It’s not the users, it’s the developers / investors. I’ve tried so many times to get into Mastodon, but it sucks compared to Bluesky. It lacks content and polish, so it’s no wonder everyday people choose Bluesky over it.
The real conundrum is why isn’t there a for profit company with big money behind it, investing in ActivityPub. I guess you could point to Threads? But insert your “not like that” meme of choice.
Fwiw, apparently Bluesky did initially look at activity pub, but found the protocol lacking, which is why they invented ATProto. I don’t know the details though.
What do devs/investors have to do with content? The users are creating the content. And then, there’s not really an algorithm rooting you in. You are free to follow the people you’re actually interested in, how it is supposed to be.
I also don’t have any polishing problems myself. It all just works, there are nice apps, etc.
Why would you want to have a for profit company with Mastodon? That’s what would probably ruin it in the long run, as they would go for their interests, instead of interests of users and the platform itself. Of course it’s hard surviving by donations and so on, but I think that’s the way it should go.
Because you need network effect. Which means you need big money for marketing, content moderation and development costs. That includes algorithms, which maybe you don’t want, but most people do.
It’s not that I want a for profit company, I just don’t think Mastodon will every achieve critical mass without one.
Yeah, but the network effect isn’t really the cause of the problem I’d say. If people wouldn’t just run to the next best thing and think about things, they could come to the conclusion to use Mastodon.
Probably will never happen and I don’t see a solution for this, but it’s still just demoralizing.
It’s not the users, it’s the developers / investors. I’ve tried so many times to get into Mastodon, but it sucks compared to Bluesky. It lacks content and polish, so it’s no wonder everyday people choose Bluesky over it.
The real conundrum is why isn’t there a for profit company with big money behind it, investing in ActivityPub. I guess you could point to Threads? But insert your “not like that” meme of choice.
Fwiw, apparently Bluesky did initially look at activity pub, but found the protocol lacking, which is why they invented ATProto. I don’t know the details though.
What do devs/investors have to do with content? The users are creating the content. And then, there’s not really an algorithm rooting you in. You are free to follow the people you’re actually interested in, how it is supposed to be.
I also don’t have any polishing problems myself. It all just works, there are nice apps, etc.
Why would you want to have a for profit company with Mastodon? That’s what would probably ruin it in the long run, as they would go for their interests, instead of interests of users and the platform itself. Of course it’s hard surviving by donations and so on, but I think that’s the way it should go.
Because you need network effect. Which means you need big money for marketing, content moderation and development costs. That includes algorithms, which maybe you don’t want, but most people do.
It’s not that I want a for profit company, I just don’t think Mastodon will every achieve critical mass without one.
Yeah, but the network effect isn’t really the cause of the problem I’d say. If people wouldn’t just run to the next best thing and think about things, they could come to the conclusion to use Mastodon.
Probably will never happen and I don’t see a solution for this, but it’s still just demoralizing.