Mastodon vs. Twitter

This afternoon I got a Telegram message from a friend who asked me what I think about Mastodon.

As I elaborated my answer, I realized it would be a good idea to publish my reasoning on Steem.

Why Twitter?

Let's start from the beginning: why Twitter ? I long thought Twitter was a stupid fad. I mean, what can you say in 140 characters that is worth reading? Then, somehow, by miracle, to my great astonishment, I started learning that a lot of noteworthy people, politicians, mainstream media, etc. were using this idiotic platform ...

But I dismissed that - what can they say in 140 chars that would be worth my time ?

Then the limit went up to 280. Then Donald Trump became a Twitter star and more and more MSM reports were reporting ... what had first happened on Twitter...

So the draw became too powerful to resist: as long as I'm reading in newspaper and seeing / hearing in the news what's been said on Twitter... I might as well go to the source directly ...

So I started using Twitter and discovered a lot (like .. A LOT!) of accounts who were experts in their fields, obviously very bright people and who, for reasons beyond my ability to comprehend, were writing LONG explanations / analyses on Twitter using threads (chained tweets of 240 chars).

Why ? Beats me ! Writing threads is not particularly easy nor user friendly. You cannot edit your tweets (even less your threads) so all typos are there for everyone to enjoy ... You are not sure who you are reaching with your tweets / threads because you don't control Twitter's algorithms... Heck, you are not even sure that Twitter won't erase your work because someone might "report abuse" ...

But despite all that, smart people keep to this day writing valuable things on Twitter ... so it's worth going there to read them ...

The miracle Twitter somehow accomplished is to get all these bright people to write deep pieces on Twitter first ...

What about now?

I personally think Elon Musk is one of the most important persons alive. While everybody is wringing their hands and obsessing about an undesirable phenomenon we caused and seem ill placed to address (climate change), Elon is the only one who is offering a positive dream: colonizing Mars.

Wrapping-up

So where do I stand ?

1. I might consider Mastodon if I find out that there are interesting authors to read there first. Until then ... shrug ...
2. As the flight to Mastodon is usually a response to Elon taking over Twitter, it seems fair to assume that those who migrate do not admire Elon as I do ... that doesn't necessarily makes them unworthy of my time / interest/ attention, but it certainly doesn't not encourage me to follow them.

What about you ?
What are your thoughts?