Microsoft’s official @dotnet sent its first Mastodon post today.

Pay attention to the domain: dotnet.social.

Which means Microsoft is operating their own Mastodon community server.

@dotnet account was registered in November, but it became active today.

Clearly, Microsoft sees the Fediverse as core to marketing to developers. I wonder what other brands they’ll bring to the Fediverse as well.

dotnet.social/@dotnet/10999012

@fediversenews

@atomicpoet That server is not affiliated with Microsoft, it says so clearly:

".NET Community on Mastodon; not affiliated with Microsoft."

@Ciantic Not so. Read what’s highlighted. @dotnet is the official handle of the .NET team at Micro.

@atomicpoet @dotnet That account is affiliated, but not the server.

You said:

"Which means Microsoft is operating their own Mastodon community server."

They are not running that server.

@Ciantic @dotnet Maybe not owned by Microsoft but clearly affiliated.

The relationship is obvious.

@Ciantic @dotnet Also, why would Microsoft allow ownership to a 3rd party? Makes no sense. I question the “no affiliation” when the official account is on that server.

@atomicpoet @Ciantic @dotnet They joined a community server. They posted about it an hour ago and said so themselves, thanking the community member by handle who set up the instance. @Ciantic is correct.

@atomicpoet @Ciantic @dotnet @styx31@mastodon.social Well, no, it's @styx31@dotnet.social, not @styx31@mastodon.social, those are two different accounts.

And do you think that servers owned privately by employees are property of their employers?

@LouisIngenthron @Ciantic @dotnet @styx31 @styx31@dotnet.social When an employee runs the server, and an official account lives there, I tend to think there’s a relationship.

@LouisIngenthron @atomicpoet @Ciantic @dotnet @styx31@mastodon.social @styx31
"And do you think that servers owned privately by employees are property of their employers?"

At a company I was made redundant from I asked for a copy of all my data. They replied "we own that". No you don't. That's like saying buying a CD means I now own all the music on it. No, the artist (or their record company) owns the music, I just own the medium it's on. Same, same. @styx31 owns the domain, not Microsoft.

@SmartmanApps Well, what do you mean by "all your data"? Because if it was work product, then the company actually does own that, usually, per the terms of the employment agreement.

@LouisIngenthron
Not work product, literally my personal data that I put on the system. It's literally owned by me, regardless of which medium it's residing on.

Also you're making assumptions about what was in my agreement anyway. I have a current agreement which specifically gives me retention of IP rights.

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