I find it difficult to get my head around mastodon and federated messaging in general.
It seems like a lot of effort to go to when all I want is a social messaging app. I want to make an account once and be able to message anyone else on whatever app I'm using, not have to worry about whether my chosen node happens to be connected to theirs, not to mention that something like this [0] can happen and then apparently you need to personally handle migrating your data to another instance. These are technical details, not things that users should need to think about.
I don't see any federated messaging platform becoming popular until it reaches the point where users don't even have to understand what "federated messaging" means.
Mastodon prompts (forces?) you think differently about what it means to be social on the internet. Do you want to have every message you write broadcast out to the entire planet? Do you want to receive messages FROM the entire planet? The scope of Twitter is "every single person on the service all in a room". To me, that's nightmarish and stopped being a good model like, 10 years ago.
I think it's about time people in general started to learn about what it means to entrust the entirety of their communication on singular entities that don't have a shred of respect for them, their agency, their rights, or their well-being in any way whatsoever.
My personal belief is the ignorant trust of the tech world is on its way out, without severe legislation to protect the rights of the public. The right to own the data they produce (and prevent it from being held hostage), the right to privacy, the right to agency over what kind of communications and solicitations they are subjected to on the now-essential Internet. Dunno, just my thoughts but I see Mastodon (and similar federated networks) as absolutely crucial examples of the way forward.
Problem is Mastodon has been around since 2016. It's got some attention, but never to the level that it could challenge Twitter. Reminds me of challengers to YouTube. Some YouTube challengers like Dailymotion, Vimeo, Twitch, etc... have got some media attention and hype, and have done OK, but just not at the level where it can be seen as a replacement. Get the feeling that Mastodon is in the same category, in comparison to Twitter.
People are definitely going there. Like, people who have hundreds of thousands of followers on Twitter. William Gibson, Leo Laporte, Jordan Mechner, Martin Fowler, just to name a few I noticed having recently joined up.
Arguably Twitter still doesn’t have mass-market culture fit outside a few bubbles. User growth has long been stuck. Their recent study shows that active users drop off at an alarming rate.
https://joinmastodon.org/
But people go where people are, so we’ll see if it gets traction.