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☆ What is Mastodon and why are Twitter users flocking there? Here's everything you need to know.
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-08 | by ( Beatrice Nolan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Many Twitter users are jumping ship to social-network Mastodon after Elon Musk's Twitter takeover. How to make a Mastodon profile? Similar to other major social-media networks, Mastodon users set up a profile with a username, display name, short bio, avatar, and header. Users choose the first part of their username and the second part is whichever Mastodon server they signed up with. Mastodon offers link verification that cross-references any links in a user's profile to prove they are the real owner.

For the most part, Mastodon looks like Twitter, with hashtags, political back-and-forth and tech banter jostling for space with cat pictures. People swap posts and links with others on their own server - or Mastodon "instance" - and also, almost as easily, with users on other servers across the growing network. But the jump in Mastodon users in a matter of days has still been startling. loadingBefore Musk completed the Twitter acquisition on Oct. 27, Mastodon's growth averaged 60-80 new users an hour, according to the widely-cited Mastodon Users account. Rochko started Mastodon in 2017, when rumours were spreading that PayPal founder and Musk ally Peter Thiel wanted to buy Twitter.

☆ The CEO of Twitter rival Mastodon calls Elon Musk 'not entirely comprehensible,' says the billionaire must now 'deal with the fallout' of his 'impulse' buy
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-07 | by ( Aaron Mok | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Mastodon CEO Eugen Rochko was asked about Elon Musk's takeover of Twitter during an interview. Rochko's comments come as some Twitter users migrate to Mastodon, which just hit 1 million users. When asked what he thought of the Musk's takeover, Rochko said that "the man is not entirely comprehensible" and that he doesn't agree with a lot of his recent behavior. Some Twitter users have voiced interest in Mastodon in the wake of Elon Musk's purchase and concerns over how strict or hands-off he'll be with content moderation. But there are signs that some Twitters users have been emboldened by Musk's takeover to test the limits of its content moderation.

☆ Factbox: Twitter alternatives that users are turning to
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-07 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

Nov 7 (Reuters) - After taking Twitter Inc private for $44 billion, Elon Musk has started making changes to the social media platform that have irked some users, making them look for alternatives. COHOSTCohost is an ad-free social media platform. The platform allows users to target an audience to enhance engagement on posts and says users can find experts on topics of discussion. TUMBLRTumblr is a social media website that was launched in 2007 which allows users to post long-form blog-style content with media elements such as photos and GIFs. It also allows users to chat with each other much like Twitter's direct messaging function.

☆ Billionaire IAC chairman Barry Diller says Elon Musk bought Twitter as a toy: 'How long he will use it, like toys, we don't really know'
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-07 | by ( Sarah Jackson | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Billionaire IAC chairman Barry Diller has mixed feelings about Elon Musk's Twitter acquisition. On CNBC's Squawk Box, Diller said Musk "bought a toy, and how long he will use it, like toys, we don't really know." "You've got this extraordinarily wealthy person, and he bought a toy," Diller said. "He bought a toy, and how long he will use it, like toys, we don't really know, but he's not going to walk away, I don't think." By headcount, however, Twitter is already much smaller in the days since Musk bought it.

☆ Elon Musk could be what makes diehard Twitter users finally rethink their habit
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-06 | by ( Travis Clark | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

It also still remains to be seen whether Musk will lead to a meaningful surge in Twitter exits, or if his changes could attract more users. Even before Musk announced planned changes to the platform, some people threatened to quit Twitter over his ownership. "After some introspection, I've made the decision to focus my time and energy elsewhere and move on from Twitter," Nibel tweeted. Producer Shonda Rhimes, who joined Twitter in 2008, tweeted on Saturday, two days after Musk's acquisition was final, "Not hanging around for whatever Elon has planned. Critics have said they're worried, however, about a potential rise in misinformation on Twitter under Musk.

☆ With Twitter in chaos, Mastodon is on fire
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-05 | by ( Rachel Metz | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

CNN Business —In the week since Elon Musk took over Twitter, the number of people signing up for a small social network called Mastodon has surged. Ascannio/Adobe StockRochko said in an interview Thursday that Mastodon gained 230,000 users since October 27, when Musk took control of Twitter. And she pointed out that Twitter users may migrate to Mastodon in particular because its user experience is pretty similar to Twitter’s. But unlike on Twitter, where I can easily interact with a large audience, my Mastodon network is less than 100 followers. A social-media escape hatchI’m not quite ready to close my Twitter account, though; for me, Mastodon is a sort of social-media escape hatch in case Twitter becomes unbearable.

☆ 'I don't want to work with these clowns.' Inside the culture war that Elon Musk has unleashed at Twitter.
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-04 | by ( Mattathias Schwartz | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +8 min

With a project, you could see who initiated the work, who was the assignee, who was in the chain of command. They wanted to make Twitter a place to exchange ideas and observations that were funny, factual and engaging. Whenever I'm on Twitter, I always find something that makes me laugh, or learn something. It feels like that's what's happening. What's even more frightening is that I don't see any viable alternatives to Twitter right now.

Elon Musk set the tone for his first full day as head of Twitter with a response to @catturd2. “I will be digging in more today,” Musk tweeted in response Friday morning. As of Friday morning, Trump’s account was still suspended, and trending topics included everything from the news of the day (Paul Pelosi) to culture (#FridayFeeling, Rihanna). “Elon” was one of the top trending topics of the morning, and many conservative influencers who had been critical of Twitter’s moderation were already celebrating what they saw as a tectonic shift. Those downloads, however, are still less than 5,000 per day, while Twitter often still sees hundreds of thousands of downloads per day, according to Adam Blacker, vice president of insights at Apptopia.

☆ Anxious Twitter users find few alternatives to platform after Musk deal closes
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-28 | by ( Jennifer Korn | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

But with few obvious alternatives, Twitter users may be left with nowhere else to go. Other platforms, like Mastodon, have promised a more decentralized social media experience. “Excited to see what you accomplish here,” retired basketball star Shaquille O’Neill tweeted at Musk on Wednesday ahead of the deal closing. Musk has said he would restore Trump’s Twitter account, though Trump has previously said he would remain on Truth Social. By unbanning users and unwinding content moderation efforts, Musk could make Twitter less palatable for its most vulnerable users, typically women, members of the LGBTQ community, and people of color, according to safety experts.

☆ For the first time in years, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter are 'weak' and VCs are eager to back alternatives, they say.
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-28 | by ( Darius Rafieyan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

VCs see an opportunity to back the next big social network and take on existing giants. "Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, they're weak, and they're just losing that edge," one investor said. And there may be room for even more young social media companies to rise. For her, identity verification and responsible content moderation are non-negotiable in any new social platform that she backs. "There is a sense of decline for some of these large social media platforms," Lee said.

☆ How one pioneering platform is working to detoxify social media
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-13 | by ( Jordan Parker Erb | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

But some platforms are trying to detoxify social media. Twitter; Mastodon; Vicky Leta/Insider1. One pioneering platform is working to detoxify social media. Once championed as heralds of a more interconnected world, social media has instead contributed to loneliness, low self-esteem, and the proliferation of harmful disinformation, Evan Malmgren writes. With 4.4 million users, Mastodon looks like Twitter, but rather than a single website, it's an open-source software platform that allows users to run self-hosted, "federated" social networks.

☆ Sick of toxic social media? Meet the tech revolutionaries who are working to create a healthier online experience that puts you in charge.
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-10 | by ( Evan Malmgren | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +12 min

Critics on both sides of the political divide say that social-media platforms have too much power over public discourse and use this power irresponsibly. In fact, a fresh wave of decentralized social networks is forming. What even is a decentralized platform? Still, decentralized and descaled social-media platforms pose a promising, if incremental, framework to address many ills of modern mass communication. "I compare it to the growth of organic, sustainably grown food," Bill Ottman, the founder and CEO of the partially decentralized social-media platform Minds, told me.

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