If I worked for Mastodon, I would create a turn key solution for parties that want to set up a Mastodon server for all their party candidates.
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@randahl yesterday at FOSDEM there was a member of the European Parliament who was asked why so many politicians are still on X and her answer made total sense (sadly):
Politicians stay on X because journalists are still there, so they feel that if they leave they will become irrelevant / not be written about.
And journalists stay on X because politicians are there.
It’s a vicious cycle
A cycle is only a cycle if you don't step out of it.
And I will also say this, if your political "success" depends on lazy journalists grabbing your lazy messages from X and slap dashing lazy articles with X screenshots of what you "said", then you are not the politician you think you are.
And for the others, what you fear is not what actually will happen. Stepping away from X will not make you irrelevant. On the contrary, it will put you in the spotlight.
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We are planning to work closely with the Save Social campaign. And also to display the Executive on our platform.
There is also this awesome work being done in Canada by @smattymatty and team, advocating for politicians to come to the Fediverse
All these initiatives are going to be listed here
There are others we need to update.
Cc @VVLD1cl @randahl @gunchleoc @bjoernsta @ElbowsUpforDigitalSovereignty
@leavex @VVLD1cl @randahl @gunchleoc @bjoernsta @ElbowsUpforDigitalSovereignty
Awesome!!!
I just coded the site, our movement has been a real team effort though
Glad to be part of this world wide network
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@randahl yesterday at FOSDEM there was a member of the European Parliament who was asked why so many politicians are still on X and her answer made total sense (sadly):
Politicians stay on X because journalists are still there, so they feel that if they leave they will become irrelevant / not be written about.
And journalists stay on X because politicians are there.
It’s a vicious cycle
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@randahl yesterday at FOSDEM there was a member of the European Parliament who was asked why so many politicians are still on X and her answer made total sense (sadly):
Politicians stay on X because journalists are still there, so they feel that if they leave they will become irrelevant / not be written about.
And journalists stay on X because politicians are there.
It’s a vicious cycle
@_elena @randahl This doesn't excuse the lack of posting elsewhere. They could just copy-paste their posts to Fedi or Bluesky. There are lots of journalists on bluesky. And a few here on fedi.
They could prepare to dump x, by putting in a tiny bit of effort on any other platform. Or rather a tiny bit of their interns' efforts.
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@ceremus @randahl Since that post was made, Mastodon has introduced an admin option to hide public timelines from people that are not logged in.
One remaining problem is that we dont have any pre-emptive moderation tools to deal with harassment & dogpiling, like common dogwistles & slurs getting flagged for review. Moderators can only become aware of problems when users report them.
@gunchleoc @randahl
I don't understand how logged-in action defends against bad actors who, for example, could upload CSAM material to someone else's private server. Which is Mastodon's default behavior, to cache potentially illegal material provided by a 3rd party.As if these bad actors, as well as the law enforcement they would snitch to, could not get access to a federated logon account?
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@randahl yesterday at FOSDEM there was a member of the European Parliament who was asked why so many politicians are still on X and her answer made total sense (sadly):
Politicians stay on X because journalists are still there, so they feel that if they leave they will become irrelevant / not be written about.
And journalists stay on X because politicians are there.
It’s a vicious cycle
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@_elena @randahl This doesn't excuse the lack of posting elsewhere. They could just copy-paste their posts to Fedi or Bluesky. There are lots of journalists on bluesky. And a few here on fedi.
They could prepare to dump x, by putting in a tiny bit of effort on any other platform. Or rather a tiny bit of their interns' efforts.
@kristinHenry @randahl hey I absolutely abhor all Big Tech platforms and deleted all my accounts, so I agree with you.
We should also not underestimate how tech illiterate many politicians and journalists may be...
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@kristinHenry @randahl hey I absolutely abhor all Big Tech platforms and deleted all my accounts, so I agree with you.
We should also not underestimate how tech illiterate many politicians and journalists may be...
@_elena @randahl I get a lot of actually useful-to-me news right here from @MLNow. They're a fantastic local news team that has embraced distributed social.
@ProPublica is also here. But not as active.
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@_elena @randahl I get a lot of actually useful-to-me news right here from @MLNow. They're a fantastic local news team that has embraced distributed social.
@ProPublica is also here. But not as active.
@kristinHenry @_elena @randahl @MLNow @ProPublica
Electoral politics is the pursuit of and the holding onto power. Sure, people go into it for noble reasons. But the sheer amount of noise inside there cannot help but dissipate those intentions. Power and unbridled ego goes and stays where the strange attractors are. Mastodon is an antidote to that. So in my view we shouldn’t be surprised that they’re not here, nor likely to be
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@randahl yesterday at FOSDEM there was a member of the European Parliament who was asked why so many politicians are still on X and her answer made total sense (sadly):
Politicians stay on X because journalists are still there, so they feel that if they leave they will become irrelevant / not be written about.
And journalists stay on X because politicians are there.
It’s a vicious cycle
@_elena @randahl it’s nonsense. https://mastodon.ie/@greenpartyni/115881150327768590
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@kristinHenry @_elena @randahl @MLNow @ProPublica
Electoral politics is the pursuit of and the holding onto power. Sure, people go into it for noble reasons. But the sheer amount of noise inside there cannot help but dissipate those intentions. Power and unbridled ego goes and stays where the strange attractors are. Mastodon is an antidote to that. So in my view we shouldn’t be surprised that they’re not here, nor likely to be
@urlyman @_elena @randahl @MLNow @ProPublica
I really should be going to sleep soon. But I have to expand on what you are saying here.
Yes, politics is one way to pursue and hold power.
But politics is the public solving of problems, at it's best and most powerful manifestation.
To some, it is a game. To most, it is the boring process of getting things done, sometimes in the benefit of the most.
The worst politicians, for the people, are those who want to be in office for the power.
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@urlyman @_elena @randahl @MLNow @ProPublica
I really should be going to sleep soon. But I have to expand on what you are saying here.
Yes, politics is one way to pursue and hold power.
But politics is the public solving of problems, at it's best and most powerful manifestation.
To some, it is a game. To most, it is the boring process of getting things done, sometimes in the benefit of the most.
The worst politicians, for the people, are those who want to be in office for the power.
@kristinHenry @_elena @randahl @MLNow @ProPublica
And the best politicians still have to swim where the fastest currents are.
It is in Mastodon’s ‘DNA’ to create slower waters
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@_elena @randahl it’s nonsense. https://mastodon.ie/@greenpartyni/115881150327768590
@greenpartyni THANK YOU for being here! Someone mentioned you at FOSDEM last weekend. I wish ALL political parties would follow your example, especially here in Europe (but honestly, everywhere)
@randahl -
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@gunchleoc @randahl
I don't understand how logged-in action defends against bad actors who, for example, could upload CSAM material to someone else's private server. Which is Mastodon's default behavior, to cache potentially illegal material provided by a 3rd party.As if these bad actors, as well as the law enforcement they would snitch to, could not get access to a federated logon account?
@ceremus You'd need to be logged in at the server with a local account to see it, a federated account won't do.
Of course, people can still tag you to ensure that the post ends up on your server and it's hard on your mental health to have to look at this shit, but it mitigates the danger of being reported.
Mastodon is working on a system to allow integration of 3rd-party tools and you could use that to get access to a detector, but that will still take a while to get done.
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@kristinHenry @_elena @randahl @MLNow @ProPublica
And the best politicians still have to swim where the fastest currents are.
It is in Mastodon’s ‘DNA’ to create slower waters
@urlyman @_elena @randahl @MLNow @ProPublica
Yes! I am hoping that more of the better leaders and journalists will learn to embrace our slower waters.
To really communicate, beyond the soundbites.
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If I worked for Mastodon, I would create a turn key solution for parties that want to set up a Mastodon server for all their party candidates.
Ilhan Omar is still on X.
Bernie Sanders is still on X.
AOC is still on X.Make it easy for them to switch. Then make sure they are aware of this option.
@randahl @osma I tell people about Mastodon, so thanks for the link. My FB account is still there as I have been with it since the beginning. The people who are my friends are actually only people that I have met, the only one who is a request on my side is Philip George, who writes tremendous short articles.
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@urlyman @_elena @randahl @MLNow @ProPublica
Yes! I am hoping that more of the better leaders and journalists will learn to embrace our slower waters.
To really communicate, beyond the soundbites.
@urlyman @_elena @randahl @MLNow @ProPublica They could also learn some things here, as well.
If they can be bothered to listen and engage.
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@randahl yesterday at FOSDEM there was a member of the European Parliament who was asked why so many politicians are still on X and her answer made total sense (sadly):
Politicians stay on X because journalists are still there, so they feel that if they leave they will become irrelevant / not be written about.
And journalists stay on X because politicians are there.
It’s a vicious cycle
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If I worked for Mastodon, I would create a turn key solution for parties that want to set up a Mastodon server for all their party candidates.
Ilhan Omar is still on X.
Bernie Sanders is still on X.
AOC is still on X.Make it easy for them to switch. Then make sure they are aware of this option.
@randahl @osma
A turn-key solution needs more than just hosting. It's less about making it easy to switch, it's more about teaching them how to do it and why they should.As an individual, where would I even point people to, e.g. if I was emailing my congressman?
Is there an elevator pitch, or a pitch deck? If you had 5 minutes of their time to convince them to change their social media footprint, what would you tell them?
What tools support it? I'm guessing that most orgs that have a social media presence on multiple networks use some tool to help manage it. Skimming quickly, Zoho, Buffer, and Typefully support mastodon, so if they use one of those it's an easy addition to their current workflow.
Is it enough to *also* post on mastodon, or should they also stop posting on Nazxitter? Yes they're trying to reach journalists but they're also trying to reach people who may be even less tech-savvy than the politicians and journalists themselves.
So many questions, maybe someone has answers?
