Context: Technology Connections is a YouTuber https://www.youtube.com/@TechnologyConnections
This is his account on Mastodon https://mas.to/@TechConnectify
Not at all surprised.
I follow Alec on Mastodon and the vast majority of interactions over the past few months have been people aggressively "well ackshually"ing him or outright getting angry.
That isn’t to say it is all shit (I would like to think a few conversations I had with him were mutually pleasant). But his entire ethos is that he approaches problems from a practical “midwesterner” perspective. And that REALLY angers all the ideological nutjobs who are angry if anyone even suggests something that won’t advance their own pseudo-political goals.
And I’ve noticed it with a lot of other “celebrities” on Mastodon. The rest of us can have fun conversations while the shitheads stay to themselves. They are too high profile and the shitheads flock to them to make sure they understand why they are actually wrong and are a bad person for thinking something.
When you compare Alec’s recent videos with his early ones, it’s pretty clear that the negativity he receives has been wearing him down. Like many YouTubers, even when he’s sharing information about something he loves, he’s very bitter and sarcastic about it. Like, half of each video is trying to pre-argue with his trolls.
I understand why popular content creators have to set boundaries because it seems like a pretty soul-destroying job to have. If Bluesky helps him do that, more power to him. But for a nobody like me, I prefer Mastodon, largely because I’ve made friends with people on my local instance, and interacting with other servers is merely a bonus feature.
How low do you have to be to criticise Alec? He’s funny, informative, and I love the presentation of his videos. One of the last remaining great YouTubers. Apparently, being a pedophile is more acceptable on YouTube than being a good person. Now, why did I leave again…
Agreed. Technology Connections is one of my favorite channels – it’s always a good day when Alec posts a new video. I wish people would treat him better, he certainly deserves it.
I’m sorry he hasn’t liked it, but critique is how we get better. Hope Mastodon keeps growing.
It’s frustrating, because a lot of the interesting people to follow and engage with on Mastodon have also jumped to Bluesky, and the fedi crowd continues to crow about algorithms and brain rot, when the biggest reason people bounce off of Mastodon is the other people on Mastodon.
There’s a deep undercurrent of “angry, hostile nerd”. When people started flooding Mastodon in 2022, you could see the binary reaction of “Finally, the recognition we deserve!” and also “you’re in my house now, you fucking normie, and you’d better start acting like it”.
Unsurprisingly, the “fucking normies” noped out, either immediately, or as soon as they had another option that satisfied their objections with Twitter.
But we’re going to wring our hands and bitch about onboarding flows and the great sin of defederation, because it let’s us ignore that we are the problem.
I don’t know how to word it, but what I really hate about mastodon is that the cancel culture is like 10x every other platform. As soon as you have a slight disagreement on something it’s because you’re a homophobe and a racist and an ableist and you hate autistic people and whatnot. If the word woke wasn’t so used by trump to mean not being a fascist, it would be reserved for this kind of people. Idk I don’t like that mastodon is basically full of self diagnosed neuro divergent people. There are two extremes on the political spectrum, there’s the facist and mastodonists. I understand why someone wouldnt want to stay on there, it’s genuinely not a good place to have discussions on
It’s got a lot of untreated, traumatized people, and frustrated power nerds on it, and both groups let you know it with haste.
The kicker is, the population is still small enough that they could be easily overwhelmed and put in their place, but you need a real mass of semi-tightly networked people to come over and take over the space, and that’s… just not the way community migrations work. So they can fairly safely gatekeep the space.
Well, until Threads washes over everything. I don’t want to give shit to Zucks, but Threads will fundamentally change the makeup of the fedi microblog space in an instant, and that instant is growing ever closer.
I agree!!!
Speaking of critique, this reply thread on Mastodon by him is probably worth reading (regardless whether you agree or not) https://mas.to/@TechConnectify/113056731556590285
Sorry, try this one https://mas.to/@TechConnectify/113056731556590285
Honestly I feel the fediverse is like the 90s internet. It’s like school clubs centered around different interests and it takes a little bit of work to find your peer group but once you do it’s great. People that look to it as a replacement for Twitter are looking for a town square to shout at people and hock their wares. Anyone that makes money from engagement ether directly or indirectly are not looking for camaraderie but a market.
Maybe this is part of why I keep bouncing off Mastodon. It feels tight-knit. It’s about individuals, about relationships.
I don’t fit in such a system. I’ve nothing to offer in a relationship, I cannot be a “comrade.” Still, I want news, media, and easily accessible knowledge being shared.
So, I’m a lurker, a consumer. I tend towards anonymous forums and spaces centered around topics rather than people. Or, I seek celebrities, and sellers, and content creators.
Either sort-of give me something I want, while Mastodon doesn’t. Too focused on the people, but without big names to follow.
Maybe that’s why I didn’t like Bluesky it was all attention-seeking and curated accounts
I feel like we need to unite and make Mastodon a better place instead of making drama about it. Mastodon is not perfect, but it’s a platform over which we have control, unlike Bluesky.
