@viomi oh yikes, I didn't know about that. That's um. Not amazing.

@tindall Yep. Used to be an entire team running witches until a couple days ago when she decided to dismantle them for trying to ban a rapist.

If you feel like reading,

https://cybre.space/@viomi/99767700790778163
https://cybre.space/@viomi/99767368675570999

@viomi Oh so _that's_ what that was about? Wild. I miss a lot of drama by not consistently reading the FTL... I'm sorry that happened

@noelle @tindall lets not forget she suggested certain people should kill themselves

@squirrel @tindall @noelle what the *Fuck*.

Granted, this aligns with my experiences with the larger queer community: it somehow attracts more assholes on the fringes

@noelle mega yikes

@noelle I'm a bit sad about this because I enjoyed the community with Alda gone.

@mattcropp @tindall For long term stability I suspect we need more instances to be run by entities that will actually have a succession plan on hand. I think encouraging real-space charities, societies, and so on to set up instances might be no bad thing.

At some point I think @ExilianOfficial, which I help with, would be a good sort of organisation to run a Masto instance, but it's currently lacking the money & volunteer time needed.

@JubalBarca @ExilianOfficial @tindall

Agreed - my instance #socialcoop is structured to be collectively managed, so we've got that baked in.

I also think there's a lot of opportunities for small non-profits to take on instance administration for particular communities. For instance, the hackerspace I'm a member of is discussing spinning one up with the core membership aimed at residents of our town.

#WitchesTown

@mattcropp @tindall Yeah, very much so! Exilian is already a collectively-owned-democratic web community thingy, hence mentioning it. Social.coop definitely seems like a good model to be emulated.

I would characterise it as more than inconvenience for users; they do lose their follows, so will find themselves less visible to their friends.

Instance death could drive a degree of centralisation especially where users feel they are investing time and money.

I imagine for instance that many people who enjoyed the niche identity of a @witches.town account may not want to repeat the mistake.

@mattcropp @tindall @ExilianOfficial @JubalBarca

@JubalBarca
I think the ones run by institutions are probably a good bet for stable, long term existence. I know mastodon.acc.sunet.se is open to personal accounts for general public. Not sure if any of the others do. The Brazilian one run by tge ministry of culture might. (There was a thread of public & educational instances the other day.)
@mattcropp @tindall @ExilianOfficial

@frankiesaxx @JubalBarca @mattcropp @tindall @ExilianOfficial

although we lost the instance for Groningen digital city (NL) a while back (due to low level of use)

one factor may be emphasis on startups didn't sit well with anti-advertising ethos of Mastodon.

I felt bad about not tooting more there but wider project has links with Agentschap Telecom (NL communications ministry) so I didn't want to discuss pirate radio on and make things awkward..

@vfrmedia @frankiesaxx @mattcropp @tindall Unpopular take: I think Masto will have to get used to organisations on here if it wants to work well long-term. They shouldn't be able to buy the limited oxygen and choke everyone else like on other sites, but I'd rather see a fediverse-led social media universe with some bad businesses in than leave many ppl forced to rely on corporate social media.

@JubalBarca @frankiesaxx @mattcropp @tindall we do have many *good* organisations on here already (Fairphone ethically made mobile ohones and Apertus who are making a digital movie camera come to mind, they toot interesting/useful stuff and do not fill up the timelines with sales pitches - there are individuals also with niche tech/electronic projects, and art as well that are on the line between hobby project and side business but behave well..

@vfrmedia @frankiesaxx @mattcropp @tindall I operate 2 masto accounts, and the other is for a creative projects community-organisation, so yes - and good companies/groups are those we're likely to get first :) But if Masto grows big enough I suspect folk will expect to use it to get updates from bigger content makers, govts, parties, etc, some of whom the current user-base may balk at being here at all.

@vfrmedia @frankiesaxx @mattcropp @tindall It's a *very* difficult one to judge, of course - but I guess that can be fine-tuned with blocks, federating, etc, on Masto in a way other social media wouldn't manage.

I'd be interested (and probably wincing a lot) to see the result if any of the political organisations I'm a member of joined Mastodon...

@JubalBarca I don't think this is an unpopular take, but I do think you're putting the cart before the horse a bit. Organizations tend to go where their audiences are.

@tindall As someone seeing this from both sides of the fence, organisations definitely also go where they think audiences are about to be. I think it's more chickens and eggs than carts and horses - in practice, sites/systems just evolve towards growth with flows of both people and organisations moving in tandem, I suspect.

@JubalBarca That's fair!

@vfrmedia
Haha. That could be awkward. I mean, given the number of Patreon pitches I see, business has always been part of Mastodon.

I don't have issues with startups or coops or nonprofits or anybody being here. If I don't care for them, I'll block them. Sad the .nl instance shut down. I hope more people utilize some of the public instances and show it's wanted.
@JubalBarca @mattcropp @tindall @ExilianOfficial

@vfrmedia I didn't even know there was an instance for Groningen digital city!

@Reinderdijkhuis it lasted for a few months, to be fair the admins did warn in both Dutch and English as it was hardly being used it would be closed down.

I was genuinely interested in many of the projects but curiously no one was even saying much about what they were doing (a pity as I heard many were to help seniors live more independent lives and that is something I have a professional interest in from my day job...)

@vfrmedia @Reinderdijkhuis mstdn.nl is also down without any notice.

Most instances start as a personal project, like todon.nl. It's important when they grow larger that those personal projects become community projects. Of course a moderation team is a good start, but having more than one admin and eventually move towards a small organization or collectivize would be a good idea. I hope to do the latter with todon.nl when it's getting real big.

@JubalBarca @mattcropp @tindall @ExilianOfficial

I know the admin said they are not willing to hand it over to anyone but we have a month to change their mind. What if social.coop or another cooperative asked to take the reins? seems like maybe once the drama dies down there could be an opportunity to step in and keep the instance alive.

@wakest @ExilianOfficial @tindall @JubalBarca

I don't know if #socialcoop itself would have the capacity to take the reins directly, as we're running collectively without paid staff rn. However, a group of us could probably advise a #WitchesTown steering committee/coven on forming a #coop.

To succeed, such a conversion would really need to be driven by the instance residents (with significant #mutualaid from co-op friends).

@mattcropp @JubalBarca @tindall @ExilianOfficial I feel like witches.town is part of the fabric of mastodon and its really a shame if a community can die so easily. I don't honestly really care what the original drama is about. Some personal drama should not cause a collection of 1000s of people to not continue their ability to discus things using the identities they have spent the last year building.

@wakest @ExilianOfficial @tindall @JubalBarca

#WitchesTown #socialcoop #instance #instances #instancegovernance

@mattcropp @JubalBarca @tindall @ExilianOfficial

using a meme in this case is not the best way to encourage dialog.

@wakest @ExilianOfficial @tindall @JubalBarca

Was it my meme that @kaniini was referring to? The referent is unclear given the way that the thread's structured.

If so, not clear what norm was violated?

@kaniini @mattcropp @JubalBarca @tindall @ExilianOfficial

not sure how its a #badlook to open a discussion about how users can transition to maintain a instance they have been using for the last year. I am sure there are hundreds of people who are using witches.town who would rather not have to go through the hassle of setting up mastodon all over again. you lose all your followers if an instance shuts down.

@kaniini @ExilianOfficial @tindall @JubalBarca @mattcropp I didn't tag the admin so I wouldn't say I was preaching to them. I have nothing against them saying fuck off to mastodon. its that they are taking 1000s of others with them over that edge. so I was bringing up how others could help that transition. I am not sure the best way to bring up this matter with the admin but I assume someone who is close to them would be key.

@kaniini @mattcropp @JubalBarca @tindall @ExilianOfficial

thats OK! fantasy is an important part of reality!

@kaniini @wakest @ExilianOfficial @tindall @JubalBarca

The meme was basically reflecting the sensibility that authoritarian unitary leadership & cantrol of infrastructure creates a systematic vulnerability for communities, while I believe to be true.

As to advocating for someone who's being destructive to choose a less destructive path, I guess I just fundamentally not seeing how that's a "bad look" at all?

@mattcropp @JubalBarca @tindall @ExilianOfficial @kaniini using memes with cartoons and characters that are known for their making fun of things seems for sure not the best way to entourage communication. comes off as troll-ish. I assume there was no ill intent but it is still good to be sensitive to such things. I can also see how people here talking about "saving" another instance can come off as savior-y. just talkin' over here.

@wakest @kaniini @ExilianOfficial @tindall @JubalBarca

Huh.

TBH I've never encountered a reaction like this to meme use in a social media conversations like this before. I tend to treat them as tools for summation and expression of sensibilities, so this feels like a new approach to their usage for me.

Need to think about it, I suppose...

@mattcropp @JubalBarca @tindall @ExilianOfficial @kaniini

I would think of it like if your having a serious conversation with someone about something its not the best time to crack a joke.

@wakest @kaniini @ExilianOfficial @tindall @JubalBarca

Okay, that makes some sense to me. Reflecting on my intention, the purpose was to create a piece of media that expressed what feels to me to be a core lesson/take-away from the episode, but I can see how, in context, it could feel like making light of a serious situation.

@mattcropp @JubalBarca @tindall @ExilianOfficial @wakest

What's happening, I have friends on there.

@lehighcommunalist Admin had a transphobic melt-down and has declared they will be unilaterally nuking the instance at the end of April.

@mattcropp wow that place seemed super inclusive. Was the admin a secret TERF or something?

@lehighcommunalist ItsComplicated do png

@mattcropp On the practical side of things, this is why Mastodon users need an easy way to migrate their account to a new instance. And local backups of your personal account in case an admin nukes it because they had a bad day.

@lehighcommunalist
Short form; witches.town is shutting down, because the admin had a rant which basically claimed nonbinary identities weren't a real thing, had an argument with people, then decided to shut the instance down, so it's closing down on Apr 30 I think.

@wakest I dunno if you saw the toots that caused the original drama, but... it was all unpleasant enough that I fear them changing their mind is unlikely. I hope they do hand it over though - it's really sad when communities die, especially when people have often put so much of themselves into them.

@JubalBarca @ExilianOfficial @tindall @mattcropp not sure why this convo is being burying behind a warning? The discussion on the tenuous nature of instances and maintaining the energy and balance to keep them going really seems important and critical to the future of the fediverse.

@rbenjamin Because it's long, contentious, and it's trivial to open warnings while it's non-trivial to fully ignore non-warned posts that you don't want to see.

Putting things behind warnings isn't "burying", it's just courteous.

@rbenjamin @mattcropp @tindall The start of the convo included discussion of the issues that closed down witches.town, which are very much fair enough to content-warn as some of them are pretty sensitive & could be quite upsetting for people - I think just nobody removed the cw tag later into the conversation.

@JubalBarca @mattcropp @rbenjamin I think it's courteous to keep (and update, if relevant) CWs, just to allow people to opt out of the convo if they want to. I guess opinions vary though, which is chill! :)

@tindall @JubalBarca @rbenjamin yes, for threads like this, I see cw as less 'hiding' the conversation, and more making it so it takes up less total room and people can choose to opt in or out of participation.

@tindall @JubalBarca @mattcropp suppose. So is a thread either CW or not or can a particular portions be? Technically speaking? I’m new to all this.

@rbenjamin Each post can have a CW, or not. Replies automatically inheret the CW of the post they are replying to. IMO it's generally courteous to not remove or change the CW when you reply, unless the topic has actually changed.