DutyBard @DutyBard@qoto.org

So, the European Union has set up its own Mastodon instance, EU Voice, as an official channel/platform for all its many institutions - what a great initiative https://social.network.europa.eu/about
#TwitterMigration #europe #Diplomacy #Transparency

Deactivated cross posting from here to there

Bye bye Twitter my old friend

Because people are talking about the unlawful PPE VIP lane again (good), I just wanted to reshare these truly shocking stats from Spotlight on Corruption:

🚩 59% of all money awarded to VIPs was spent on useless PPE

🚩 HALF of VIPs supplied PPE that wasn’t fit for purpose

🚩 One third of all £ spent on unsuitable PPE went to VIPs

🚩 £1 BILLION was awarded to VIPs for unsuitable PPE

#UKPolitics #VIPLane #PPE #Cronyism

Remember that time Matt Hancock gave his mate, a pub landlord with no previous experience making medical supplies, a £30 million pound government Covid contract to produce vials for testing kits?

He just gave it to him after getting a WhatsApp.

Remember that?

Because I do.

"When Zero-COVID worked you said it was working, now they've changed what they are doing, halved incoming quarantine time and it's not working anymore you're suddenly saying it's not working!"

Ya got me🙄 To think all 200 of your followers just don't appreciate your brilliance.

@DutyBard YES, I’m greedy.

Nice to see some support on reddit:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Mastodon/comments/z09ioa/qotoorg_an_inclusive_stemfocued_instance/

#reddit

I sat by an election denier on the airplane and he started poking me in the arm to be emphatic about his views on people stealing ballots secretly and the airplane was full and I couldn’t move anywhere so I started explaining the yellow fever in very great detail, all the way down to telling him about the bloody vomit that looks like coffee grounds and it worked. He stopped talking to me. The moral of this story is you can’t out-weird an academic; our toolset is too vast. #vastearlyamerica

I'm a consultant in Emergency Medicine and I work plenty of weekends.
And evenings.
And night shifts.

I don't want to work any more than I already am. Why should I make up for decades worth of workforce neglect?

There's just not enough of us.
That is not OUR fault.

This site makes me feel guilty about the fact I didn’t let mastodons on the Ark.

Here's your irregular reminder that:

Twitter was a multi-billion dollar company with thousands of employees.

Mastodon is a niche hobbyist product run by volunteers

The fact that we're being seen as a viable alternative to them is an admission that a federated, decentralized future is not only possible, but desirable.

Mastodon is not one thing, or one place. It's a network of many things and many places. We don't have a spokesperson (I mean, there's me. I'm the official spokesperson for 💯 of the fediverse, but beyond me there is no spokesperson) we don't have consensus on moderation or blocking or tools or what is good and what is bad. Some of us are professional SREs and Sysadmins, some of us aren't. Some of our instances have been around for 5+ years, some won't be here in six months.

And that's good! All of it, every last bit of it is good.

We're wrestling power away from the billionaire class, in real time, and reclaiming it for the People.

So there are rumours that government *might* *perhaps*, on a very good day… consider a Swiss style arrangement with the EU.
We should be so bloody lucky.
That’s not a model that either the EU or Switzerland particularly like and we think we can just swagger in and propose that do we? With our ugly rejection of freedom of movement? While the zealots still scream about betrayal? And we threaten to break the treaty we already have? Staggering.

The rage I feel when someone favourites my post. Stop favouriting it, fools! RE-BLOG IT! (Please, thank you)

Let's see what happens on this site.

One thing we can do is not use twitter tweet links.

It takes a bit more trouble but we can photo tweets, or report what they say, if news worthy.

So I shall still be following accounts with Russia’s war on Ukrainian analysis and promote the information on here.

No doubt Russia applauds Melon Husk and Trump’s efforts and I shall do what I can to prevent disinformation spreading and promote reliable accounts instead.

I am considering adding the following phrasing to QOTO's ToC.. Before I do I'd like some feedback from the community

> While QOTO aims to provide a community where our users do not fear being punished for their personal opinions, that does not mean we allow people to disseminate ideologies that are abusive or violent towards others. Demonstrating support for or defending ideologies known to be violent or hateful is a bannable offense. This includes, but is not limited to: racial supremacy, anti-LGBTQ or anti-cis-gender/anti-straight, pro-genocide, child abuse or child pornography, etc. While we allow questions and conversation regarding these topics in general, doing so in bad faith will result in immediate expulsion.

@trinsec @khird #QOTO

Live scenes

I joined this site a fortnight ago today.

I did not have a clue how it worked, or about its lore and culture.

Now, it seems intuitive - though not because I am adept but because networks and protocols are familiar and practical things.

We use them all the time: www, mobiles, emails, etc.

And this place is structured to encourage calm civility.

It was Twitter which was strange and, in many ways, inhumane - rewarding clicks and rage and vileness.

We just got used to it.

And now we are out.

Every time I see 20+ users sign up in a matter of a few minutes I instantly think "What dumbass shit did Musk do now..."

#twitter