F.A.Q. - Frequently Asked Questions: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 06:05, 5 November 2022

	This article is a draft! A lot of info might still be missing and the page might change at any time.

This is the protocol of a (series of) workshop(s) held by @PaulaToThePeople for Fediverse beginners, especially those who came to Mastodon after Musk bought Twitter.

_TOC_

   you can search using topics, results can be accounts, hashtags or posts

What is Mastodon?

Mastodon is a free software mictoblogging project, so similar to Twitter, with some features that are the same and some different features.
It is decentral/federated and part of the Fediverse (see below).

When you just created an account you'll see the basic interface with an empty home timeline. You'll have to fill it by following people.
To follow someone from a different instance you'll probably need to enter their full handle (username@instance.tld) or their profile's url in the search field.

In the Settings you can change some things about Mastodon's look and feel. For example you can switch to the advanced interface where you can have many columns.
You can for example search for a hashtag and then pin that column to the screen be clicking in the top right corner.
If you have too many columns, they won't fit on the screen and you will have to zoom out.

You can create lists of people, e.g. people who's posts you don't want to miss, and also pin that list as a column.

The home timeline shows posts by accounts you follow and boosts by those accounts. It will look the same no matter if they have a Mastodon account or use a different Fediverse service.
The local timeline just shows posts by accounts on your server. No boosts. The federated timeline shows the whole known Fediverse - known to your server that is. An account is known to your server once it is followed or was ever searched for by someone on your server.

What is the Fediverse?

Mastodon is just one part of the Fediverse.

   mastodon is part of the fediverse

   what you see in your home timeline, it might include people on mastodon, and people from elsehwere - eg pixelfed - see infographic - there are lots of branches of the fediverse

   [can't see the infographic so can't note it I'm afraid]

   all of these different servers in the fediverse can communicate with mastodon

   it works similar to email, you can write to someone who has gmail from an icloud account, for example

   you can follow different  fediverse can

   What is Pixelfed?

   it's for pictures and there are lots of others for music, podcasts, books, writing etc

   works similar to mastodon servers, but interface looks different

   includes some special features like licence information or adding posts to a collection

   if you want to actively use a certain fediverse service, you always also need to start an account there, but passively you can follow accounts throughout all the fediverse and their content will appear in your "home timeline"

   Questions

Questions from the people:

   How to find people on other services? A number of us particularly interested in finding people from niche communities/ with specialised interests eg multiple sclerosis/ ADHD. And also interested in finding new people not connected to on, eg twitter

   You need to know their full handle or the url

   but if the server is down they won't appear

   can also search for hashtags, you can then click on the tag to see them

   tools like https://fedifinder.glitch.me/ will crawl the infos of everyone you follow on Twitter for fediverse accounts, you can download it as a .csv file and import it into your account

   How to choose the right server?

   there are either themed, local or general servers

   if you want to move, there is a "How to" in German: https://wiki.subversive.zone/doku.php?id=umzug_des_eigenen_accounts_auf_eine_andere_mastodon_instanz

   Search-Site that gives infos about server-quality in the advanced mode: https://instances.social/list/advanced#lang=&allowed=&prohibited=&min-users=&max-users=

   too big servers attract hackers

   Relevant fact about "deleted posts": because servers need to crawl each other, a post you delete may still be visible on any server other than the one you are on

   Will Mastodon/the Fediverse remain nieche?

   it grows everytime the big commercial plattforms f**k up

   but because it's not centralized, everyone can create their own nieches (which need not even be connected to the rest of fediverse)

   How to best share audio, pictures and movies?

   for media, especially videos with bigger file sizes, it's better to post them via peertube and then use the link to this video in your mastodon posts

   if you want to share a youtube-video, you should use invidious.snopyta.org to create a tracker-free link, because a lot of users don't like sharing their data with big tech companies

   Is it sensible to have several accounts, so for mastodon, pixelfed, peertube, etc.? And how to connect them?

   depends on what you want to share, especially for multimedia

   do mastodon servers generally have the same technical features or are there relevant differences? If so, can I check this out before joining or moving?

   most servers have the same limits, some have higher limits for example characters (5.000 instead of general 500)

   contentnation.net has an overview for German servers

   limits for polls or number of bio-links can be adjusted by the admins, but might create problems for every update

   changes on one server can possibly affect the performance of other servers

   I'm actually on Friendica and not Mastodon (not sure if that was a great decision but I also didn't want to overthink things). On my server there are not as many people, I think, so if I use the search bar I often find nothing at all. People probably then tend to choose servers where there's already a lot of people to make it easier to get connected. So could we say that, while trying to decentralize social networking, fediverse still has those mechanisms that automatically lead to more centralization?

   one instance/server can block users on other servers or even a whole other server

   Are there specials servers for govermental accounts

   in Germany there is social.bund.de which is invite only

   there is also an EU-server

   there is no offical verification system in the fediverse like on Twitter but there are other ways to check, if an account is legit:

   certain servers are invite only, so only legit users can create an account there

   every account can create a verified link-back to their own official website

Accessabilty-Feature:

   Glitch-Soc has a feature where you can see red boarders around pictures or videos without alt text

   there's a BOT that reminds you, if you've forgotten alternative text / description

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 {{Draft}}
-Agenda:
+This is the protocol of a (series of) workshop(s) held by @PaulaToThePeople for Fediverse beginners, especially those who came to Mastodon after Musk bought Twitter.
-    Introduction
-    Moderation
-    Does everybody already have an account?
-    What is Mastodon?
-    What is the Fediverse?
-    What is Pixelfed?
-    Questions
-Notes
-    Introduction
+_TOC_
-    Paula joined Fediverse in 2018 and became and an administrator a bit later
-    Proper notes will be shared later on (Thanks so much!!)
-    Moderation
-    Rules for this workshop
-    Don't turn on microphone while someone else is speaking
-    Wait for Paula to invite you to speak
-    Raise your hand (if on browser look for the hand symbol bottom right of screen; or write in the chat you want to speak)
-    Does everybody on the call already have an account?
-    it will help understand if people need help setting up an account
-    @sburall@mastodon.social
-    gaysis@social.agb-web.de
-    very often you need to use the full handle to find a person, just their name might not be enough
      you can search using topics, results can be accounts, hashtags or posts
-    What is Mastodon?
+==What is Mastodon?==
-    it's a free software,
-    has some features the same as Twitter, and some different
-    What does it look like?
-    Use preferences to change how mastodon looks
+Mastodon is a free software mictoblogging project, so similar to Twitter, with some features that are the same and some different features.<br>
+It is decentral/federated and part of the Fediverse (see below).
-    use advanced web-interface to see multiple columns
+When you just created an account you'll see the basic interface with an empty home timeline. You'll have to fill it by following people.<br>
+To follow someone from a different instance you'll probably need to enter their full handle (username@instance.tld) or their profile's url in the search field.<br>
-    If you have too many columns, they won't fit on the screen and you will have to zoom out.
+In the Settings you can change some things about Mastodon's look and feel. For example you can switch to the advanced interface where you can have many columns.<br>
+You can for example search for a hashtag and then pin that column to the screen be clicking in the top right corner.<br>
+If you have too many columns, they won't fit on the screen and you will have to zoom out.
-    you can make a list of people you don't want to miss and they will appear in a column (sorry can't see this happening and so can't quite explain properly)
+You can create lists of people, e.g. people who's posts you don't want to miss, and also pin that list as a column.
-    home timeline is people you follow and people who are boosted by people you follow. But it almost never matters which fediverse server they are on, just need to follow their account
+The home timeline shows posts by accounts you follow and boosts by those accounts. It will look the same no matter if they have a Mastodon account or use a different Fediverse service.<br>
+The local timeline just shows posts by accounts on your server. No boosts.
+The federated timeline shows the whole known Fediverse - known to your server that is. An account is known to your server once it is followed or was ever searched for by someone on your server.
-    There is the local timeline, this shows only posts for people on your server. It is filled when you join the server and you don't need to follow them
+==What is the Fediverse?==
-    federated timeline shows the whole, known fediverse (known to your server - depends which accounts are followed from your server or what was searched from your server)
+Mastodon is just one part of the Fediverse.
-    What is the Fediverse?
+[[File:Fediverse branches.png]]
      mastodon is part of the fediverse