What is the "Mastodon" platform that has become a haven for fugitives from Twitter after the Musk deal?
After Elon Musk acquired Twitter, the end of last month, some users of the application began to look for new options, only to quickly discover that there are not many alternatives.
However, it seems that the application "Mastodon" succeeded in attracting the most experienced users in using technology, according to the British newspaper "Guardian".
The application got its name from an extinct elephant-like animal, launched 6 years ago, and today has a popular base among specific groups, usually left-leaning.
Perhaps the most notable thing that distinguishes it from other social media applications is that it adopts a decentralized program, and therefore cannot be controlled by a company or a billionaire.
Mastodon.. Open source platform
The mastodon platform is an open source social network focused on the user, what he wants to see, what he wants to ignore and what he likes to share, and all these are governed by microcontrollers, allowing the user to have full control and control over what he wants to see.
The idea of Mastodon was started in 2016 by the German developer Eugene Rochko as a project in the world of social networking and its goal is to be the basic and appropriate alternative to the famous platform Twitter.
How does Mastodon work?
If you search for Mastodon, you will see more than one result in the search results, each of which presents a specific topic on the platform where it works on separate servers managed by volunteers.
For example, the first one you find may focus on a specific topic such as technology or culture, and the last one may provide a general discussion on a specific topic but with strict rules against insults.
However you should be careful because you may come across an example showing content that is not suitable for children or content that you do not want to see in the results, so children should not use this platform unsupervised.
These small communities use the basic Mastodon program but have different rules and ways of interaction, this platform can be likened to any democratic country that has states with their own laws, but they all work under the infrastructure of this country.
There is no single Mastodon application, but there are a variety of independent applications such as Tootle, Fedi and stats that combine programs in different interfaces.
It's like email, for example you may have a Google account but you can still message someone who has a Yahoo account or Hotmail but social interactions are very similar to those on Twitter.
Anything that distinguishes mastodon from other platforms?
The most important thing that distinguishes mastodon from other platforms is that it is open source, unlike large companies such as Facebook or Twitter and others that are limited to one website that offers many diverse contents where there is no division of special interests.
But the decentralization system in Mastodon allows the user to operate unified self-hosted social networks, instead of subscribing to Mastodon.
You can create one account on a large number of independent Mastodon networks with unique "URL" addresses, they depend on the basic Mastodon program but have different laws and methods of interaction.
There is something wrong with social networks these days, platforms such as "TikTok","YouTube" and"Instagram" have contributed to loneliness.
low self-esteem and the spread of harmful misinformation, and despite such a bad reputation, these giants remain entrenched in the industry as always.
Critics say that social media platforms have too much power over public opinion and use this power irresponsibly, despite the numerous proposed technical solutions to the dangers of social media.
Centralized and private control is carried out by companies that maximize profit, there is a constant push and pull between those who are just looking for a pleasant online experience and platform owners, who have an incentive to maximize participation at any cost.
But as the writer and technologist Ben Tarnov wrote in his recent book (the internet for people), these platforms are not actually trying to enhance human communication.
But rather social media urges users to behave in ways that are maximally legible to the automated systems that track and analyze them in order to sell advertising and increase profits.
As for the other party to which Mastodon belongs, it is based on decentralization, the ecosystem of smaller media looks like a mixture of neighboring but interconnected virtual villages that operate on an understandable scale.
Some say that the structure of Mastodon is too confusing for most people to understand, which limits its attractiveness, but change must begin at some time and place.
And the relative success of the platform suggests that people may be ready to start a gradual transformation.
The highlight that distinguishes the platform from Mastodon from other platforms is the absence of ads, as the platform wrote in its blog "does not contain ads.
Aespects your privacy, allows people and communities to be autonomous," and this indicates a move away from tracking and monitoring users ' interests for targeted advertising.
Perhaps Mastodon in terms of social interactions is closer to Twitter, but with better privacy measures, an increase in the number of characters to 500 characters instead of 280 as in Twitter, and more control by users.
But despite these features, its disadvantage is its small size compared to the giant Twitter, which prevents Mastodon to be a real alternative for people who want the world to see their publications.
"I made a post and immediately random people with whom I had never spoken were carefully handling it, I felt that the internet should be like that,"says Morgan, a mastodon user who considers it the most democratic platform.
What is the future of Mastodon?
The subjective community experience is ultimately more relevant to the average user than the experience shown on web hosting, but decentralization offers some concrete solutions to the diseases of social media platforms.
So to speak, and perhaps the community is the ideal solution point for treating this pollution emitted by some social media platforms.
"I really like community control over social media more than company ownership," says Morgan, stressing that they still hope for the emergence of a viable decentralized platform.
Decentralized social media platforms constitute a promising, albeit gradual, framework for addressing many of the diseases of modern social communication.
And so starting with the idea of a decentralized platform, its continuation and growth does not depend on a particular external party, but depends on the community itself and on what it chooses.
Social networking sites were intended to provide communication and news services for the benefit of society, but this benefit was exploited for commercial.
And advertising purposes for the benefit of major companies, which makes communication limited to these companies and by following their policies.
But open source platforms-such as Mastodon-broke the restrictions of isolation and worked out from under the wing of those platforms so that users become the bird that puts the community under its wing.