Last October, I set up an account on the non-commercial social media network Mastodon. Like many, I grew exhausted by the real-time disaster movie of billionaire Elon Musk’s ownership of Twitter.
Three months of not being very Twitter-active has been mind-opening. I’ve been on that platform for a long time, since January 2009. Ironically, Twitter sent me a “happy Twitter anniversary” message just at the point when I’ve realised how much I prefer not being anywhere near Twitter.
Nonetheless, I still check in once or twice a week because some people still directly message me there and I like to check in on a few valued accounts.
I also don’t want to fully deactivate my account because my Twitter handle could be nabbed by someone else and perhaps deliberately misused (Facebook at least gives users the possibility of hiding an account, rather than relinquishing it).
My occasional visits have re-confirmed how Twitter easily nudges even a disgruntled user like me back into the addictive behaviours the platform trains us to perform. A visit means checking notifications. What’s been retweeted and how many times? Who has replied, posed a question or offered a comment? And, of course, I need to view my timeline, triggering me to like a few things here and retweet a few things there.
Then there’s the urge to retweet with an added comment — a quote-tweet or QT. QTs have become a source of agitation on Mastodon for some because Mastodon is designed not to allow them, primarily because it is a “feature” that has enabled easy attacks on others and bullying behaviours. It’s also seen as too self-promotional.
On Twitter, QTs often purposefully or inadvertently refocus attention, allowing the commenter to capitalise on the original tweet. Inadvertently, because this behaviour is so encouraged and driven by Twitter’s structure, and rewarded by the public display of “likes” which now accrue to the commenter who created the QT rather than the original poster. It’s an ingrained, self-rewarding action.
There are those who profess to never use quote-tweets in this way and especially not to attack others, but I wonder how many of us can say this in total honesty. For years, I’ve seen people who criticise Twitter for enabling attacks on others, use it themselves to directly “@” belittling comments at people they disagree with, often public figures.
That’s the hypocrisy of social media: personal attacks are terrible when made against those that someone likes, but are fine if against those one dislikes.
Mastodon only allows people to “boost” someone else’s post in its entirety and without comment. Boosting is encouraged, to highlight the posts users appreciate, and the knock-on effect is to make others more visible. The booster is removed from the equation.
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This function, more than any on Mastodon, has made me realise over the past three months just how many times on Twitter I’ve had to view quote-tweets that target the original poster in some snide or dismissive way (often disguised as “discussion”).
Mastodon boosts have also made me recognise uncomfortable home truths: like, how often on Twitter I’d have opted for a quote-tweet, and consciously or not, moved the focus to me. Now, on the occasions when I do visit Twitter, I try to retweet, never quote-tweet.
The urge to QT is always there, though. If I ask myself what I am really adding by sticking myself into the discussion, it’s almost always: my two cents are negligible, and would just repurpose someone’s tweet to highlight my added thoughts. Overall, I’ve found no QTs equals considerably less distracting noise.
Using a non-commercial service like Mastodon exposes how many social media functions are not really there to benefit users but because they drive revenue and profile for the platform itself, regardless of the problems they cause.
They’re so addictive (sadly because often so self-aggrandising), that users end up defending the very functions that create the worst problems. Yet even if we are absolutely sure we, personally, use such features in wholly positive ways, it’s the very existence of those structures, and the business model they directly support, that causes serious damage to individuals and society. It’s not all about you.
Removing myself from Twitter and multiple daily visits has also made me realise how much constant clamour the site generates in my life and also across media, politics and society.
It’s been a relief to have that social media jackhammer mostly gone. Visiting individual media websites without the Twitter jabber has restored a much broader and real-world sense of “the news” for me.
As again, has Mastodon, because I now get a far broader and enriching range of discussion and interaction, even though I follow fewer people. I’m shocked at how narrow a range of people and discussions Twitter’s algorithm fed to me. Mastodon has quietly offered so much more.
Mastodon is not an easy solution to the many problematical questions raised by commercial social media platforms. But it’s been an escape hatch and helped me reconsider and recalibrate my digital life in many positive ways.
