@feditips I think this is fine. And if mastodon aims to be more centralized that's fine with me too.

These umbrella type plattforms dont go well with normies. Something similar to email providers is the future.

@feditips After a bad experience with a terrible mod, who nuked my last account without warning or explanation, I've temporarily joined mastodon.social so I can have reasonable confidence in rebuilding a following without fear of being shut down again, then potentially migrate the new account/following around the fedi.

I've also syndicated longer posts using Hubzilla, to which I've installed ActivityPub so it's interoperable with Masto. Nomadic identity, baby. Shut me down now! 😎

@feditips

That strikes me as a bad step and also going against the Federated idea. I thought the idea was a multiplicity of servers of different interests and textures.

This move seems definitely a desire for monopolization.

@feditips

I suspect @Gargron is trying to address the UX problems Mastodon has.

(And there are a lot of UX problems.)

I've been doing a lot of UX testing of various parts of the Fediverse (including Mastodon).

I think @Gargron has definitely (also) noticed one of the UX problems — having to choose a server causes many people to give up and abandon the sign up process.

...

Let me ask you this —

@feditips I think this is great for new users to start using Mastodon and as you can move later to another server at any time I don't think it is a danger. Just making onboarding easier

@feditips This UI is a classic example of a dark pattern.

@feditips Of all the *real* issues out there, people “maybe” signing up to one particular Mastodon instance instead of another is actually worth cold-sweating about?

@feditips The whole 'pick your server' has been one of the complaints to get non-tech people on board, so I very much welcome this.
You can still pick another server but at least to non-tech users have a clear way forward.

@feditips Hmm. I don't know. I agree with everything you say here about the need to avoid one server becoming too big, but at the same time the "pick a server, any server" stage at onboarding has proved to be too much of a hurdle for far too many non-techie users. Perhaps this really is the least worst workaround for that—make one server a "welcome" server and then let people move once they've got in and had a chance to get used to it?

@feditips There's also the moderation issue where some instances are "too big to fail" and you can't just defederate from them fully because too many people, including some friends, are there. So intentionally funnelling everyone there rather than trying to diffuse that as much as possible is not a good thing.

@feditips I think it’s designed to help the helpless who find the “pick a server” step to be too hard and bounce. It’s probably wise

@feditips I'm not technical but isn't this a flaw in Mastodon's basic functionality? It should be tweaked so that it has a tendency towards many smaller servers, that the disincentive to increase the size of a server gets exponentially stronger as the server grows.

@feditips Eugen literally said in one of his recent big interviews, that instance diversity is "historical" and he sees no alternative to default servers. Of course, his default servers.

When I read it, it was clear to me in which direction Mastodon is heading. The app is just the beginning.

Mastodon's decentralization is key to safeguarding free speech and preventing greedy centralization (which is what happens right in front of us now). Central servers can easily become susceptible to censorship, surveillance, and data abuse. By supporting Mastodon's diverse community of servers, we can ensure that power remains decentralized and accessible to all. Let's prioritize decentralization over greed!

#Mastodon

@feditips@mstdn.social
I did not come to Mastodon for a social media experience.
I came because I am interested in current events and up to the minute news.
If I am missing the point it is your point, not mine

@feditips

creating a single point of failure.

sad

@feditips it's a great way to reduce friction for less motivated new users, at the cost of one of the main benefits of the Mastodon ecosystem.

I wonder if a compromise could look like cycling through a different default general-interest server every app update

@feditips I quit twitter and joined here when Elon started messing with the CBC. I had/have no idea how this thing works and wouldn't know what picking a server means. The first time I heard Fediverse was about 3 days ago.

@feditips yeahhhhh i learned early on not to pick the 'biggest server' as a rule

@feditips mastodon.social had already been overloaded for years. Why do they keep pushing this?