Is #mastodon becoming an echo chamber?
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As this conversation is spiraling a bit I want to make a few things clear:
1. I'd like Mastodon to be MORE inclusive and bring in more voices
2. Some people don't seem to want that
3. This is core problem to solve: How do we let more in, but not "pollute" your feed?
4. The solution is NOT "gatekeeping", revelling in the fact that AI journalists aren't welcome
5. This is the same reason we lost "Black Twitter" when it came over in 2022Yes, a lot of you don't want AI posts in your feed (or pick any other topic) but the solution isn't to keep "AI People" from joining Mastodon, any more than it is keeping marginalized communities off of Mastodon.
@scottjenson “As this conversation is spiraling a bit let me double down on my worst possible take: AI journos are marginalized exactly the same as BIPOC, trans, and queer folk.”
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@scottjenson @evan @cratermoon
For my instance, for my feed, AI boosters bring nothing of value.
They own the government, mainstream media, and the stock market.
It's just a strange group to call out as needing a signal boost.
@eestileib @scottjenson @evan To drill down on the "what value?" question, we can refine it to ask, "who benefits, who is harmed, and what recourse do those who are harmed have?"
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@evan @cratermoon Exactly, even asking that question "What value do they bring" is kind of scary.
It's a fine line, I get it. We draw the line at nazis and scammers but let's not cross the line into "intellectual purity" tests
@scottjenson @evan what if the question is "who benefits, who is harmed, and what recourse is there for those harmed?"
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@scottjenson @evan what if the question is "who benefits, who is harmed, and what recourse is there for those harmed?"
@cratermoon @evan should everyone who joins mastodon be forced to pass that gauntlet? Who are the gate keepers? There shouldn't be a purity test. Catch the scammers of course, but passing judgement on the quality of someone's thoughts is very dubious
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Is #mastodon becoming an echo chamber? This post from @carnage4life has me questioning our community. The Mastodon team is finally getting some traction, the product improvements are increasing, The #UX is improving, yet people posting on multiple platforms are making comments like this. It's confusing.
I *know* people here don't want this to be a classic social media-clone but we'd *like* journalists to be here right? They aren't coming with examples like this!
@scottjenson actually, Mastodon in Brazil has been getting less tech-centric as it grows. But I do believe that the people who come to the platform, and stay here, are willing to trade less engagement for more real engagement, and that is not enough to sway big influencers (and by that I include popular authors, journalists, etc.), that truly require the algorithm to get big follower numbers. It's just a different logic. I think something might change if more outlets open an account here and they think of their instance as a kind of Verification mark. Like an "AndersonCooper@cnn.social", for instance.
@carnage4life -
@scottjenson “As this conversation is spiraling a bit let me double down on my worst possible take: AI journos are marginalized exactly the same as BIPOC, trans, and queer folk.”
@devlord don't put words in my mouth. I didn't say that. I'm asking for more inclusivity. I assume you don't think that is horrible do you?
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As this conversation is spiraling a bit I want to make a few things clear:
1. I'd like Mastodon to be MORE inclusive and bring in more voices
2. Some people don't seem to want that
3. This is core problem to solve: How do we let more in, but not "pollute" your feed?
4. The solution is NOT "gatekeeping", revelling in the fact that AI journalists aren't welcome
5. This is the same reason we lost "Black Twitter" when it came over in 2022Yes, a lot of you don't want AI posts in your feed (or pick any other topic) but the solution isn't to keep "AI People" from joining Mastodon, any more than it is keeping marginalized communities off of Mastodon.
@scottjenson When I see discussions about numbers here, I always think about the admins and mods. Are they being empowered with the proper tools to manage that kind of growth? Many instances go invite only because Nazis and transphobes are very good at what they do and they will twist and turn any code, rule or measure to let themselves in. Keeping this at bay requires work that in many occasions is underappreciated and unpaid. Are the right tools at their disposal at the present time?
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@scottjenson I may have miss understood the initial post, I'm not suggesting the journalists shouldn't post, just that I think their engagement measurement may not be the right metric (but it is the one they are used to)
@ben @scottjenson So, a little context from a former journalist: I asked my boss if I could start and manage a mastodon account for my publication, and she advised that we would have to conduct a study to justify the use of my time - a company asset - by measuring traffic that mastodon drove to our site. Because this is a respectful space, there was no real way to track clicks, so I couldn't justify it and I ended up deleting the account I had already started. It's often not a matter of the journalist's lack of imagination or excess of ego, but their need to meet metrics.
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@devlord don't put words in my mouth. I didn't say that. I'm asking for more inclusivity. I assume you don't think that is horrible do you?
@scottjenson it’s kind of what you said. Read what you said again if you don’t believe me. Black Twitter didn’t succeed on Mastodon not due to “gatekeeping”. But a failure of gatekeeping, at keeping the baddies out. E.g. racists or those not sensitive enough to recognize their racism.
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Is #mastodon becoming an echo chamber? This post from @carnage4life has me questioning our community. The Mastodon team is finally getting some traction, the product improvements are increasing, The #UX is improving, yet people posting on multiple platforms are making comments like this. It's confusing.
I *know* people here don't want this to be a classic social media-clone but we'd *like* journalists to be here right? They aren't coming with examples like this!
@scottjenson @carnage4life Welp, this whole comment section was a trip!
I don’t give these things enough thought to make an helpful comment. So I won’t.
Let’s be kind to each other peeps. We’ve got enough actual bigotry, racism, genocide, and hate speech.
Let’s show the world we can have intelligent discussion and target the topic, not the speakers.
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Is #mastodon becoming an echo chamber? This post from @carnage4life has me questioning our community. The Mastodon team is finally getting some traction, the product improvements are increasing, The #UX is improving, yet people posting on multiple platforms are making comments like this. It's confusing.
I *know* people here don't want this to be a classic social media-clone but we'd *like* journalists to be here right? They aren't coming with examples like this!
@scottjenson I too would greatly like Mastodon to be more inclusive but network effects are emergent properties and a particular stance towards AI is likely to be one of them on a platform that skews nerdy.
Fwiw there is no shortage of politics in my feed here.
As with Twitter, I find journalists in social media spaces to be among people who like to broadcast more than to engage or publicly self reflect.
I don’t know that this predicament has a solution
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@corbden @isagalaev @scottjenson @devlord A part of the sample bias is the self selection of the interactions: on fedi the are quite a few who do not boost/repost images without alt text _as part of their political stance_, and from what I've seen @carnage4life pretty much never use alt even when others provide it for him.
So it's a path of anti-interaction that could easily be changed to get more engagement. -
@corbden @isagalaev @scottjenson @devlord A part of the sample bias is the self selection of the interactions: on fedi the are quite a few who do not boost/repost images without alt text _as part of their political stance_, and from what I've seen @carnage4life pretty much never use alt even when others provide it for him.
So it's a path of anti-interaction that could easily be changed to get more engagement.@Mabande @corbden @isagalaev @scottjenson @devlord @carnage4life
Welp, carnage has taken their personal experience in a network where everybody curates their own experience, found it wanting, and instead of doing what it takes to get what you want, has decided to whine about it. And now we are talking about it.
Like, go follow people and hashtags you goof, get a grip
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@aura i don't understand where being white factors in.
to be completely clear about the point i'm making, the group of "AI users" as of April 2026 is broad and currently includes people of color, disadvantaged, and other traditionally marginalized people. i know this because i work with them.
in the context of this thread, what i'm wondering is whether the people who would exclude "AI users" from their community here mean that to include these groups, as well.
you are trans. i am interested in your point of view on this.
@toddsundsted @aura there are marginalized cops and it's still acab
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Is #mastodon becoming an echo chamber? This post from @carnage4life has me questioning our community. The Mastodon team is finally getting some traction, the product improvements are increasing, The #UX is improving, yet people posting on multiple platforms are making comments like this. It's confusing.
I *know* people here don't want this to be a classic social media-clone but we'd *like* journalists to be here right? They aren't coming with examples like this!
@scottjenson I'm not sure this is the best example of Mastodon gatekeeping. I suspect the person you cite (I won't tag him, to not bother him. I follow him. He doesn't follow me) has a different definition of 'engagement' than many on Mastodon. He has 19,000 followers. He follows just over 200. He never ever engages with anyone. He posts one-way toots. He never uses Alt Text. The Fediverse is a chatty place full of engagement, if you choose to take part yourself, to chat, to boost, to reply.
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@Mabande @corbden @isagalaev @scottjenson @devlord @carnage4life
Welp, carnage has taken their personal experience in a network where everybody curates their own experience, found it wanting, and instead of doing what it takes to get what you want, has decided to whine about it. And now we are talking about it.
Like, go follow people and hashtags you goof, get a grip
@TeflonTrout @corbden @isagalaev @scottjenson @devlord @carnage4life If you didn't want to talk about it you could've so very easily just ignored the thread.
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@TeflonTrout @corbden @isagalaev @scottjenson @devlord @carnage4life If you didn't want to talk about it you could've so very easily just ignored the thread.
@Mabande
I have come to realize that my insistence on reserving friendship for people I actually like has turned my rl circle of friends into an echo chamber. If only I'd trusted algorithms instead
@TeflonTrout @corbden @isagalaev @scottjenson @devlord @carnage4life -
Is #mastodon becoming an echo chamber? This post from @carnage4life has me questioning our community. The Mastodon team is finally getting some traction, the product improvements are increasing, The #UX is improving, yet people posting on multiple platforms are making comments like this. It's confusing.
I *know* people here don't want this to be a classic social media-clone but we'd *like* journalists to be here right? They aren't coming with examples like this!
@scottjenson I love Mastodon because it feels like “old” twitter, a bunch of clever people sharing stuff they’ve made or found or figured out… not to build a “following”, but because they’re passionate about it.
That said, lately I’ve noticed my feed getting filled with more negativity around certain topics, and people I respect getting radicalised in one direction or another (signs of an echo chamber).
Rather than muting entire people or topics, I kinda want to mute the negativity itself.
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@scottjenson I'm not sure this is the best example of Mastodon gatekeeping. I suspect the person you cite (I won't tag him, to not bother him. I follow him. He doesn't follow me) has a different definition of 'engagement' than many on Mastodon. He has 19,000 followers. He follows just over 200. He never ever engages with anyone. He posts one-way toots. He never uses Alt Text. The Fediverse is a chatty place full of engagement, if you choose to take part yourself, to chat, to boost, to reply.
This is exactly it.
People like to be talked to, not talked at.
Accounts in "broadcast mode" do better on other platforms, with different styles of use.
People get ridiculous cognitive dissonance when they don't do numbers.
I remember in 22 an account for a housing activist group was blasting out pronouncements that nobody was disagreeing with but they weren't doing numbers so they went to back to Twitter to tell everyone we were all landlords.
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@scottjenson I love Mastodon because it feels like “old” twitter, a bunch of clever people sharing stuff they’ve made or found or figured out… not to build a “following”, but because they’re passionate about it.
That said, lately I’ve noticed my feed getting filled with more negativity around certain topics, and people I respect getting radicalised in one direction or another (signs of an echo chamber).
Rather than muting entire people or topics, I kinda want to mute the negativity itself.
@scottjenson I’m also wary that chasing “engagement” is what led Twitter to actively encourage things that provoke arguments.
Are we able to differentiate positive engagement (bringing people together) from negative engagement (divisive) in a universal way?
