Mate, I was simply extending an analogy you introduced. I neither know (nor care) what the presence of a McDonalds does or doesn't do so don't Sagan me. Nor am I claiming mainstream social media is all arseholes. What I'm saying is that mainstream social media most certainly has the ability and propensity to make people into arseholes due to constant enshittification - part of which is the influencer phenomenon in my opinion and the need for growth at all costs.

I most definitely have reached out to lots of good people on the fediverse and had lots of great exchanges that follow both professional and 'hobby' based interests I have.

But here's the thing - you want growth? OK. I also have no issue with growth. But the best sort of growth in my experience comes organically. It happens at its own pace. The minute you start prodding it along with managed algorithms and all the other stuff mainstream social media now has you end up with an extended hate room. I don't miss Reddit or Xitter at all. I genuinely mean that. No more 'suggestions' of people to follow, no more manufactured outrage getting pushed to my feed, no more clickbait. Instead what I have now is a curated feed across multiple different types of experiences that I spent some time getting how I want them and dipping in and out of when I want to.

[–] rglullis 0 points 2 weeks ago

Who here is talking that the way to grow the network is by applying the techniques from Big Tech? It seems like you've created this giant strawman in your head.

All I am asking is for us to be more welcoming to people here, even if they are not exactly like what you wish. Or to help your friends to try it and see if they can help enough people/content for them to remain invested. Or even (possibly?) reaching out to someone on Twitter/YouTube and say "hey, I want to keep following you, but I don't want to stay here. Would you consider creating an account on Mastodon/Peertube?", etc.