[jeremyjh]

I just spent 30 minutes trying to figure out the best way to follow my interests on Mastodon. I had to figure out which instance to use, and the most popular ones cannot keep up with the traffic surge right now. And then I don't know how much the instance matters, can I follow a hashtag across all instances? It seems yes, but I spent time figuring this out.

How much time will the average twitter user invest into this? How much will it cost these hobbyists to run Ruby on Rails apps that can service hundreds of millions of users? I'm just...skeptical it can take off. Whereas something VC funded that can monetize and its just one thing you point people to, and they can sign up in 30 seconds and it handles all the traffic with no hiccups or slow-downs. That could work.

[mxuribe]

@jeremyjh I genuinely appreciate your comments! Allow me to kindly respond...

> ...best way to follow my interests...

If you're still stuck on the topic of following interests, may i direct your attention to the following website: https://fedi.tips/how-to-use-mastodon-and-the-fediverse-basi...

And, once you have completed that section, i invite you to click around the different sections available at the top nav of the above website. I have no affiliation, but have found it handy to give out to newcomers to the Fediverse - regardless if such newcomers are using the Mastodon *software*, or pixelfed, or funkwhale instances, etc. The "Beginners Start Here" area of the website is a section i highly suggest you and all newcomers to spend time reviewing.

> ...How much time will the average twitter user invest into this?

I'm detecting in your statement that there is an assumption that the commercial socials (e.g. Twitter, Facebook, etc.) and the Fediverse have the same goals....but i believe they differ. Most instances on the Fedi are cool with being village-sized communities that can easily interconnect with all/many other village-sized communities...The Fedi's goal is not to have a single, massive commercializable silo. There is no such overacrhing goial to scale up at all cost, as might exist for commercial services. While, there are no doubt paid Fedi instances that legitimately are commercial by their definiton and operation, their goals are not as audacious as the entities coming out of Silicon Valley. So, if some newcomers struggle during onboarding, while i never want to see people struggle, maybe its not the end of the world if newcomers have to invest a little time in learning the ways and customs of what amounts to a new world for them.

> ...I'm just...skeptical it can take off...

You have every right to your opinion of course! That being said, as I noted above, the Fedi cares less if it "takes off". Its goals are more about quality of connections rather than numbers of connections. Richer and more fulfilling interactions are sought after, while brazen increases of follower counts are not.

I should also clarify facts here: Mastodon - the software and initial instance/server - only started life late 2016. While the greater Fediverse (that mastodon is only one part of) has been in existence since around 2008. Yes, that's right, none of this is new! Not the networks, nor the latest wave of newcomers. So, while you (and some other newcomers) doubt this will take off - well before this latest wave of newcomers - there have been already millions of active users interacting with each other for almost a decade and a half.

If you're willing to invest a little time/effort, then please by all means do participate on the Fediverse, and enjoy. But, if you don't think it is worth it, that's fine too; no harm, no foul.

[jeremyjh]

Thanks for the kind reply and pointers to information. But if the Fediverse is not trying to take off, how can you you describe it as “mechanisms in place already to achieve what this new thing is proposing to do.”? This new thing has ambitions at Twitter scale and beyond.

[mxuribe]

The Fediverse en masse - and most participants that i have met on the Fedi in my 13 or so years on this thing - are not trying to "take off". However, the beauty of the freedom of the underlying protocols and other mechanisms like the software employed (with mastodon being only one example), offer the ability to scale up *if so desired*...But, again, my experience tells me that the vast majority like it as-is. For Mr. Bardin, while he might wish to scale his effort up to Twitter-like scale, i merely wished that he used some of the open source software already used and developed on the Fedi....with the benefit of more and continued universal interaction. There is already precedent, such that the mastodon.social instance is maybe one of the biggest if not the biggest instance on the Fedi (Of course, i know its not twitter scale, but its still pretty huge relatively speaking)....but the size of a big instance doesn't stop other instances from happlily staying small, but while still allowing for interaction among all. That's all i'm saying.