So I had been planning on getting back on Twitter recently, but right after I made the decision the company was bought by Elon Musk. At first, I didn’t care one way or another about it and decided to wait a bit and see what happened. My backup plan was to move to Mastodon, which is an open-source alternative to Twitter.
I’m glad I waited. Since Musk took over Twitter seems to have fallen apart. There’s no content moderation, hate speech 
and trolls have been unleashed, and members are dropping faster than football players during a tight World Cup game. At least the football players can get back into the game. Twitter seems to be turning into a Mad Max wasteland.
Mastodon is very much like Twitter, but it’s also very different. There’s a slight learning curve during the sign-up process, but I think I’ve got the basics down. Plus, I’m finding a lot of the accounts I followed on Twitter have migrated over. So it’s nice to see familiar faces.
I’m hopeful that Mastodon will be around for a while and gain popularity. The thing I liked most about Twitter was the Writing Community. It was a great place to meet other writers, to exchange ideas, promote each other’s writing, and find inspiration and motivation. I know the community is still there, but I feel it won’t last terribly long. At least, not the community I grew to love. It’ll slowly be picked apart by the dark forces and eventually fade away.
If you’re interested in an alternative community, check out Mastodon. You can find me here for now, but there’s a very slim chance I may set up my own Mastodon server. There’s a lot to consider beforehand, so right now it’s in the dream stage. Until I win the lottery or inherit money from a long-lost relative, it’ll probably remain a dream.
But hey, check it out and feel free to contact me if you decide to join.
RB
Musk taking over Twitter MAY work out in the long run. Right now, it’s in the “tear down the old” portion of rebuilding (or total collapse, lol).
I’d love to know where this mythical, wonderfully supportive writers’ community was on twitter though. I found a few good people… who all turned a blind eye to the bullying I saw; “you’re not a REAL writer if you do anything different from me”, “men can’t write”, political POVs forced into writing discussions… Mainly I remember getting bullied and blacklisted myself for defending others who were bullied.
It’s difficult to find supportive writing communities online, but I’ll continue my search. Nothing ventured and all that jazz.
Oh good to know where you’ll be! yes Twitter’s going through interesting times?
I’ve not been regular there lately myself and haven’t heard much about Mastodon (except about its learning curve). I hope we hear more about your adventures there ^_^
Thanks, Lila!