1/ I'm seeing a lot of talk (still!) of defederating mastodon.social over the recent spam attacks. I have a feeling I'm going to regret this, but as someone on that instance with no current plans to move, I feel like there are some things those who are considering it may not be taking into account. There are loads of patronizing comments that people on this instance are "doing the Fediverse wrong". No, we're not. You can't have a democracy while telling others their vote is wrong/doesn't count.
@AbandonedAmerica Agreed! I posted something similar a few days ago, pointing out the contrast between Mastodon's openness and the policing tone of some users.
It's legit to disagree with having the "official" mastodon app direct people to m.s. by default. I'm honestly not sure myself that's the best way to solve the (very real) issues with onboarding. But I've read folks saying it's good that onboarding isn't straightforward because that way only "smart" people can join and... wow, just wow.
This is really a difficult one, perhaps we need to make it clearer people can download all their data and then upload to a new instance and carry on. This is really important for a number of other reasons.
1. While interacting you may find an instance that better reflects your interests so decide to move
2. New users may want to explore and try things out first.
3. You may want to back up your data generally in case there is a problem with the server
4. You may be on a smaller instance, and get notification from the owner, that life has got in the way and they can't run the instance for much longer, so you then find a new instance and take content with you.
5. I think from a teaching digital skills to people who may not be confident with tech perspective, just suggesting people accept the default and sign them up, is probably easier for them to do, and easier for you to support.
