I’m mixed on her articles. Is she a journalist or is she just posting fediverse circle jerk on the fediverse? She writes well but feels like pretty much the same article every time
this post was submitted on 07 Mar 2025
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I'm actually a fan, but I get what you mean. I feel like she just writes what's on her mind, when she's writing for her named website. Her writing for The Index is a bit more by the books internet journalism.
And yeah I agree sharing this on here is a bit of a circle jerk, but articles like this get shared around in the mainstream and show people still captured by the big platforms another way. I've definitely emailed a couple of her articles around to friends, and I can't be the only one.
I liked her enough to follow on Mastodon so I’m with you there. Thanks for explaining that. I didn’t realize she had her own site and her own publication.
I didn’t mean just sharing here but she frequently writes on exactly this topic then shares to mastodon then here. Almost like all the HN posts sharing their own blogs about why blogging is good, lol. Which I still enjoy.
The fediverse won’t succeed just because it’s better. It will succeed if and only if people choose it.
Part of that is making it monetizable. Influencers can build huge followings (and make some cash) because existing platforms recommend their content to other users.
Mastodon devs have chosen not to provide recommendations and quote posts. That's reasonable, but it reduces the utility of the platform, and it cedes space to Twitter & co.
To my knowledge, the only creator that's exclusive to Lemmy is the unix surrealism author. Until it's easy to monetize content, we're gonna have a hard time attracting creators, and a hard time attracting users.
I'd rather have one unix surrealism than a thousand influencers with lots of followers. These days, I want to be among people who interact as equals, who share ideas, who cooperate in a genuine way. If we try a shortcut to more users through money, what is the point?
I want to be among people who interact as equals, who share ideas, who cooperate in a genuine way.
I think online journalism might be a good example of influencers and users interacting as equals. Users provide extra information, ask questions, reify, and help highlight where the journalist can focus. The journalist does the leg work to produce novel news.
If we try a shortcut to more users through money, what is the point?
To build an interesting, self sustaining network, where people can express themselves fully, and understand each other.
The features I'm suggesting would benefit everyone: a decent view of trending topics/posts/tags; mod-controlled tags; stuff like that. Most users would find them helpful, but a few could use it to build a livelihood that others value.
The journalist does the leg work to produce novel news.
Just to add that in addition to novelty, journalists provide valuable services, like
- holding up a mirror to the present culture
- documenting and disseminating happenings
- packaging up events into narratives
Not to say that you weren't including these in "novel news," but just to make it explicit.
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I feel like this is comparing the mall to the park.
They both attract people, but not always the same people, or for the same reasons. And that's OK.
I get what you're saying though, because I've felt this way when trying to come up with reasons for people (sole proprietors) to get with the fedi, but maybe this place is just not for influencers - not like the corp platforms, anyway. I think the fediverse will attract more and more people with its network effects, but probably never all of the people all of the time.
My modest hope is that the fedi bleeds the big platforms just enough to put them in their place and keep from enshittifying to infinity.
maybe this place is just not for influencers - not like the corp platforms, anyway
The things people need to build a livelihood on a platform are quality of life features. In a lot of cases, I think it's small stuff: being able to reward patrons with a tag on a specific community; automatically highlighting popular posts; making it easy to find a user's monetization page; etc.
I think the fediverse will attract more and more people with its network effects, but probably never all of the people all of the time.
At the moment, Lemmy is an ad-free version of Reddit missing some community and notification features. There are good political reasons to be here, but that hasn't driven a sustained increase in users.
So we won't get critical mass for network effects by being a better Reddit.
One to make the platform self-sustaining (or grow) is to give creators a reason to use the platform, which will give people a reason to come and stay.
It's not just ad-free, it's actively anti-corporate, anti-advertising, even anti-monetization. I would go so far as to say even anti-content in some ways. That's a cultural disconnect that goes beyond tooling.
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I am a hostage that has been set free from a prison camp. Thank you Fedi.
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Don't let the grabbing hands grab all they can.
Ho does one even use mastadon, it seems to require a login on every instance?
You navigate from your local instance. So like you just use hyperlinks (like here on lemmy, I'm clicking around, but my URL still shows slrpnk.net/... - yours probably shows sh.itjust.works/...), or if you try to do something like follow/reply/boost/etc on another instance, it'll prompt you to connect from your own.
So like here I'm looking at a post on mastodon.social, which I don't have an account on. If I just type in my home instance in the pop-up modal there, then it'll complete the action from my home instance. If you're already signed in on home instance with a cookie then it'll to it automatically.