kasey @kasey@qoto.org

I keep seeing articles about Mastodon slumps, and journalists going back to Twitter. Is it fair to say, that maybe Mastodon isn't for journalists, or brands, or even people who want large accounts? Maybe Mastodon is true social media, for people who want to interact and discuss, not be influenced, sold to, or manipulated with cult style tactics and followings. There will always be groups who dislike the idea of the people controlling their own inputs, people who don't like the idea of accessible Administration, and people who don't like the idea that if we don't like a space that we can just move to another one, or even create our own. Individualism is scary to the kind of people who thrive on complacency, and not challenging the status quo.

Piers Morgan interviews the PM:

Morgan: Do you worry that many people will default on their mortgages?

Sunak: What’s a mortgage?

Morgan: It’s when people borrow from the bank to buy a house.

Sunak: Why would they want to do that? Why don’t they just buy a house with their own money? It doesn’t make sense. People should live within their means.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/feb/02/spirits-of-downing-st-present-and-past-submit-to-talktvs-finest-inquisitors

So the big #strike day has passed & in its wake more strikes & disputes will continue.

The Govt. (at present) seems keen to continue its hardline, but the Q. is who is the audience for this rhetoric - as more & more #voters get involved with strikes, the conclusion must be the hard-line is a performance for a different group of people; the right wing media (as always?), the #Tories rich backer?

Its difficult to see a #democratic strategy behind the positioning... so we need to look elsewhere!

Finally I have managed to take a snowdrop picture that I am relatively happy with. Snowdrop Valley, Exmoor. #Exmoor #ExmoorNationalPark #SnowdropValley #snowdrops #snowdrop #photography #naturephotography #landscapephotography

Ah, gotta love malicious compliance.

Zahawi gone, the lawyers he used now taking the SRA investigation seriously. ⁦@DanNeidle@twitter.com⁩ fairly and accurately puts some of the broader criticisms in context here, but he will have invested enormous time and I daresay stressful energy into… 1/ https://www.taxpolicy.org.uk/2023/01/29/three-wrong-takes-on-the-zahawi-affair/

This is nothing less than a stitch-up. Mega-wealthy landowners are commercialising access to nature & wild camping for their own profit, and holding the public hostage - we must continue the campaign for free & open access

@guyshrubsole @Right_2Roam

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jan/19/dartmoor-national-park-to-pay-landowners-to-allow-wild-camping

🐦🔗: https://n.respublicae.eu/CarolineLucas/status/1616421202792251394

In this article by Brown et al I found via @MarkRubin authors show that the misperception that #equality is always zero-sum and harms advantaged groups make these groups vote not only for inequality-enhancing policies that financially hurt them, but also against equality-enhancing policies that financially benefit them. This may explain why inequality prevails even as it incurs societal costs that harm everyone.
#inequalities #DEI #inclusion

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.abm2385

This Forgotten Coal Mine is an abandoned industrial relic in England. It once extracted hundreds of thousands of tonnes of coal every year. Now if lays abandoned, succumbing to decay.

Explore more photos from this derelict colliery: https://www.obsidianurbexphotography.com/industrial/forgotten-coal-mine-england/

#Photography #History #Urbex #AbandonedPlaces #England #coalmine #industry #foto #photo

If you're thinking Republicans are under pressure to pick a speaker today, you are SERIOUSLY overestimating their interest in actually doing any governing.

This whole thing is a denial of service attack on Congress.

GOOD IDEA: This may look like a transit map, but it’s actually a map of typical walking times & distances in the walkable, car-free Spanish city of #Pontevedra. A simple, clever idea that every city working to be more walkable should steal.

#walkablecities #cities #urbanism #walking

By banning some of us, Musk is sending a message to everyone else: Comply with the dictator or lose access. #Twitter has become a virtual simulation of authoritarian rule."

But Musk didn’t build Twitter. We, collectively, turned the bird app into a consequential power. If it remains under the control of a man who sees journalists as enemies, we have a moral responsibility to fly the coop.

(Reposting with paywall-free gift link for those who couldn't access it earlier)

https://www.sfchronicle.com/opinion/openforum/article/elon-musk-twitter-ban-censorship-17680044.php?utm_source=marketing&utm_medium=copy-url-link&utm_campaign=article-share&hash=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuc2ZjaHJvbmljbGUuY29tL29waW5pb24vb3BlbmZvcnVtL2FydGljbGUvZWxvbi1tdXNrLXR3aXR0ZXItYmFuLWNlbnNvcnNoaXAtMTc2ODAwNDQucGhw&time=MTY3MjQxODUwMTMyOA==&rid=ZDBhY2NhMjQtNzY2Ny00MWYzLWExNzktMGVmMjljNTdjNDE0&sharecount=MQ==

@kityates The “Economy” is just the word we use to describe the value we place on our society’s resources, and the roles we play in the production and consumption of the goods and services we create from them.

If people cannot make a living from a job that is fundamental to the functioning of your society (a nurse, care worker, a transport worker, a teacher, etc.), then there is something fundamentally wrong with our economy.

@jeffjarvis

#BylinesNetwork @BylinesNetwork doing it right. They have their own server (Bylines.Social) hosting all ten of its local citizen journalism publications, with website verifications throughout:

1) The English regionals:
@YorksBylines
@NEBylines
@BylinesEast
@centralbylines
@NWBylines
@KentBylines
@SussexBylines
@WEBylines​

2) The nationals:
@BylinesScotland
@BylinesCymru

#Bylines

#JohnMastodon is proof that things *CAN* go viral here on Mastodon, but the key is that *YOU* are the algorithm. The reason that the John Mastodon meme showed up on other people's timelines is because so many users boosted the posts.

The lesson here is: please don't just favourite something if you really enjoyed it; BOOST it so that other people can enjoy it, too! This is the only reason why I bother to create as large a social graph as I can on Mastodon—to act as an amplifier. You can, too!❤️😉

Mediaite right wing writer Isaac Schorr misread the Twitter account @joinmastodon as "John Mastodon," and referred to him as the founder of the platform in his article https://www.mediaite.com/opinion/hypocrisy-and-fear-all-the-way-down-at-twitter/ #tech #twitter #twittermigration #twitterexodus #news #media

#cats #printers

So I understand that the bird site has started blocking links to common/known Mastodon instances, and that doesn't seem like free speech to me. So... I did a thing.

If you go to https://spacekaren.sucks it is now a URL shortener that blocks the twitter user agent. That means you can share that link that will redirect to your Mastodon account without the pouty baby stopping you. If you find this helpful can you boost so others can find it? #TwitterMigration #Mastodon #Musk #introduction

A mob of red deer stags in Richmond Park, they were on the edge of the woods and unless you stopped to look from most angles they were perfectly hidden, I crouched down to take the shot, that's when I could see how many there were (shot with a long lens it looks like I was a lot closer than I actually was). #RichmondPark #RedDeer #Stags #RedStags #WildLifePhotography #Nature #Photography #AltText