9 November is the anniversary of Kristallnacht.

These brass plates in the pavements memorialise Jewish people at what were their addresses. I saw this one in Berlin in the spring. #NeverForget

I love programming, but when people you've taught goes above and beyond what you yourself would have been able to - that's an even better feeling!

Here’s a poem called ‘You Took the Last Bus Home’.

Can anyone id this? Eastern Poland, wetland forest. #Fungi are weird, but many taste great.

Very much a newbie on Mastodon, but hoping to find a kinder, more collaborative, supportive community here.

I'm excited this week as my long-standing fascination with anatomy, etymology and art has evolved into a literary offering... Anatomical Oddities - out tomorrow!

Limited signed copies are available:
https://blackwells.co.uk/bookshop/product/Anatomical-Oddities-by-Alice-Roberts/2100000289202

Still daylight outside, so a photo from three years ago: Germany, 9th of November, eve of Kristallnacht, around the corner from my home. 👇 #Stolpersteine en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stolpersteine - I am not crying, you are. #NeverAgain #FCKNZS

"The government has backed down in its fight to keep secret a “lessons learnt” review of the Covid pandemic.

It means the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has 35 days to finally make the document public."
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/covid-lessons-learnt-foi-battle-review-publish/

Peace. Solidarity. Dignity.
Freedom. Unity. Europe. 🇪🇺

Today, we mark the 33th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall – a decisive moment in European history.

#StrongerTogether #EUarchives

Today’s poem is called ‘An Update to My Privacy Policy’.

Over on Twitter, we post a healthy mix of politics, book promotion and tripe.
Mastodon seems like a cooler place to be, so we'll probably dial back the politics and concentrate instead on a more leisurely dive into our #books and #tripe. We've also been asked if we can provide more of an insight into the workings of the TMB. It's a deal!

A cryptobro DMed me to ask if I wanted to join his mailing list.

I spent slightly too long making this to send in reply.

Some Mastodon thoughts, for bird-site expats (which include myself). I'm aggregating these from posts I've boosted before, so little of this is my own brain.

- There's no algorithm here. That means favoriting/liking doesn't do anything except communicate approval to the OP and others (which is still nice!).

- No algorithm means boosting ("retweeting") is the true method to increase a post's visibility. Do that more than you did on birdsite.

- There's no post-quoting here, and that's by design. Look at quote-tweets on the birdsite; it's a feature primarily used for toxicity.

- There's no direct word-search here either; that means you want to use hashtags to make posts more searchable. This is also intended, since word-searching posts was often used to harass/stalk on the birdsite and elsewhere, so that was left by the wayside here. This also means hashtags are much more a thing here than any of the algorithm-powered sites.

- It's encouraged to put in text descriptions when you post images; a lot of Mastodon users use screen-readers due to various disabilities, and getting an image description read out loud helps them immensely.

- Speaking of screen-readers: using capitalization in your hashtags allows the screen-readers to read them more easily, especially if you're smashing multiple words together. #rockmusic = unreadable. #RockMusic = readable.

- The best way to make threads is to make set your first post as public, but "unlist" all of your replies. This prevents your whole thread from clogging up feeds.

- Content Warnings should be used more liberally here. If you haven't gotten the impression yet, much of Mastodon was built and populated by marginalized groups who were harassed/bullied off of other platforms. This is the culture they built, to respect each other's mental health. It's not a rule, but it's well-appreciated.

- Consider chipping a few bucks towards whomever runs the server you're on; the strain is real, and most server admins were likely paying out of pocket before so don't have an existing donation base. The growth here has been extremely fast, and that means money's needed.

- DMs are just posts with privacy settings. So if you @ someone in a DM, you pull them into the thread. That could be embarrassing.

- Also, no, DMs aren't end-to-end encrypted, but they aren't on Twitter either. Don't use either if you want true privacy.

- Including your Mastodon handle in your birdsite profile will help people find you here; there's a tool (pruvisto.org/debirdify/ is one of them that's used) people can use to pull Mastodon handles from Twitter profile.

- Use the blocking and reporting features liberally, if needed. This should go without saying, but they work, and work well!

- If there's an entire Mastodon server you don't want to hear from, you can block the whole thing too.

- Preferences -> Appearance -> "Slow Mode": this can make larger "Local" feeds and any "Federated" feed much more readable.

I'll reply with some more as I see them, or reply here too. I've only been here 4 days but I'm loving it so far.

Code is up now and seems functional. Still a few internal rough edges I’d like to polish..

You expect me to present the summary of the current research projects, doing what we always do; blowing the little work we could do way out of proportion again. Taking credit for what others could achieve. Blowing that out of proportion too. Every year just a little more fantastic, until even we can’t tell fact from fiction anymore. More papers, more grants, more shine.

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