I think free speech very often gets conflated with “speech I agree with”. Every social media platform has its rules on what can or cannot be said there (whether you agree is a separate matter). It’s on the individual users to find one which works and results in the better user experience for them.
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Tweetbot Developer Tapbots Launches 'Ivory' App for Mastodon
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I think free speech very often gets conflated with “speech I agree with”. Every social media platform has its rules on what can or cannot be said there (whether you agree is a separate matter). It’s on the individual users to find one which works and results in the better user experience for them.
It's almost as if you made this comment without putting in any effort at all to see how long they've been working on Ivory
I have never really understood Twitter and how it is supposed to be useful. All I see when I open Twitter is a bunch of tweets and ads that confuse me. They are injected by Twitter and forced upon me.
Is Mastodon different in that regard?
Does it respect my choice and simply present the stuff I truly signed up for to follow? If so then that's already a win no matter how few users it actually has. If there are 100 actual users on there that provide some meaningful content vs 100 million users on Twitter where most posts are just about utter BS and self centered attention seeking noise then I know where I'll be found going forward. People seem desperate to gain followers on Twitter and they will do just about anything and everything for it.
Wwhat exactly is the benefit of being part of any of these platforms? I mean really, what do people get out of something like Twitter that actually improves their lives on a daily basis?
I'm really curious. I have asked a lot of people that question and nobody really had a convincing argument yet.
As somebody who used one of these things
to connect to a VAX so I could chat at 300 Baud or 0.3kbit/s with strangers I feel like there was actually something to be gained by sharing knowledge but I seem to miss that part on any of the social platforms these days.
It's all about who's shouting the loudest to gain the most attention with the most controversial tweet.
Maybe I'm just getting old...
Is Mastodon different in that regard?
Does it respect my choice and simply present the stuff I truly signed up for to follow? If so then that's already a win no matter how few users it actually has. If there are 100 actual users on there that provide some meaningful content vs 100 million users on Twitter where most posts are just about utter BS and self centered attention seeking noise then I know where I'll be found going forward. People seem desperate to gain followers on Twitter and they will do just about anything and everything for it.
Wwhat exactly is the benefit of being part of any of these platforms? I mean really, what do people get out of something like Twitter that actually improves their lives on a daily basis?
I'm really curious. I have asked a lot of people that question and nobody really had a convincing argument yet.
As somebody who used one of these things
to connect to a VAX so I could chat at 300 Baud or 0.3kbit/s with strangers I feel like there was actually something to be gained by sharing knowledge but I seem to miss that part on any of the social platforms these days.
It's all about who's shouting the loudest to gain the most attention with the most controversial tweet.
Maybe I'm just getting old...
The anatomy of a conspiracy theorist on full transparent display folks: “I didn’t see them build an app for the last three months and that had a public beta for a while now, and now’s the first time I’ve heard of it so it must’ve just popped out of nothing. No effort!”
I'm really glad this app has finally been released! I've been waiting a long while for it to come out and after some trying it out today, I'm happy with what I see so far. The UI, smoothness of everything, how it fits my own needs so well. I didn’t mind paying for the year subscription, BUT…I do also wish this was just a pay once and have it for life app, but I kinda get it. The team is literally just two dudes working on a niche app right after losing one of the biggest sources of their revenue, they need some consistent income.
I’ve accepted that this app is in early access so I’m just gonna wait and see how this client will evolve over time to be even more fleshed out. The main thing I’m waiting for is their eventual MacOS client. I like Mastonaut, but I’d love to have something like Ivory for desktop.
I’ve accepted that this app is in early access so I’m just gonna wait and see how this client will evolve over time to be even more fleshed out. The main thing I’m waiting for is their eventual MacOS client. I like Mastonaut, but I’d love to have something like Ivory for desktop.
Devs already got paid for their Twitter app and apparently get to keep all that money too.
You only see the users you follow. It doesn't inject anything into your timeline, including ads.
As for a benefit, it's subjective. It keeps me in contact with people I follow without having to open up a bunch of blogs. In a way, it's like RSS. It gives me the information I want. You may have an entirely different use-case that doesn't fit a social media like experience.
The official Twitter app has always been a mess. When I used Twitter, it was always with Tweetbot or Twitterific, where one could see a proper timeline - recent tweets by people you follow. The impression I get is that Mastodon gives you that same thing (that is, "recent comments by people you follow", not the mess that Twitter's app gives).
The benefit of social platforms is being exposed to information and viewpoints you wouldn't have gotten at home, and to engage in interesting discussion. And sometimes to help others. Usenet had a good run of being precisely that. Twitter started out as that, but they unfortunately followed the path of "give the service away for free and then figure out how to make money off of it", and what they figured out was tons of ads and "promoted tweets", and trying to lead you around by the nose to look at the things that might make them money, which is why the official Twitter app looks like such a crapfest when you open it.
I started with 300 baud modems too, though in the days before Vaxes ruled the world (first learned on an HP 2000 timesharing system). Later on, I spent a bunch of time on Usenet (ran the Usenet feed for the company where I worked) - in the early days, before the Eternal September and before spam was invented, the SNR was amazing. Even on Usenet, though, there were plenty of idiots.
I have friends who were on Twitter quite early, and made a lot of good friends there (one toured the UK with her husband, staying with various friends they'd met on Twitter). There was much good discussion (and also a ton of crap). Similar to, but not the same as Usenet.
These days, I find Reddit to be kinda sorta like Usenet was - tons of discussions going on in different rooms and you can wander from one to the other. Many good discussions, also plenty of junk. The trick is avoiding the junk and finding the stuff that you want.
Mastodon is set up a bit more like Usenet was - no central authority, a whole bunch of servers that pass content back and forth. It's not one monolithic thing like Twitter was. It's what you make of it - a combination of the server you choose to get an account on, and who you choose to follow (you're not limited to the local server, you can follow basically anyone on any server). Mastodon is probably going to end up somewhat like Usenet, where you would find good discussions going on to join, or make your own, with plenty of junk around to ignore of course, but at least not controlled by the whims of one single authority (e.g. Space Karen), and not run with "extracting the most money possible from the viewers" as the strongest design principle.
What made apps like Tweetbot & Twitteriffic the best were that they synced your timeline positions across iOS, iPadOS, and macOS. The Tapbots folks have already confirmed to me directly on Mastodon saying their macOS client is on the way and will have all the same sync features Tweetbot has had for years.
Tapbots gonna tap out of money pretty soon trying to develop for a dead platform. Poor use of funds. If I had paid for Tweetbot back in the day and saw the developers using that money for this, I'd be mad. Luckily, I didn't. Give it a year. Big L.
Twitter: Not very interested in it now, but future might change things, we never know.
Tweetbot don't work, I bought it early on, so no subscription anyway.
Twitter app is sh-it.
Tweetdeck seems to work fine, in browser mood these days though, but all good when I need to search or check for something.
Reddit: Not using it much, but ok for certain things, except when moderators are fkd up.
Mastodon: uhhmm, doesn't feel interesting.
I am in general not very interested in social media right now 😉 which is a good thing for me.
Life contains other things of more value, I think. Each to their own.
Tweetbot don't work, I bought it early on, so no subscription anyway.
Twitter app is sh-it.
Tweetdeck seems to work fine, in browser mood these days though, but all good when I need to search or check for something.
Reddit: Not using it much, but ok for certain things, except when moderators are fkd up.
Mastodon: uhhmm, doesn't feel interesting.
I am in general not very interested in social media right now 😉 which is a good thing for me.
Life contains other things of more value, I think. Each to their own.
Hmm.
Are you certain an indie app developer (I'd not use 3rd party since as you've stated their making their own app), is living off their work? Typically for a decent app how long does it take to develop, and how long does it take to flourish to be able to afford the necessities: Rent/Mortgage, Eletricity/Heat, Food, internet, transportation, and insurance? I'm sure an indie app developer must be having a main 9-5 before tearing up their nails, sweating and bulging eyes during the night begging for visine! ??
honestly I don't know.
Well it depends. Mastodon didn’t solve Twitter’s moderation problem, it just shattered it into thousands more, smaller moderation problems. People quit Twitter ostensibly because they don’t want Elon to be the sole arbiter of speech, and then joined instances where someone else is the sole arbiter of speech.
In the past week, Elon unbanned Stefan Molyneux, Nick Fuentes, and Steve Franssen. 3 openly proud white nationalists. Apple needs to do something about the Twitter app.
Mastodon is not a single site, it's communication / social media software, and it's a collection of sites that all agree to exchange messages between their users using that software. There is no central authority. That's an intended part of the design. Anyone can set up their own Mastodon server and get connected to others. You found out that there are some Mastodon servers that cater to white supremacists, just like you can find white supremacy websites somewhere on the internet (because it isn't illegal, regardless of how distasteful / offensive it is). There's no "website police" to complain to, and there's no overarching authority for Mastodon either. You just choose not to follow people who espouse white supremacy.
Same. I have both. I prefer Ice Cubes and it’s free. I actually don’t mind the official mastodon app either.
Moderation is done on an instance level, instead of some central authority that everyone reports to. If you want to join a LGPTQ+ server that only federates with other LGPTQ+ servers, you can. If you want to join a white supremacy instance that only federates with other white supremacy instances, you can. Mastodon does not require one instance to follow another. If you want to create an instance that federates with the instances you want, you can. That's what TruthSocial did. Each instance is free to federate with any other instance.
Now the question becomes who do you want to determine who's allowed to speak on your chosen platform. With twitter, it's always Elon. With the fediverse, it's whoever runs your selected instance. You have to trust someone to make those decisions if you're not willing to run your own instance.
Mastodon kinda feels like the early days of Twitter. It's quite refreshing. There's some kinks to work out of course, but it'll get better.
I think that is my problem right there. Enternal September seems to truly be eternal
Usenet. I remember it well. It had a bit of a comeback and I even find myself on IRC every so often.
I should have worded my question differently. I'm well aware of what the original purpose was of these social platforms. I just can't see the benefit people are getting out of them today in this day and age the way these platforms are now geared up.
Well, be it as it may, each to their own. I find myself wondering why we as a species haven't been able to actually transform the huge amount of knowledge at our fingertips into something more useful. We seem to spend an awful lot of time glued to our devices but what is it we're actually doing? What evolves out of the time we spend following others or reading stuff that has precious little to do with our own lives?
So many younger people seem to struggle with real life and I am convinced it has a lot to do with the insanely inaccurate views they get on social media platforms and the pressure that they put upon themselves as a consequence.
Then again, my parents blamed the Sony Walk Man for all things evil so this is just a generational change and new perspective. 😄
of course it takes time for a company to grow, I’m sure plenty of devs have 9-5s before going full-time (as is the case with any creative job, which I would file this under)—in the context of this article, however, we’re talking about a company that’s made one of the biggest Twitter apps for years. they’ve had the time to flourish; I don’t doubt that app revenue is their main source of income at this point. I equally don’t doubt that startup devs having a subscription model is their gateway to being able to work on the app full-time.
code is never perfect. design is never perfect. even as someone who did casual web design years ago, I would come across bugs that were complete head-scratchers and took forever to fix+make sure they were fixed across all browsers. (maybe it’s just because I was an amateur, who knows.) we all see that minor updates on the App Store are usually just bug fixes/minor improvements—to be able to actually take the time to do that requires 1) a good app with a well-defined purpose (Ivory already checks both of those out the gate), 2) a lot of time (and ideally, by the time one can afford it, the ability to work with a team).
anything else…I dunno. Rohtos > Visine. 😂
Any reason you can’t just you know, use the native apps for these things? Native Twitter and Native Mastadon app working well, and I’m not paying extra. I think these gen z app developers need to deliver more meaningful products instead of some api shell that plugs on top of someone else’s successful product…