shades fills you in

when elon took over twitter late last year, npr said users were ditching twitter for mastodon, a text-based social platform

mastodon is a decentralized software that looks a lot like twitter. users join servers (“instances”), each with their own rules. users comm across servers -- kinda like email. watch a tiktok on it here

mastodon is diff from fb or insta bc it’s not owned by one company. bc it’s so different, cnn says that starting out on mastodon is a bit tricky. but the vibes are good -- it kind feels like a young twitter!

the guardian, otoh, isn’t so sure about it. it’s a cool concept, but decentralization comes with its own problems. plus, everyone you wanna interact with online is still on twitter

cnet was rooting for mastodon, but just didn’t like it: choosing which server to sign up for was daunting and confusing. it’s also a pain to favorite or follow

yup, that’s exactly the problem, says wapo: it’s not user friendly. tech-savvy users like it, but it’s no twitter 2.0

a fortune op thinks mastodon’s not replacing twitter anytime soon: hate elon all you want, but twitter’s still very popular. mastodon just can’t catch up

wired adds that mastodon doesn’t have the infrastructure to support a lot of users on its site. after elon’s takeover, an influx caused mastodon servers to overload

more on that from a diff wired article: people are intimidated by the idea of opening their own instance/server bc they’d be responsible for the content there. lawsuit anyone?

by february 2023, wired said mastodon’s newfound popularity was shortlived: many people who jumped from twitter to mastodon eventually made their way back to twitter. mastodon just isn’t a good replacement!

vox: they all suck -- twitter, mastodon, the whole mess of them! the ideal digital town square just doesn’t exist yet

but forbes is a defender. sure, mastodon isn’t twitter 2.0. but that’s not the point! it’s not a mainstream site. it doesn’t have to run like one

yup, mastodon is a glimpse into what the internet *could* look like the future. but there’s still a long way to go before something like mastodon hits the mainstream -- vice