Twitter is in turmoil, with a new CEO Elon Musk plan to charge $8 / £8 / AU$9 for blue labels Causing a mass exodus of users looking for the best Twitter alternatives.
It has been observed that Mastodon originates in new users, for example, with many disgruntled Twitterati believing it to be the closest fit in terms of form and function. But while there are similarities, there are also differences – as I found out after spending the last week on it.
If you haven’t tried Mastodon, think of it as Twitter but divided into different communities, called servers, you can join. However, you can still follow your friends even if they are on a different server in your timeline. This sounds simple enough, but it’s actually a bit more complicated.
Eugene Rochko (Opens in a new tab)Mastodon, the creator and developer of Mastodon, has already expressed surprise that more than a million new users joined the service in the past week, but if he wants to continue to grow user numbers at this level, he should look at simplifying how someone joins the server.
Currently subscribing is a headache
I was Mastodon user (Opens in a new tab) Since 2017, but I’ve been using it more for the past month, its simplicity in posting and reading content is certainly welcome, and the ability to organize your schedule according to your interests, without any trolls or irrelevant ads appearing, is definitely refreshing.
However, the glaring problem I’ve found so far is when you create a new account, you’re sometimes overwhelmed with somewhat confusing options, like a screen asking you to join different servers. If you have an existing account, you need to find the server on which you created your account, and finding new users is very difficult, as it is difficult to list the available servers.
It’s a confusing issue – and it makes a bad first impression if you’re a regular user who just wants to try out the platform. Some people may get confused as to what “server” actually means in this case.
I’ve also only been able to access it via the web – Mastodon’s Android And the iOS apps (Opens in a new tab), which was released in 2021, they both refuse to recognize my valid credentials. To be fair, this could be due to the number of new and existing users trying to do the same at the moment, but it’s still frustrating.
Whatever the case, we hope Rochko looks for a solution for that, as well as considers macOS and Windows apps in the future.
However, this is see and The platform’s early days – Facebook, Twitter, and even MySpace were all in growing pains at first, and thanks to its users these issues have been resolved.
What I’ve seen so far is definitely encouraging, and a foundation that could be the start of something special for people looking to make the jump off Twitter.
However, at the moment, it is simply too complicated at the registration stage. If Rochko doesn’t redesign the setup process soon, Mastodon could prove a pretty big leap for the average user.