Is Mastodon an alternative to Twitter?
It's open source. So you're not dependent on the whims of Facebook or Twitter, but you can decide the direction yourself and choose your own direction if you find it necessary.
It is a service set up as a federation. So it is not one network, but a collection of networks that can communicate with each other. It offers the option to set up networks of your own choice. About a topic, as a group of friends, as a company. And with its own rules and agreements. Small networks are more manageable in terms of atmosphere.
And, as mentioned, those networks can also communicate with other networks so that you have a channel for only the like-minded people in your own network, but you can also engage in conversation with outside.
Mastodon allows 500 characters, so you don't have to limit yourself to one-liners in your communication.
Messages can be open, visible only to your followers, or “unlisted”. More privacy options.
That list is still very much on. And thanks to Musk, but also thanks to trolls and other mood disruptors, Mastodon is now more likely than ever to make a dent in a pack of butter. But a central approach also has major advantages. It makes it easier for you to search through the whole thing and that you can easily find and follow interesting people and content around areas of interest, for example. Even though Musk is an acorn, the masses will only go away when Mastodon can be a good alternative in terms of network, ease of use and capabilities.
1 How does Mastodon work?
Mastodon is a microblogging platform similar to Twitter. Tweets are called “toots” and retweets are called “boosts”. You can use hashtags and address others with @ and their username. Messages can be 500 characters — on Twitter, that's a maximum of 280.
You can reach the network via an app or website. To get started, you must first choose a server. At Mastodon, there isn't one place where you can create an account, like Twitter. You can choose from a variety of servers, each with their own community.
Mastodonsocial is the most popular of all servers, but if you want, you can also choose from communities focused on topics such as technology, art or music. The servers form a global system where the different communities can communicate with each other.
