Despite the fact that Mastodon is one of its rivals, the thousands of users who migrated from Twitter are noticing that this platform is quite different.
Twitter is in an obvious crisis after it was confirmed that its main offices have closed due to the fact that employees did not accept the new working conditions imposed by Elon Musk . Despite the fact that the billionaire in charge of Tesla and SpaceX tries not to pay too much attention to it, it is a fact that the social network that he now runs is not having a good time and thousands of users are migrating to other platforms due to this debacle. One of the main alternatives is Mastodon , a direct rival of Twitter .
However, these people who escaped the Musk administration are noticing that Mastodon is very different from Twitter . Although the platform promises to be an “open, free and federated network”, its operation based on several servers is much more complex. Here are the main differences between these social networks that are taking their recent new user base by storm.
The differences between Twitter and Mastodon
Mastodon is divided into several servers and each of these have their own rules. There is no main or sovereign administrator like Elon Musk who can decide these rules on all servers and, rather, there are “small communities” with their respective “leader”. Depending on the community in which it ends up, the experience changes radically.
In these last few days in which users have increased, some administrators have chosen to be very severe with their efforts, blocking users who do not conform to the rules of said community. Others, on the contrary, take it much more calmly. This decentralization is one of its most notable characteristics and although many prefer it that way, it can also lead to bad practices from both users and leaders. Luckily, moving to another server is possible.
When it comes to the presentation of information, Twitter shows us publications that do not always align with our particular tastes. On the contrary, Mastodon focuses on the circles of friends and the interests of the users to facilitate the formation of “echo chambers”, information bubbles where the content will almost always be linked to the preferences of the people. This can be good or bad depending on the user’s vision.
One feature that Twitter and Mastodon share is private messaging, which isn’t really private at all. Since the security of the platform is focused at the server level, an anonymous user will not be able to read your messages, but the administrators will be able to do so since these texts are not encrypted.
Mastodon is a rival to Twitter, but they are not the same
As far as development is concerned, Twitter is simply on another level. Some of the best engineers in the field have passed through the company to cement the great platform that it is today. On the other hand, Mastodon is a project that relies on volunteer collaborators to correct errors and vulnerabilities, so its cybersecurity capacity could not keep up with the massive flow of new users it has.
Despite this, Mastodon has mechanisms such as two-step authentication and other more robust privacy controls such as applying filters, deleting old messages and approving followers. As far as the constant battle against trolls is concerned, it would be extremely complicated for administrators since this platform does not have a global message search engine.
Mastodon ‘s decentralization separates it quite a bit from what Twitter is and represents, but it is also one of its greatest advantages and differences with the social network currently commanded by Elon Musk