We are excited to share that we are beginning work on a new onboarding experiment for #Mastodon: Default Server Recommendations.
Our intent for this experiment is to recommend the closest server geographically that is in the correct language during the sign-up flow. We will be running this experiment on our iOS and Android apps only to start.
1/6
@Mastodon > 1/6
pathetic
@Mastodon
Great that the recommendation is no longer for a specialised topic server.
The fediverse is about avoiding the problems of centralisation. Having centralised topic servers has already resulted in much fedi-infighting.
I have several special interests. But its nonsensical to need multiple accounts. Resulting in topics most people are excluded from because they are not a member of that club. And those topics are watered down with other topic or non topic posts.
This is all because Mastodon doesn't yet have Federated groups, where 'anyone' can join. Where topic posts stay within those groups.
@Mastodon that's a great step forward! ❤️
@Mastodon I hope the servers can handle the load :)
@Mastodon it sounds like a good idea but more than geographic distance, keys server themes and rules are the determining factors for selecting a server IMO.
@Mastodon I want to continue access to German accounts to practice my German language skills.
This sounds like a really good way to get regionally organized.
It could add tremendously to civilians getting organized.
The Fediverse as Civil OS.
Way to go!
@Mastodon remember many of us speak more than one language...
@meadmin Qlub comme serveur recommandé? 👀
@Mastodon really good idea, more diversity!
@Mastodon just make sure to check the servers *before* recommending, just because the language is the correct doesn't mean the server is properly run
@Mastodon this would be great for some of the smaller indigenous communities here that might be experimenting with creating their own servers. The people I’ve spoken to up here about the fediverse were most excited by the idea of easy ways for minority language groups to create their own social spaces online.
@Mastodon hype, this is a great idea! Looking forward to this- also it would be cool to see this with other apps too
@Mastodon this is great and will improve the user experience so much. Well done 👏
@Mastodon Consider that many may prefer non-local servers. I sure wouldn’t want an American server.
Onboarding seems to be the barrier to Mastodon's growth and success. The whole Active ecosystem is a bit foreign to general users and needs more work.
☝️ check out the thread, admins:
cc.
@chm
@admin@mastodon.nu
@trumpet
@hugo
@xaphanpl
@admin@paktodon.asia
@tc
@xrobau
@team
@sysadmin
@amministratore
@mastodonie
@maop
@kenobit
@chief
@support
@admin@piaille.fr
@valvoja
@henri
@saustrup
@donelias
@admini
@spla
@announcements
@mike@thecanadian.social
@admin@mastodon.com.br
@adrian
@xrobau
@aussocialadmin
@mike@chinwag.org
@Mastodon
just remember that "the correct language" is just a guess and may be wrong. Plus, for many users there may be 2, 3, or more "correct languages".
@Mastodon Very good. Sometimes one got the impression that Fediverse was finished, but it reads as if we have started something whose future is yet to come.
@Mastodon What would be great is to be able to see more than one server in the app, merged into a single feed...
Would you please like to focus your attention on the issue of encryption, please. Currently you are building a network with servers that do not encrypt user data and do not offer e2ee for private messages. This will explode into a gigantic privacy catastrophe when Mastodon will get it´s endless November, so these heavy design issues must be solved before that.
@Mastodon I hope international boundaries will be taken into consideration. Many mobile apps (such as dating apps) use geographical proximity, and it’s not helpful where I live, as preference is given to a rather hostile neighbouring country over the nearest cities in my own country.
@Mastodon Можно выпустить в тг подарок , который можно будет получить при подтверждении ак ,в мастодонте .
Хотя не знаю почему ещё не выпустили свою же крипту, 🤔
You can issue a gift in tg , which can be received upon confirmation of the ak , in mastodon .
Although I don't know why they haven't released their own crypt yet,
@Mastodon Awesome! The other issue is “filling up the feed”, right? Bluesky’s feeds to follow are nice, but we got hashtags here. Maybe when people sign up, you also give them a nice (and attractively presented) list of hashtags to follow???
LEAN IN on that old school spirit and people feeds will fill up right away!!!
"We will be running this experiment on our iOS and Android apps only to start."
And here is the core symptom of the core problem itself:
You're pointing the question and its solution right back at the Deathstar Mothership itself: @Mastodon dot Social
Sort of a recursive, self-fulfilling loop, no?
But not the least bit surprising
@FinchHaven @Mastodon this is literally official mastodon profile. Is this really shocking they are on mastodon.social?
@Mastodon ideally combined with personal interests, right? (as long as there are enough servers to choose from) 😎🌈👩💻🌳
@sunnythesheep @Mastodon for this experiment we are looking to partner with general-purpose servers. But this is just one experiment, not the only experiment! We’ll be looking at how we can help with special-interest server discovery soon.
you might also wish to ask the user about legal jurisdiction
the German and similar jurisdictions can be unreasonably and surprisingly problematic
Fabulous news. Any movement away from mastodon . social (risk of centralization, and plenty of other issues) is progress
HT @FediTips
https://social.growyourown.services/@FediTips/115894771542915681
@FediTips you should boost this to the admins of servers you have recommended on http://fedi.garden
I've posted about this on my other account @homegrown which is for people who run their own servers, and boosted it on here to get it a bit more visible. Hopefully that gets the word out to admins 🙂
@Mastodon good idea!
"Correct language": Does it mean the favourite language that people choose individually in their preferences (but for which they need an instance) or official language of a country/region? Asking for all the multi-language migrants, bilingual regions, and foreign-language prefering people.
@Mastodon Excellente idée
(The reason we’re starting with the apps and not the web is because the necessary data to run this experiment is already provided through the app store. It is more complicated to do this right for the web, and we want to think carefully about how to do this in a way that respects privacy.)
2/6
@Mastodon How to tell the Apple App Store and Google Play Store provide a lot of privacy information about a user without saying that the App Store and Play Store provide a lot of privacy information about a user.
@Mastodon
Good point! Just in case your team hasn't thought of this yet, I'd like to share an idea.
On the pricing page of my hobby project (link in my bio), I wanted to show the prices of the "correct" country. But I wanted to ensure that I don't get to know the result if someone is just visiting.
But sending the user's IP address to a third party geolocation service is not legally possible without first asking for consent.
Here's my solution: the web page contacts a tiny endpoint on my server that returns the IPv4 address it sees, but doesn't log it. Then the country lookup happens client-side via a geo-IP database file that the web page has loaded into the browser cache earlier. As the web server itself also doesn't log, I don't have any data on visitors (unless they become customers). 🎉
In the next step, you could list all languages of servers in that country, starting with the most common ones spoken there (e.g. for Switzerland: DE, FR, IT, RM) & let them choose.
The experiment will be designed to ensure that server admins remain in control: meaning they will have the power opt-in and opt-out as needed, or reduce the percentage of sign-ups flowing their way.
3/6
Starting now, we’re recruiting general purpose servers with open sign-ups. To be eligible, servers must:
- Run default Mastodon (for now)
- Agree to the Server Covenant
- Have existed for 1+ year
- Have shut-down & disaster plans
4/6
@Mastodon Not even "Open Registration"?
@Mastodon Looks good. Only the open sign-up requirement will result in more overall spam. So hopefully you will take more action regarding this.
@Mastodon So no Glitch instances at this point?
@Mastodon does "open sign-up" include required approval for sign-ups as well?
@Mastodon Having open signups is so risky and makes moderation so much harder for the rest of the fediverse. This is a bad idea. You should require closed signups to prevent spam and harassment. Right now mastodon.social already creates so much extra work for moderators due to this policy. Having this policy says to bad actors: you're allowed to come here and hurt others for at least a little bit. It's such low hanging fruit...
@Mastodon Open sign-ups? Won't we just get spam from more servers? (Most of our reports are of mastodon.social accounts for this reason).
@Matt_Noyes
Yeah, if by open sign-ups they mean you can sign up without admin approval, then this requirement is either hilariously stupid or purposely crafted so that they can exclude most, if not all, other servers except mastodon.social and then just return to the current status quo.
I'd so much like to apply Hanlon's on this, but given how long it took them to start working on this...
@Mastodon
@Mastodon besides geographical location, are there going to be any filters for like, interests or core topics etc?
A gardening and plant instance is going to have a different vibe from the software/hardware developer instance, etc.
It would be a neat to be a part of this, but only if relevant users/signups are being directed.
@colinstu it says "general purpose servers". So no special interests servers or topical servers are gonna be able to participate in this feature (at the moment).
@Mastodon This is a link to the server covenant:
https://joinmastodon.org/covenant
One important question – and one we’ve discussed together – is which definition of antisemitism are you going with? I’d appreciate it if you could state the decision you’ve reached on this publicly. Crucially, is it one that conflates opposition to Zionism, Israel, and the ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people with being bigoted against Jewish people or not? This is key in knowing whether only Zionist, pro-Israel, pro-genocide Mastodon servers will be featured in recommendations or not.
I feel like by asking this question you're — inadvertently — legitimizing zionism by implying that the conflation of antisemitism with antizionism is a credible definition of that word.
Personally, I assume that antisemitism means antisemitism unless I have reason to believe otherwise.
@potatoes_fall It’s not a credible definition of the word but it is a *legally accepted* one in certain jurisdictions and it is essential that we know what is meant – in this specific context – by a term that is so widely and so willfully misunderstood so we understand what exactly the effects of this initiative will be and whether we should be in support of it or in opposition to it.
@Mastodon do you mean entirely open sign-ups (i.e. prone to spam accounts) or accepting sign-ups that get manually approved by a human? 
For this experiment, that is correct. We are looking to partner with servers that have open sign-ups. But we've heard the feedback that spam is going to be a big issue for many servers to participate, so our team is going to discuss what we can do about that next week.
@haubles @OctaviaConAmore @Mastodon
Thanks for clarifying.
As it stands any participating server would be paying a price for inclusion.
I'm not ever sure how many reputable general purpose servers still have open sign-up after recent spam waves.
As a volunteer, eyeballing potential member applications while not attending to one's own business is the only way to do it.
If you’re interested in participating in this experiment, please let us know by filling out this form.
(sorry it’s in Google docs)
https://forms.gle/7uRui5VnMPfEYAgq8
5/6
@Mastodon Boooo Google forms. A big failure to choose this.
@Mastodon please do not apologise for using a good free tool while it's free lol
@jippi er expressional.social også med her?
@Mastodon can we have something like a quota? Not to overflow a small instance?
@Mastodon Please switch from G***** docs or give us an alternative.
@Mastodon Since you say Sorry it's in google docs, why don't use other tools?
@Mastodon we could deal with the form being on Google, but it requires a Google account to fill it, which our instance admin doesn't have. I'm pretty sure this is configurable
@stux I bet they were just waiting for you haha
@mainz_sozial_digital könnte interessant sein?
@Mastodon google docs wtf?!... switch asap to Cryptpad comrades for stuff like this
@Mastodon
Cool that you crowdsource.
But no need to use g forms and then apologize for it.
I like to use https://framaforms.org/
@sebzuen @Mastodon
Not heard of Framaforms. I was going to suggest using https://cryptpad.fr/ which also has a forms offering.
The Default Server Recommendations experiment is a first step in reimagining how Mastodon onboarding & server discovery work.
Our team’s intent is to work with the community to build new onboarding pathways that support the entire network.
We can’t wait to get started 💜
6/6
@Mastodon Question: why go geographical? I personally would rather be funnelled into a server by theme.
@Mastodon I presume by "default Mastodon", you mean that if a server has so much as changed the max characters per post from the default 500, they won't be eligible?
Otherwise, I think this is a fantastic idea!
@Mastodon I’d be interested if it didn’t require open reg. Reality is, opening up registration creates a massive headache. I’d like to see us get a trial signup mode where someone can join still use the service but be in a read only state until approved. Would solve the drop off problem registration reasons cause.
@Mastodon I suggest a rule:
That the number of servers that defederate this specific server in her language is low.
To prevent toxic server.
@Mastodon
How about also interest based?
There are some for special interests
Like punkstodon.de for punk music, metalhead.club for metal heads, infosec.exchange for tech security interested people and so on.
So just the region is maybe too less?
At least it's something to be considered after the first iteration
@Mastodon It sounds really good, especially to avoid overcrowd Mastodon official servers and strengthen the Fediverse philosophy!
@Mastodon It's amazing seeing these sorts of things play out across the Fediverse. Making sure we make a better internet that is centered around Privacy and staying decentralized for all.
Keep up the good work and can't wait to see where we all are in several years to come.
@Mastodon
Interesting experiment!
Before I fill in the form:
Is there anything in particular that should be done or followed-up server/admin side for this?
Sounds like a really good idea. I am very excited to see the first results.
@Mastodon Really great news 😍
