John Oliver's Show covered what's happening with X/Twitter. How it's algorithms are designed to push right-wing content, and how people don't just get away with, but get paid for inciting violence and hate speech. His advice? Leave X.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7ZG_xWYLzI
Here's an idea I'm playing with: a semi-customizable fediverse invitation page.
Example: https://invite.jointhefediverse.net/?server=hachyderm.io&apps=1,2,3,5
More about the project: http://stefanbohacek.com/project/fediverse-invitation
RE: https://stefanbohacek.online/@stefan/116114454315002327
There are many great explainers for the fediverse, and they all fit different scenarios.
But the best way to invite someone to the fediverse is to tell them about a specific community that you think they should join.
My latest tool may help you do that.
John Oliver's Show covered what's happening with X/Twitter. How it's algorithms are designed to push right-wing content, and how people don't just get away with, but get paid for inciting violence and hate speech. His advice? Leave X.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7ZG_xWYLzI
Tomorrow, members of our team will be in Montreal, Canada for FediMTL! 🇨🇦
@saskia will be giving a talk on the Newsmast Foundation's work to grow the Social Web and provide digital space for communities and organisations. Especially our friends in Quebec, who we've partnered with to bring a dedicated @qlub app!
If you're in the area, we'd love to see you there 🧡
Learn more about FediMTL here: https://fedimtl.ca/
And Build 92 of #FediReader is out featuring a major overhaul to the #iPadOS app as well as some updates to the list picker
Check it out at:
https://testflight.apple.com/join/tFmh7dw4
#Developer #SocialWeb #IndieApps #SocialMedia #BuildInPublic #SwiftLang # Mastodon #Apple #iOS
And Build 92 of #FediReader is out featuring a major overhaul to the #iPadOS app as well as some updates to the list picker
Check it out at:
https://testflight.apple.com/join/tFmh7dw4
#Developer #SocialWeb #IndieApps #SocialMedia #BuildInPublic #SwiftLang # Mastodon #Apple #iOS
Working on the iPadOS version of #FediReader tonight, coming soon to an iPad near you
#SocialWeb #BuildInPublic #Developer #Mastodon #SocialMedia #IndieApps
Shoshana Zuboff (Harvard) who coined the term 'surveillance capitalism' (having now produced a documentary on the social media encouraged suicide of Molly Russell), thinks the only solution to the problem of social media's malign influence is an outright ban.
This seems unlikely to be politically possible or even practical now, but it does do is require us to be clear why its impossible & how effective regulation might modify the logic of Zuboff's demand?
#SocialMedia #regulation
h/t Obseever
Working on the iPadOS version of #FediReader tonight, coming soon to an iPad near you
#SocialWeb #BuildInPublic #Developer #Mastodon #SocialMedia #IndieApps
@Mastodon is changing course when it comes to how people join the platform. In late 2022, the team decided to send sign-ups directly to their server in order to make onboarding more straightforward. But that didn't align with the promise of decentralization. Here, Community Director @haubles explains the new approach to server recommendation, along with some other ways Mastodon is helping build community.
#Mastodon #SocialMedia #Decentralization #ActivityPub #Community #Technology #Tech
What you working on there?
#Plushtodon is here to keep me motivated on a Friday afternoon. 💜🐘
What you working on there?
#Plushtodon is here to keep me motivated on a Friday afternoon. 💜🐘
While I'm no longer active in many commercial #SocialMedia platforms, as a #science communicator I still keep an eye on them to see how people (mis)understand #astronomy, and incorporate those lessons to my job.
Today Facebook crushed my soul with this abomination.
A while ago I wrote this article explaining how to spot fake #astrophotography images using science:
https://www.eso.org/public/blog/csi-astronomy/
That article has now been superseded by "this is fake because <waves hands angrily in despair>"
The Mastodon team is introducing https://help.joinmastodon.org, a "place where people can learn how to use Mastodon’s software [and] more information about participating on mastodon.social in a healthy, safe, and accessible way".
More on the official blog: https://blog.joinmastodon.org/2026/02/mastodon-is-for-the-people/
@smallcircles @deadsuperhero I've quietly been borrowing ideas from AT Protocol for ActivityPub:
- declaring moderation actors
- supporting content labels (first party abd third party)
- looking at how custom feeds, DIDs and other tech may translate across
I was looking at #ForgeFed which is a very sizable #ActivityPub extension (constituting the "Code forge" app domain in app-centric view, but arguably "Software development" top-level business domain in a service-oriented fedi).
The way that things are modeled here adheres more to the actor model where there's a Factory actor, which in turn creates resource actors that expose various sub-domains. For instance for the management of Issues and PR's there's a TicketTracker actor to obtain via a Factory actor on a forge instance. Though I'm not sure whether I'd modeled that in similar fashion, it is a fascinating direction where we focus much more on good protocol extension design.
All in all AS/AP offers a very granular foundation that allows for very interesting architectures, if only we dare explore them and do not dogmatically stick to some engrained notion how "social media" ought to be. I see #SocialMedia as but a small subset of #SocialNetworking.
The UK Govt. hopes to pass legislation requiring social media platforms to take down abusive images once they have been reported within 48 hours, or face a fine fo 10% of global revenue.
This will come up against issues of process & feasibility, but may be an alternative to the now much criticised plan for a blanket under-16s social media ban?
Its clear that Grok's image scandal has (finally) galvanised a political response to big tech's hands-off attitude to such abuse.
#SocialMedia
h/t FT
Blacksky went from a "custom feed that created a sense of shared space" to being the first independent ATProto microblogging community outside of Bluesky.
This is where the focus needs to be in the fediverse as well. Creating safe and welcoming communities that people want to be part of.
#YEG Still want to get a PRINT copy of Move Slowly and Build Bridges: #Mastodon, The #Fediverse, and the Struggle for #Democratic #SocialMedia by @rwg
Copies are available at the #MacEwanUniversity Bookstore (https://www.macewanbookstore.com/t-contactus.aspx) BUT they are closed until February 20.
Judge Carolyn B. Kuhl at today's hearing over social media’s alleged harms to children:
"If your glasses are recording, you must take them off. It is the order of this court that there must be no facial recognition of the jury. If you have done that, you must delete it. This is very serious."
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2026-02-18/mark-zuckerberg-tesimony-la-social-media-trial
#news #USNews #technology #TechNews #meta #SocialMedia #MetaGlasses #AI
Judge Carolyn B. Kuhl at today's hearing over social media’s alleged harms to children:
"If your glasses are recording, you must take them off. It is the order of this court that there must be no facial recognition of the jury. If you have done that, you must delete it. This is very serious."
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2026-02-18/mark-zuckerberg-tesimony-la-social-media-trial
#news #USNews #technology #TechNews #meta #SocialMedia #MetaGlasses #AI
