Day 1 on Mastodon and I already love that there's no algorithm screaming at me What should I know as a newbie?

You post to them, but change the privacy settings to "Private Mention" before you post. @Katherinesalom @WeirdWriter

And welcome! @Katherinesalom @WeirdWriter

@Katherinesalom Like private message them? I am blind so I don't know the visual interface, but there's a button that says post visibility. Click that, select, private mention, or I think it's called, direct message, and that will be a DM but you can also click into someone's profile and hit direct message there. This page may have visual instructions https://fedi.tips/who-can-see-my-posts-in-mastodon-how-do-i-send-dms-in-mastodon/

@Katherinesalom Follow everyone who amuses you even slightly, I wind up following three people every time I sign in

@Katherinesalom

Different servers have different cultural norms, sometimes nearly contradictory, and sometimes I have to think about balancing them. But this is a reflection of life, different people have different needs.

Related, posts by any but very very popular people spread in bursts and hiccups from server to server.

I think of it as being very neighborhood-y. Not one town square, lots of them.

@Katherinesalom

@Katherinesalom Follow hashtags.

@NoRestfortheWicked @Katherinesalom

I cannot improve on this advice! Perfectly stated.

Do take your time. One way I found interesting people to follow, was to check the follows of an account I already like.

The wider your interests, the more dynamic your feed.

@Katherinesalom
Did someone say hashtags already?

More seriously: it's a great way to discover nice content. You can sort them in lists, so you don't have to see everything every time you open mastodon. I have one for politics, local, comics, weather nerds and general.

Lastly: sometimes you get rogue posts abusing hashtags. Block and move on, engaging is a waste of time.

https://fedi.tips/how-to-use-the-lists-feature-on-mastodon/

Yep, and also, well, I gotta jet, but I'd also follow accounts such as @FediTips and their linked accounts in their bio. I'd especially follow hashtags such as #FediTips @DoomsdaysCW @Katherinesalom

@NoRestfortheWicked @Katherinesalom ...
+ install linux, start selfhosting, buy meshcore radios, punch nazis, publish photos of moss and cats and you're almost done with the initiation ritual

@po3mah
Pssst, don't tell her the secret arts yet!
@Katherinesalom

@troublewithwords @Katherinesalom

As noted, follow freely and unfollow freely.

My own addition is don't hesitate to Mute or Block people who are annoying you frequently. It is just avoiding people where interaction isn't making anyone's life better. It is not declaring them Unspeakable Monsters

Katherine Salom

1. Spend time on your Local feed. It’s the easiest and most direct way to see what the people around you are talking about or sharing.

2. Mastodon isn’t your only option, and you might find a different platform suites you better. Friendica, Catodon, Sharkey, Hometown, etc. all have different layouts and user experiences, while accessing the same people and content. Once you feel comfortable in the space, it’s worth looking at whether you want to engage with that space in different ways.

3. Follow hashtags.

4. There are other services on the network that operate very differently from Mastodon that are worth checking out for more focused usage. For instance, there’s a photo/image sharing platform called PixelFed that feels like Old Instagram. You can follow PixelFed accounts from Mastodon (or Catodon, or Friendica, or…), but it’s often better to engage with PixelFed via PixelFed. Then there’s BookWyrm, which is a GoodReads alternative, FunkWhale, which people use for sharing music and podcasts, Lemmy or PieFed, which are Reddit-like platforms, and NodeBB, which is a traditional bulletin board. All of these are on the same network, so you can get content from them, but they’re not necessarily best accessed from Mastodon.

@Katherinesalom

Welcome!

You've already gotten some great tips here, but I have one that no one else has mentioned yet (I think):

Comment on things that you like or that interest you. In the hierarchy of nice feedback, Comments > Boosts > Likes.

In other words, liking something is nice, but not terribly meaningful. Liking and Boosting has more of an impact, because you're passing the post or comment on to your followers as well. But if you Like, Boost AND comment, you're actually interacting with the original poster and anyone who's following that post–or has responded to it.

When I post something I'm much happier to get comments on it than just likes or boosts.

Oh, also: the culture of Mastodon in general is much more polite and kind than Twitter/X and Reddit. When I run across someone who's rude or hostile, I take a moment to remember that. And then I mute them permanently.

You can also mute people for a specific period of time. They won't know you muted them, but you won't see anything they write while they're muted. It's a good way to improve your Mastodon experience! We get people here fresh from other social media services, and some of them don't understand the culture here. We also get the occasional troll. It's best to mute or block them and move on. Personally I prefer to mute them permanently, because they way they can read my stuff without ever impinging on my awareness. Who knows? Maybe they'll learn something and become a better person.

Oh, one last thing: DMs (private mentions) here are NOT secure. They should be visible only to the designated recipient, but don't give anyone the password to your bank or anything like that! But of course that's just basic common sense these days.

Have fun!

Coming back to this, but I'd also suggest reading https://blog.djnavarro.net/posts/2022-11-03_what-i-know-about-mastodon/ @Katherinesalom

@Katherinesalom I found it took a bit of patience to get my feed both full and of what I wanted. Not every community is here, so follow widely. (For example, tablet weavers exist here but Facebook has way more of them.)

Some people boost amazing things, some people boost a bunch of stuff that’s upsetting or not what you want. You can turn off boosts for a person you follow. I follow enough people that I basically do this immediately after someone boosts more than a few uninteresting (to me) things.

@Katherinesalom

Two things:

There isn't any really good way to search as far as I can tell.

One aspect of the federated nature and lack of central control is that you won't see all toots that meet your criteria. You will see posts answering posts you can't see. Clicking on the three dots at the lower right and choosing "open original page" may help with that. But it may not.

@Katherinesalom

Things to consider in a few months if you are still here:

If you can afford it, kick in some money to whoever is running your instance.

There are settings to automatically delete your old posts after X months, unless they meet conditions Y. Doing this makes things easier for your instance provider.

Note that one of the points of the system here is to make it easy to change to another instance if you aren't happy with yours.

(Your instance is mstdn.social, by the way.)

@Katherinesalom

There is also a way to download all your old posts and stuff and archive them.