@feditips
I've seen this 50-volume 200-pound bible before. I choose not to read War and Peace for the same reason.

@feditips
In the 1990s I worked on computers running the UNIX OS back when we searched for text using "grep". The Mastodon hashtag search is very reminiscent. Wish we had a 2020s social platform employing tools that remember personal preferences and anticipate personal needs. I'm not a sw designer anymore, but I bet there are smart people out there who could do it.

@feditips
Don't assume we know what you mean. The word "embed" probably has history among Masto devs, but for us newbies it could mean anything from "attach" to "function" to "join a military group as a war journalist".

@feditips didn't work for Firefox. The button is disabled and Download link downloads a file that fails when I open it.

@feditips @news

I love how admins promote Masto (& my comments):

Masto uses an open API for its servers, which means that anyone can write an app
(even teen hackers!)

The easiest way to find out whether it works is to download a free Masto app and try signing in
(test it yourself, we didn't bother!)

It should be noted that Masto developers don’t officially support this
(good luck sucker!)

if it stops working check with the maintainers of your Fediverse platform
(like you know who that is!)

@feditips
Still seems way too hard. For example, finding someone interesting to follow is a 10 step process to drill down into categories, look at each person's description, select Follow, and log into their Mastodon site (which regularly errors out). Twitter and other social sites suggest new people based on user activity -- one click and you're following.

@Gargron
Who is "we"? That seems to be the core issue with Mastodon, no one is in charge. So how do improvements get into the software? Who decides? I've seen a site for suggestions, but it expects the person suggesting to be an experienced Mastodon developer / tester.

@feditips
I asked my provider for a simple Mastodon follow image that I could place on my webpage, and they had no idea what I was talking about! If only Mastodon had a PR unit. Alas, there seems to be no org to turn to.

@Mastodon does "quote post" mean that we can repost someone else's post adding our own comment, Twitter style?

@feditips that's the clearest post yet from a Mastodon admin!

@feditips clear as mud. Each time I've tried to access content on some other instance I'm asked to login. And it won't accept my credentials.

@feditips now trim it down to a single page and you're there! Of course, simple documentation requires an intuitive UX, so a bit of dev work still to do.

@feditips recognize that each time you widen the landscape, you increase confusion. The whole value of joinmastodon is that a single point of entry assures newcomers they've gone to the right place. For example, you wouldn't want multiple web addresses to apply for social security, right? When you go to ssa.gov, you're quickly assured you've gone to the right place. Far better, IMO, to secure the system against attack!