It's kinda funny that I don't even care anymore that "not everyone is on Mastodon". It is definitely a good thing. The same happened in the past with IRC and Telegram. You know they still exist, lots of people like me use them and I still will not use the popular ones that much or at all.
@rolle I was very much into IRC back in the day and having a channel with half a dozen people was great. I think I’d only miss the big audience if I had something to sell, so having less of that pressure is a positive.
News tends to find me regardless.
@donovanh We still have a very active IRC channel today that has over 100 people.
Social media has never been a channel to sell for me. Marketing, perhaps, but that does not require tens of thousands of followers. A couple of thousand will do.
@rolle Well.. IRC is still very much popular among the people. Especially when uses some of the modern updated or already new features equipped servers. Such options I like a lot. For example being able to download on demand all of the previous conversations from the time period when I wasn't logged into the channel. For me personally that's an great idea, because I don't have any gaps in the whole topic being discussed. Same as this new variation of gopher called gemini, which is awesome idea.
@MartinBe Yeah, I still use IRC daily and our channel has a very active userbase.
@rolle Too true! I thought I would miss the other platforms, but I find I have more engagement here.
And the people I want to stay in touch with, I stay in touch IRL (or via signal/etc).
Mastodon/Fediverse has given me new contacts and more engagement than I had on other sites/platforms.
@markmetz @rolle Exactly that! I've tried to get some IRL x/twitter-using friends over, because knowing their political/life leanings, I do not understand why they stay, but they say it's what they know. Still I carefully try to remind them of the fun days of early twitter, and how mastodon/fediverse is much more accepting.
Mostly they reply "yes, but so-and-so is not there", and they do not want to acknowledge the stockholm syndrome they find themselves in.
In a sense, everyone IS on Mastodon. 😅 I mean, you can share your sh... stuff by link and it's open for everyone to view, unlike walled gardens. (if not closed post)
@exerra @jarkko @donovanh For WhatsApp, IRC, Signal and Discord. Yes, privacy is always something you should think about and if you're unsure, do not use. https://www.beeper.com/faq#our-primary-objective-is-to-earn-and-keep-your-trust
Few things I like in IRC over Matrix, or any other protocol in professional setting: