@jeff @matthewkeys Someone creates a server designed for journalists with some sort of vetting process. Then other servers block that server for doing the things that journalists do: Looking for stories, building audiences, and occasionally publishing information and points of view that others disagree with.
This kind of mentality will make it harder for Mastodon to compete as a space for public discourse.
We can't have the benefits of the Fourth Estate without a little sunshine.
@stanwise @jeff @matthewkeys Genuinely frustrating to see people with brand new accounts telling everyone how Mastodon should work instead of taking the time, making the effort, to understand how it does work.
@DanBC @jeff @matthewkeys I don't know what to tell you except that it's genuinely frustrating to see others assume that people with new accounts know nothing about how online communities work. I guess I missed the sign stating there was a probationary period during which users' ideas are automatically considered invalid.
@stanwise @jeff @matthewkeys So far you've just said stuff that's been discussed pretty heavily in the past, and you've shown no awareness of those discussions. You're also not aware of why journa.host is being blocked which makes this convo a bit weird. You're pointing to trivialities and ignoring the big stuff. [1/2]
@stanwise @jeff @matthewkeys Virulant transphobic journos were joining journa.host, and people raised the alarm, and initially journa.host said they wouldn't ban until transphobia happened on Mastodon. That's fine, they can do that, but it means they're going to get rapidly defederated by other instances who need to protect their users. [2/2]
@DanBC @jeff @matthewkeys You mean I didn’t illustrate any awareness of prior discussions in the four sentences I typed on my phone about the topic at hand while waiting for a meeting to start? I suppose I concede the point.
You say I’m pointing to trivialities and ignoring the big stuff. I disagree, and the reason is that I believe whatever happened on Mastodon prior to Musk destroying Twitter matters less than what happens now. 1/
@DanBC @jeff @matthewkeys Before, it was fine if Mastodon was a loosely connected series of gated communities, each one devoted to particular topics and enforcing certain behavioral norms. If the communities didn’t want to talk to each other anymore for whatever reason, it didn’t really matter. Mastodon was another Discord – a great place for forming homogenous, safe communities. However, it wasn’t very relevant. CNN wasn’t reporting on what public figures were writing on Mastodon. 2/
I'm honestly trying to figure out why I find this thread so completely annoying, and I think it's sentences like this: "Before, it was fine if Mastodon was a loosely connected series of gated communities, each one devoted to particular topics and enforcing certain behavioral norms."
The implication is that this is no longer "fine", as if that is something you get to decide, and on further reading it turns out that the reason it isn't "fine" anymore, is that journalists might not swoop in heroically and cause Mastodon to become "relevant", where the standard of "relevance" is whether for instance CNN is reporting on what famous people are saying on Mastodon.
I don't know if it's obvious to you why that attitude would be deeply repugnant to most people who use and like Mastodon. :) Perhaps it is, and that wasn't really the attitude you meant to convey. Or perhaps it isn't, in which case you don't really understand the people involved very well yet!
@stanwise @ceoln @DanBC @jeff @matthewkeys If you care about journalism, you just...not use the instances that ban journa.host?
Neither Mastodon as a whole nor the most popular general-interest instances has banned journa.host. It's just certain instances.
@stanwise @ceoln @DanBC @jeff @matthewkeys I see what you did there. You formulated a false equivalency of independent instance operators determining how to moderate their instance knowing that their users have the easy option of moving to a different server with Musk's fiats pertaining to hundreds of millions of Twitter users. Respectfully this is just not a valid comparison and it is not how "it looks from outside."
"Everyone" isn't saying this. You are saying this. People who run servers are not obliged to change their behavior to make you happier.
Feel free to argue that it's a good idea to defederate only as a last resort; look into the (what's it called?) United Federation of Instances, for instance, which advocates that. The server that I'm on very seldom defederates (and has been defederated by some because of that!).
Just don't argue that journalists are so special that everyone MUST change to avoid annoying you. You'll just get eyerolls and alienate people.
@stanwise @ceoln @jeff @matthewkeys Again, that's not why journa.host is getting federated. This convo is pointless if you're going to ignore why instance admins are protecting their users.
@ceoln @stanwise @DanBC @jeff @matthewkeys to me it looks like the biggest bridge siphoning off twitter’s relevance and users to mastodon is msm.
“i was on mastodon when it was indie” is a great way to preserve mom-and-pop shops but imo not the way to drain Musk’s swamp
Maybe? I'm not sure what your evidence is, though. I left Twitter because it was becoming an annoying dumpster fire; nothing to do with whether or not journalists were leaving. It's nice that some of them are coming here, but is it causative? Are you on Mastodon because Stan is? Or...?
Also it isn't Mastodon's job to drain Musk's swamp. :) If it has that effect, great, but it isn't obliged to change itself to be more attractive to ex-Twitter users if the people actually doing it don't see that as a priority...
@ceoln @DanBC @jeff @matthewkeys
Here's how this looks from the outside.
Musk: Bans journalists for writing negatively about him.
Everyone: That's nuts!
Mastodon server: Bans tons of verified journalists because one of them linked to one of the few conservative columns at NYT.
Everyone: Umm...
OG Mastodon users: That's just how we roll.
Everyone: So... how about we check out The Post?
And that will be a shame because that place will be about the money.