The mastodon, mascot of the social network Mastodon, by its creator Eugen Rochko (under GNU AGPL license, Wikimedia Commons)
While Twitter, which has become On Mastodon, which is both free software and a decentralized network – and not a company – you can either join an existing server, or “instance”, or create your own. This is what Switzerland has just done, reports the Swiss online media Watson.
“Escape the control of a single company”
The Confederation published a press release announcing this one-year pilot project: “The body created by the Federal Chancellery as part of its pilot project on Mastodon is called “social.admin.ch”. It is available to the Federal Council and departments to host official accounts. Users with an account with other instances of the network can follow social.admin.ch accounts and read their content, in accordance with Mastodon’s rules and practices. (…)
Certain characteristics of Mastodon make it attractive for government communication. Its decentralized organization and the absence of recourse to a central server allow the platform to escape the control of a single company or state censorship. Mastodon respects data protection, because it is the operators of the instances who decide what happens to user data. They are mostly transparent in this regard, limiting data collection to the minimum necessary for exploitation and explicitly excluding the sale and trade of data. The Federal Chancellery body will also be managed in compliance with data protection.”
“The project will last one year and will be followed by an evaluation which will determine the follow-up to be given to this experience.”
The information officer at the Federal Chancellery said: “What the Federal Chancellery is interested in is to what extent this platform stands out from others in terms of government communication,” reports Watson. The Swiss site indicates that “in addition to the Federal Chancellery and government spokesperson André Simonazzi, there are currently the accounts of the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs, the Federal Department of the Interior and the Department of the Economy, training and research.
Master your communication
The Swiss state is not abandoning its presence on other social networks, but in the case of Mastodon, there is a clear issue, notes Watson: “It is digital sovereignty that is at stake here. In any case, this is the opinion of Florian Siegenthaler. Administrator within the FairSocialNet association, which notably manages an important Swiss body “tooting.ch”: “I see a very big advantage in the sense that they control their communication”.
The Vaudois remembers an episode in 2020 where the Federal Office of Communications (OFCOM) saw its four Twitter accounts closed overnight without any explanation.
He reminds us that each authority defines its own rules – the Swiss State therefore does not risk being blocked following the umpteenth whim of a billionaire for example, as we saw for a while on Twitter for journalists displeasing Sa Majesty. Watson recalls that “Switzerland is not the first state to try Mastodon’s “toots” (the equivalent of tweets). Germany has already taken the plunge in 2022, by also creating its own instance, “social.bund.de”, which currently hosts around a hundred accounts.
The European Union launched around the same time with the “social.network.europa.eu” instance. There are around twenty representatives of European institutions such as the European Commission, with 90,000 subscribers, or the European Union Space Program Agency (EUSPA) (3,100 subscribers).
A network still with less than a hundredth Twitter users
Mastodon still remaining tiny (2.1 million active users in July according to its creator Eugen Rochko) compared to X (255 million active in November 2022 according to Elon Musk), the accounts mentioned here are not of the same size: on X, 18,600 subscribers for EUSPA and above all 1.8 million followers for the European Commission (main account, in English).
In May 2022, the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) announced the launch for the European institutions of an instance, EU Voice, on Mastodon, as well as its installation (EU Video) on PeerTube, free alternative to YouTube. With arguments similar to those now used by Switzerland:
“With the pilot launch of EU Voice and EU Video, we aim to offer alternative social media platforms that prioritize individuals and their rights to privacy and data protection. Concretely, this means, for example, that EU Voice and EU Video do not rely on transfers of personal data to countries outside the European Union and the European Economic Area; there are no advertisements on the platforms; and there is no profiling of people likely to use the platforms. These measures, among others, give individuals choice and control over how their personal data is used.”
“Free, outside the GAFAM system”
In November 2022, the Ministry of National Education in turn set up its own body for teachers: mastodon.mim-libre now indicates 246 active accounts.
Another example of a public service on the social network, the Isère town of Echirolles announced in February its arrival on Mastodon: “It is a social network in accordance with the digital strategy of Échirolles: free, outside the GAFAM system, and which therefore does not endanger the personal data of agents and users. Positioning yourself on a server hosted in France is also a guarantee of compliance with national and European laws and regulations (CNIL, GDPR, etc.).
It also means participating in a non-profit network, and therefore without advertising.”
“The SITPI (Intercommunal Union for Telematics and IT Services), of which Échirolles is a member with Le Pont-de-Claix and Fontaine, has created a server only in France: colter.social, reserved only for agents, services and elected officials of French local authorities who would like to create an account on Mastodon.”
The director of strategy and digital culture of Echirolles, Nicolas Vivant, has devoted several articles (including this one on the Framablog) to the de-Googlization policy of his community.
Read also
Free and open source express: National Education on Mastodon, Smile and Europe, Red Hat, Nonfiction – November 1, 2022
European institutions arrive on Mastodon and PeerTube, alternatives to Twitter and YouTube – May 8, 2022
Mastodon: the social network that could supplant Twitter – April 5, 2017