A new Type of Mastodon Signup that gives people a sense of Agency

Submitted ⁨⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨blue_berry@feddit.de⁩ to ⁨fediverse@lemmy.world⁩

https://fungiverse.wordpress.com/2023/12/17/a-new-type-of-mastodon-signup-that-doesnt-leave-people-confused/

TL;DR: The current Mastodon-signup is only removing the confusion of users on first glance, because it either hides the server-choice altogether, or leaves them with a choice that is impossible to make at this point of their Mastodon-journey. Instead, it should introduce them to decentrality on a lower scale, with a handful of handpicked servers to choose from, such that the decision makes sense to them and shows them the merits and fun of the concept instead of scaring them away. Ideal would be to give them a sense of agency. Then, chances are higher that they consider migrating again in the future and eventually internalize it as a permanent option of the digital world.

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MudMan@kbin.social ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I've been saying this from the go: users don't need to know decentralization even exists until AFTER they are signed up.

What Mastodon needs is a proper migration flow that moves old posts and remote follows so users can decide if they want a new instance after they spend some time in the system and start to understand how it works. Any mention of decentralization on signup is a churn point, because decentralization doesn't add any features to posting and reading posts. From a UX perspective, decentralization isn't a feature.

Things are about to get messier once the big decision coming in becomes "do you want to see Threads or nah?", which then actively requires thinking about a competing social media platform on the way into this one.

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- Scrollone@feddit.it ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Not only decentralization is not a feature – it’s a burden. “Normal” users (read: non nerds like 99% of us here) couldn’t care less about which server they should sign up to.
  
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  - ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Tbh then just tell em to sign up for madtodon.social, or a specific instance you know they’d like since you know them fairly well, problem solved. They can migrate later if they want anyway, fuck it, they’ll be fine. It’s a masto acct not a limb amputation, like hair so to speak “it’ll grow back.”
    
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  - richieadler@lemmy.myserv.one ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    That kind of attitude leads to being scammed with popups and robbed of all your savings.
    
    Go back to your VCR, Granma.
    
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- Foxfire@pawb.social ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Though if decentralization were to be hidden, it’d be a good idea to cycle through lots of well established general instances for user signups under the hood. The vast majority of people are just going to choose the default options, and if it’s all going to funnel into mastodon.social, that’s a lot of centralization of users. Ideally no single server lords over all the others in terms of user count, because that gives them lots of power other instances may feel compelled to abide by. Having power spread out across many different people helps keep things in check, at the very least making large or drastic decisions more of a round table affair.
  
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Nougat@kbin.social ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Here’s another way: stop referring to everything “Twitter-like” as Mastodon. Stop referring to everything “Reddit-like” as Lemmy. Those are both client platforms through which one can access ActivityPub content.

Conflating the platform with the provider with the protocol with the content is what’s confusing people.

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- CoggyMcFee@lemmy.world ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Are you saying to start calling all of it ActivityPub? In which case, I would think that’d be extra confusing since lemmy and mastodon don’t cross-interface very well and you really need one client for each type.
  
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  - Nougat@kbin.social ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    I said no such thing.
    
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- helenslunch@feddit.nl ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  I’m curious how you would explain Mastodon to a layman without mentioning Twitter.
  
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  - Nougat@kbin.social ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    
    ... without mentioning Twitter.
    
    That seems like a pretty arbitrary restriction. At this point, a basic knowledge of "what Twitter is like" is a pretty general-knowledge thing.
    
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AllNewTypeFace@leminal.space ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Bad example, given that Hogwarts-house-in-bio is a reliable transphobic dog whistle, and transphobia is very much unacceptable in the fediverse.

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- them@lemmy.world ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Is it really? Can someone not just like the potter series and either disagree with or ignore the politics of the author?
  
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  - AllNewTypeFace@leminal.space ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Given how strident the author has been about her views, and that she is still alive, earning royalties and materially contributing to anti-transgender causes, proclaiming oneself a fan of these books is as least saying that the author’s anti-transgender activism is not a dealbreaker. Making part of one’s identity an aspect of the books’ universe is even more so, to the point where there’s a correlation between people proclaiming their Hogwarts house in their bio and expressing anti-trans views. (TERF/“gender critical” activists having suddenly discovered that they were Slitherpuffs or whatever a few years ago, despite not having expressed any interest in YA fantasy novels before Rowling’s statements, is an observed phenomenon, to the point where such a statement in one’s bio is more likely than not to serve as a feeler for scouting out fellow anti-trans sympathisers.)
    
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  - ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    No, you’re not allowed to like things. I know because I’ve been told this as a fan of H. P. Lovecraft, comedy, old movies, books, and music. Everything is bad and you should feel bad for liking it.
    
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  - Corgana@startrek.website ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    You can of course add it to your bio if you’re a fan, but you might want to be aware that it will increasingly not be interpreted innocently.
    
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  - brbposting@sh.itjust.works ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    More reading here:
    
    Please consider how many (not all) trans individuals, out or not, might see your posts and excitement about Harry Potter and view them as a red flag, an implicit sign that you value Rowling’s work over trans lives, and question whether or not you’re a safe person for them connect with.
    
    I’m dismayed by Rowling’s too-real controversies but have a deep affection for the imaginary universe she gave the world.
    
    It’s good to know this, that at a minimum disclaimers are critical forever more it seems.
    
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Carighan@lemmy.world ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I like this, though I will say I acutally prefer the playful choice idea. Not Hogwarts for me particular, but in general.

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Serinus@lemmy.world ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
2 is good.

Decentralization doesn’t matter until it does. Recruiting people to your specific Mastodon instance is ideal and simple. All they need out of the decentralization concept is to know they can’t be screwed if Elon takes over their instance.
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otter@lemmy.ca ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I’m curious about the state of account migrations right now. Ideally it should be super easy and it should strengthen the Fediverse if people can hope platforms with ease when an admin isn’t behaving as they should.

One technical challenge might be deletion

Admins need to be able to delete or quarantine harmful / illegal content

You can’t move instances if an admin suddenly comes along and deletes everything

Could on-device backups be a thing? The collective userbase takes up a lot of storage, but each individual person probably doesn’t upload more than their phone can store. It might also incentivize them to not spam large files
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- starman@programming.dev ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/pull/3976
  
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- CleoTheWizard@lemmy.world ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  I think account migration will have to come in two waves. It would be far easier to migrate accounts that are federated. That should be as simple as name swapping comments and posts and assigning them to the opposite servers while handing over user data.
  
  The hard part is with servers who do not federate. Two solutions exist. One would have a data hop. It’s very likely that defederated servers would contain some link somewhere between federated servers. So the original server would pass data through one or two other servers to get to your new destination server that otherwise wouldn’t receive that data.
  
  The other solution involves allowing a user to download their content with a key from the server and then present that to the new server. That data may need to be encrypted or have verification somehow to prevent tampering before reuploading it.
  
  Any of these solutions will probably require manually approving and sorting through of data. The good news is that you can make requirements to say that users should have so many upvotes or whatever to receive a transfer to your platform. So their backup of data can sit still until you’re deemed worthy of transfer.
  
  I’d say that data backups on your phone should definitely be an option regardless.
  
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stevecrox@kbin.social ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
If you signup to social media it will pester you for your email contacts, location and hobbies/interests.

Building a signup wizard to use that information to select a instance would seemto be the best approach.

The contacts would let you know what instance most of your friends are located (e.g. look up email addresses).

Topic specific instance, can provide a hobby/interests selection section.

Lastly the location would let you choose a country specific general instance.

It would help push decentralisation but instead of providing choice your asking questions the user is used to being asked.

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- astronaut_sloth@mander.xyz ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  
  Building a signup wizard to use that information to select a instance would seem to be the best approach.
  
  That’s actually not a bad idea. I’m not on board with mining contacts, but I think there’s a simple, transparent way to do this that can actually be fun: a personality quiz. Sure, if someone knows what instance to join already, they can override this. But if they don’t, they get like five questions, and then they are matched to an instance.
  
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- Plopp@lemmy.world ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Giving social media platforms access to my contacts? Ew. Never. However for those that want it it might be a good idea, except what if I don’t want whoever has put me in their contacts to find me that way?
  
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- russjr08@bitforged.space ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  To be honest, as an instance owner I would not want to even have that data touch my instance - that would be a nightmare waiting to happen whether some instance operator does so with or without malice intent (such as a server compromise).
  
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- shrugal@lemm.ee ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  
  The contacts would let you know what instance most of your friends are located (e.g. look up email addresses).
  
  I don’t think that’s possible without creating a privacy nightmare, at least not with an identifier like the email address.
  
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nycki@lemmy.world ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I think the “migration” process needs more work. If you want to hop homeservers, you’re going to lose your whole post history and all your followers. That’s what keeps people stuck, more than the sign-up process itself.

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RobotToaster@mander.xyz ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
There’s still nothing like awesome lemmy instances that shows a server’s blocking and blocked by count?

That’s the biggest hurdle for me, there’s no guarantee who you want to follow won’t be blocked by your or their BOFH.

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Kecessa@sh.itjust.works ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I think it should be like joining a mining pool, if you create a server you don’t have admin privileges, you’re added to the pool of machines that stores info and users don’t choose a server at all, the servers communicate between themselves to make sure all info is backed up on at least three machines.

From the front end it looks like any equivalent private social media, one website for everything. On the back end side the servers are all over the place instead of in a couple days centers.

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