The “fundamentally different social network, back in your hands.” The mastodon motto seems to be pulling. Prominent figures from the German-speaking Twitter cosmos are increasingly cavorting on the platform, which has a primeval proboscis in its logo instead of a birdie. At least since Elon Musk announced that he wanted to charge a fee of eight US dollars per month for the blue tick for verified Twitter accounts, some could already smell an exodus from the platform with the blue bird.
The most prominent example of the team of pioneers on Mastodon: satirist Jan Böhmermann. The moderator wrote on Twitter:
With det.social ZDF Magazin even manages its own server, where, after a first look, there are already a few well-known faces from the German-speaking world of Twitter. These include Dax Werner and El Hotzo.
However, and this is a big one, otherwise there is not much going on even on Böhmermann’s Mastodon server. Between a few original posts posted on Mastodon, mainly – no kidding – Twitter links are shared.
What about other servers? I look around and come across the bitcoinhackers.org server. It had already grown into a retreat for laser eyes in the course of the (but not so permanent) Twitter ban by former US President Donald Trump. After all, the libertarian Bitcoin Bubble feared a kind of censorship breach with the exclusion of the enfant terrible. However, bitcoinhackers.org was not particularly successful. But maybe on the second try?
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It’s harder to get to the Bitcoin Mastodon than to Berghain
I won’t know by the time of going to press. The server is closed and they ask for a kind of application letter. Truthfully, I answer with: “I’m a German bitcoiner and journalist looking for a Twitter alternative.” Hopefully one day I can get past the hard door of BTC gatekeepers and into the promised land of bitcoin maximalism.
Well, for Bitcoin there is still – Twitter! Incidentally, there they celebrate the takeover by Elon Musk. After all, the richest man in the world represents a very broad interpretation of freedom of expression; Hate speech should no longer be a criterion for exclusion in the future. Donald Trump is already rolling up his golf pants and getting ready for his Twitter comeback from Mar-a-Lago. There is enough fire to pour in oil.
In addition, Musk is considered an outspoken crypto friend. His favorite coin is not orange, but has a Shiba Inu dog in the logo. Ultimately, however, BTC in particular should benefit from a deeper crypto integration.
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Mastodon: Trendy is different
I look further and find the server ravenation.club. Cool, a techno community. Here I can pursue my second passion as a DJ, I think. But here too: yawning emptiness. Actually there is only the user @Anakiin15, but he doesn’t seem to know what to do with the social platform as a solo participant either.
Has Mastodon failed as a Twitter alternative? One could now be cynical and say that “decentralized Twitter” doesn’t stand a chance against the original anyway. And that’s probably true. Nevertheless, it is good that there are alternatives to the blue bird that at least begin to show the limits of the megalomania of its new owner. Or if you’re just not in the mood for the erratic multi-billionaire.
But what really bothers me about Mastodon is the fact that you have to join a new server for each topic. Brainless doom scrolling, unhealthy as it is, is just plain fun. On Twitter, right under a thread that discusses an economist’s doctoral thesis on the historical connection between interest rates and the price of gold, you can find tweets like this one:
The announced mass exodus after Mastodon will most likely not happen. Or, to put it in the words of the one and only El Hotzo:
“Mastodon feels like you’re dating the nice guy with the clean apartment, but every time you’re in his arms you think about the chain-smoking ex with the gaming chair.”
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