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@_elena i use the fediverse because it has more #Social_Logics than corporate media and networks.
foundation of common ground is not profit but interest and trust. .. and with this aspect fediverse is more suitable for human InterAction .
... side-factor: there are no ads ..

@_elena Ici, tu es un être humain, pas un produit dont il faut tirer le plus de profit possible.

@_elena I love that it's both local and global for me. The instance I'm on makes it feel very local (because I chose one by location rather than interests), but I follow foreigners and hastags, and get a global feel too.
Additionally, I love that my timeline is not an endless scroll. I can always go on reading either the global timeline, or more chatty people I have in lists, but there's a natural "stop" if I try to use "check mastodon" as a nervous tick or procrastination button.

@_elena This is awesome! Thank you for speaking for us!

@_elena
On the Fediverse i see the things I CHOSE to see, and not what the ALGORITHM FORCED ME to see.

@_elena Facebook and Twitter tried to build social networks for the entire world. But they demonstrated that it's impossible to define rules that work for everyone and all situations. The solution is to have many communities, each with its own rules and norms, let people choose the community that best fits, and give users the power to communicate to people in other communities.

@_elena

I was about to write mine when this came across my timeline, almost exactly what I was going to toot.

https://wandering.shop/@realtegan/116365146237067187

@_elena je vais pas mal répété ce qui a été dit j'pense :
Je préfère ici parce que l'environnement de scrollingl'air bien plus... "choisi"
Enfin, on a le contrôle sur ce qu'on veut voir. Si je veux pas de... je sais pas moi... de vache (pardon les vaches, c'est juste un exemple 🤷🏻) dans ma TL, je choisis tout simplement de pas suivre des gens qui en parle. Ou de masquer les mots-clés liés. Et ça fonctionne !
Tandis que les grosses plate-formes nous imposent beaucoup de choses. On peut bloquer des gens qui parlent de vaches à tour de bras, on continue encore d'en voir beaucoup.
Aussi on est + proche des "chef" des instances, et on peut discuter -

1/?

@_elena alas my French is very rudimentary these days.

In an age where most social media sites implement algorithms to control what we see based on the whims of tech billionaires, and people are encouraged to chase popularity and influence, the Fediverse frees us from those algorithmic barriers and allows us to find true human connections and build supportive communities, while giving individuals greater ownership and control of their data.

I suspect others could write it more eloquently!

@_elena no built-in surveillance or tracking, no ads, no algorithms.

@_elena Parce que je peux voir les vies de vraies personnes, éparpillées au hasard dans mon fil, et non ce que l'algorithme essaie de m'imposer ce jour-là. Parce que Mastodon ne cherche pas à pomper mes données pour les revendre à des courtiers peu scrupuleux dans des pays du tiers-monde comme les États-Unis. Parce que les gens se passionnent vraiment pour la mousse, les fenêtres et les vieilles technologies informatiques. Parce que c'est humain, bordélique et aléatoire, et non pas sélectionné pour moi par un système à la Big Brother appartenant à des milliardaires ou à des investisseurs en capital-risque.

@_elena I think the fediverse is special because it's got that old-internet vibe.

@_elena

Chère Elena,

je préfère le Fediverse parce qu'il est cool, important et progressif. Et parce que je veux éviter tous ces idiots sur les grandes plateformes:)

Bien des salutations de Berlin,
Elke

@_elena The instance you join largely defines your experience here as they each have their own flavour and differing levels of moderation (some more, some less). You can try different ones until you get a good fit.
I'm lucky that I landed on one that works well for me - they block servers with worrisome content, I can see posts from thousands of other instances, it has a very large character/word limit for posts, and attracts a lot of people with overlapping interests.
Mastodon doesn't work as smoothly as as big name social media platforms. But if you get confused and post a question, people jump in with advice and tips. There is a bit of a learning curve (as every new endeavour has), and the people who stick with it don't mind that.
There are also volunteers who offer help and it's worth following them as they often post tips.
The volunteer culture throughout Mastodon and the Fediverse is what makes it all a great experience.
I've found a great community here. As a science writer, I've encountered and conversed with people with all sorts of expertise in sci-med-tech -- and have found leads for multiple stories I've written. Also, lots of artists who post wonderful artwork and photos. And, other writers.
Once you learn to do things like use hashtags and follow hashtags, you can 'find your people'. There are also directories out there to help you find instances to join that focus on an area of interest. Switching to another instance is easy too.

@_elena The fedi is truly neighbors meeting neighbors: by geography, interest, need, cats or moss. It’s what the internet felt like when it started reaching people via modems before everything became a place for large companies to plaster with ads.

@_elena I just don't get the rage from it like I do with Meta products.
I've been so angry for so long.
Fedi is much calmer, chill, easy to nope out if things do get a bit weird in a way you don't like (just mute that conversation, mute someone for a period, or forever, or block, lots of options!)

Conversation is meaningful.
It's random, niche and nerdy.
Whatever your special interest, you can find it, if you look - there is no algorithm hiding things from us or presenting us with things we should apparently love/hate.

It's so much more.. Real. It's not sanitised or exaggerated for reach and clicks. People just put themselves out there for whatever reason. It's more like when the internet was better (granted not for every marginalised group but nowhere has achieved that yet - we can keep trying!)

And overall it's got more good things like: anti-AI sentiment and critique, no quarter for fascists etc. Again not perfect but, a definite improvement over for-profit socials where you and your life are the product. No one is a preiuxt product here. Just people!

@_elena People are simply just more friendly here on Mastodon. And the absence of algorithms is for me how the internet should be.

@_elena

@_elena what I like about it is that holds within it a precious gem, something you cannot put a price on. The promise of a better world. A hope for the future. It has idealism and the promise of world where we all partake as equals. A public democratic space.

Pur trop je ne peut pas exprimer ça en français (encore).

@_elena well, I've met someone really cool who went twice on a modern art exhibition to get a plushie for my kid on the fediverse.
No algorithms could have done that better than the human chain that brought my desperate call in the big internet void to this amazing person 🥰
Thanks the fediverse !

@_elena Bonjour Elena, voici mon témoignage si cela peut t'aider : https://docs.federated.nexus/docs/55bd75b6-f9c6-4c72-ac33-14dcb9c41c3c/

@_elena ...because we don't suffer the advertising incentives that built the modern internet into a caricature of humanity.

Thanks to the dampening of that, humans can have real interactions in the fediverse. We are all imperfect, but our imperfections are our own rather than magnified and marketed.

We are allowed to be as whole as we can be without some marketing department telling us we are defective in a way that they magically have a product or service for...

@_elena Commercial social media platforms are built for ‘influencer’ engagement and sponsored content - the fedi is not. It’s lack of an global algorithmic feed and global moderation make this type extremely of high-engagement content difficult to achieve. Additionally, the lack of an algorithm ensures even smaller accounts have equal voice to larger ones. This comes at the cost of users having to strictly curate their own feeds through follow requests, instead of passively accepting an algorithmicly generated feed. For people used to other platforms, this model can feel burdensome, initially.

Generally speaking, it is misleading to try to compare the fedi to other social media platforms, like Bsky, X, Threads, etc. These latter platforms are singular in operations, ownership, and moderation. The fedi is best understood as a confederation of different communities (which we call instances). Each community has it’s own unique characteristics, culture, and moderation policies. No community is forced to interact with another but must come to a generalized, and understood, social contract, or face consequences of being ‘defederated’ by one or multiple instances (see various fediblock dramas). While this may create – what appears as a – hodgepodge of content restrictions or moderation policies, it is – in fact – the single most scalable and democratic model for moderation possible. This model does not rely on the exponential growth of a large centralized team or the implementation of questionable AI moderation bots, but requires merely that every new and ongoing instance abide by a general social agreement to participate within the larger fedi community.

@_elena Le Fédivers construit des ponts — entre les humains. Ici, je ne suis ni un utilisateur, ni un point de données, ni une cible marketing. Je suis simplement moi. Et le Fédivers n’a pas été conçu pour le profit, mais pour nous.

It's hard m there's so much good to say about the fediverse...

@_elena the Fediverse allows me to choose what I will see (and why). It feels like a more natural way of social networking than the other platforms.

@_elena

La porte de la Fediverse, c'est une communauté bien à soi, que l'on peut s'approprier à sa façon et selon ses propres besoins sans en déléguer le contrôle à autrui, tout en restant connecté aux autres communautés et à leurs membres, dans le respect des valeurs et des besoins de chacunes et chacuns.

@_elena Le Fediverse est le dernier coin de tranquillité, imperméable au marketing dans un Internet rendu inhospitalier par les Big Tech.

Ce sont nos potagers qu’on cultive et où on se détend entre voisins, là où le reste de la ville est pollué par les publicités et manipulations de Meta et consorts.

@_elena what makes fedi special is that it helped me to move away from my big social addiction and showed me that a social media system without ads and algorithm is possible.

@_elena My biggest plus: No Algorithm. That is the main reason why we have really good content here!

@_elena Mastodon is unique because it doesn't sell me anything or prevent me from seeing what I've asked it to show me. If I see advertising, it's for real things, posted by their creators, who are people I have chosen to follow, or that they have chosen to follow. Mastodon lets me build trust with others in a way other platforms no longer do.

@_elena

The Fediverse is a great place to learn about queer identities and anti-capitalism stuff that the super rich don’t want you to know about.

Plus it’s a pretty solid dating app.

@_elena

it's #DemocracyOfReach.

freedom of speech is not enough if the wealthy determine who gets attention. decentralized social media can displace them, allowing the public to collectively decide what information, ideas and art goes viral. based purely on human boosts. no owners, no algos, no ads. that's the revolutionary potential here. while there's other ways to find and participate in community and be entertained, nothing else can do this. nothing else can so empower all the people.

@_elena pendant un certain temps j'avais twitter et mastodon en parallele.
Tandis que sur twitter il y avait des centaines de messages dans mon flux, je passais que 10 minutes par jour dessus.
Sur mastodon, il a avait très peu de messages. Et je passais 2 heures par jour dessus.
Le contenu est vachement plus interessant sur le fediverse.

@_elena J'aime le fédivers parce qu'il est conçu pour faire profiter des communautés en tous genres, qu'elles soient thématiques, créatives, régionales, etc. Par opposition les grands réseaux commerciaux ont pour seul but de monétariser chacun de mes clics en nourissant leurs algos optimisés pour le ragebait, le clickbait, l'addiction, la manipulation, la propagande, etc.

Humain vs. inhumain.

@_elena tagging @firesidefedi as I'm sure he'll have something nice to say too! Good luck!!

@_elena

It's the trust that I have in the Fediverse. The trust that, even if individual instances come and go, the Fediverse will remain - and so will my presence here. And that it will only get better over time, instead of worse.

I put a lot of time and effort into Google+, but then it was gone. Then I put a lot of time and effort into Twitter, but then it was bought my Elon Musk. With the Fediverse, I don't have to fear any rug pull, and that does _woners_ for my peace of mind.

@_elena

I appreciate this platform. I don’t need to be fed by an algorithm. I want organic real people. When one asks a question or advice here they get real answers, from truly kind people wanting to assist you. This has become a novelty on other platforms. Here on the Fediverse it is the norm, not the exception. Plus there are some really smart, funny and compassionate people here. It’s fun, we all need fun.

@_elena when I was on commercial social media I felt like I was drowning. On fedi I can breathe.

@_elena What makes the fediverse special to me comes down to a few core differences from corporate social platforms.

First, control. On the fediverse, I decide what I see and what I don’t. Corporate platforms are built around engagement algorithms designed to keep you scrolling, clicking, and reacting. That usually means being shown whatever is most likely to provoke a response — often outrage, conflict, or sensational content. Advertising is also baked into that model, because those platforms exist primarily to generate revenue.

The fediverse works differently. There’s no global engagement algorithm deciding what deserves your attention. Instead, you follow people, hashtags, or communities you actually care about. That alone changes the experience dramatically. You're not being pushed toward content designed to manipulate your attention — you're choosing your environment.

That leads directly to the second reason: the tone and atmosphere. When I use the fediverse, I’m not stepping into a constant stream of negativity. If I make a post, the people who see it are usually those who chose to follow me or share similar interests. That tends to produce more thoughtful, constructive, and positive interactions. Likewise, what I read is content I intentionally opted into, which creates a healthier and more welcoming social space overall.

Finally, ownership and autonomy. On the fediverse, no single corporation owns your voice. Your posts aren’t controlled by a company, a billionaire, or a centralized platform. Your instance may have moderation policies, but your content ultimately belongs to you. Privacy is also built into the structure itself. If you post to followers-only, only your followers see it. If you post directly, only the mentioned people see it. That behavior isn’t an afterthought — it’s part of how the system was designed from the start.

Ultimately, the fediverse is built by users, for users. It isn’t controlled by a single entity, and that decentralization creates something rare: a social space shaped by communities instead of profit motives. That’s what makes it special.

@_elena

@_elena The Fediverse is regularly an inspiring alternative vision. I draw on it constantly as a reminder that we are the ones build who build these systems and we can build better systems that reflect different values and priorities besides extraction and capitalization and algorithmic injustice.

I’ll be using the Fediverse as an example in an upcoming keynote that’s on ethics and hope and metamodernism. I look forward to seeing what you speak on once you’re able to share.

@_elena privacy and independence, no big tech companies controlling what we say , and no misinformation like Facebook.

@_elena Cher Président Macron, pourquoi êtes-vous encore sur X et toujours pas présent sur le Fediverse ? Quittez X et laissez le aux trolls et aux extrémistes. Rejoignez nous sur le Fedivers, le réseau social européen, souverain et démocratique.

#LeaveX

@_elena
I left Twitter, expecting to find a similar experience on Mastodon. But what i found instead was community.

I'm brought back to the ways of the old internet, where humans matter and interactions are not fueled by algorithms, but curiosity.

@_elena Le fédiverse est pour tout qui respect les droits des autres.

@_elena Je pense savoir dans quel cadre tu interviens et je regrette infiniment ne pas pouvoir être disponible. Je me suis manifestée pour obtenir l'enregistrement.
J'ai hâte, mais vraiment hâte de voir ta présentation !

@_elena The ability to:

Filter my feed using keywords. Every platform needs this.

Cater my own feed to something meaningful and manageable instead of being at the whims of the slop algorithm.

The lack of ads and there being no incentives for them or any enshitification to be added in.

I can decide exactly what notifications I want or don't want, instead of having to choose between none or too many.

The privacy options are much stronger here than every other social media or content platform.