Mastodon

About

Mastodon is web server software which provides a user interface to the OStatus and ActivityPub fediverses. It is written primarily in Ruby and JavaScript; Eugen Rochko is the creator and primary maintainer. The official code repository is on GitHub.

ActivityPub support was introduced in version 1.6, with the intention of making it Mastodon's primary communication protocol.

It also makes use of WebSub but I haven't found an explanation of how this fits in. -- Woozle

This page is a seed article. You can help HTYP water it: make a request to expand a given page and/or donate to help give us more writing-hours!

Pages

• instance: a brief definition
• people: a directory
• tech: details about how it works
• usage: user guides
• admin: administration guides

Forks

• Toot.Cat: GitHub
• Mastodon Glitch Edition
• Mastodo

Apps

• official list of clients
  • /Tusky (GitHub) (Mastodon: official, main developer)
  • TootStream: CLI Mastodon client (Python)

Utilities

• Hellthread Visualizer

Links

official

• home site
  • documentation
  • corporate sponsors
• GitHub
• Twitter

reference

• Wikipedia
• Guide to Mastodon (as PDF) (via)
• The Mastodon Wiki (not sure who runs this)
• Grafana - Mastodon Network Overview
• Mastodon instances: an automated list of all known Mastodon instances, with technical ratings
• Instance Recommendations (via via) "Some general suggestions for whitelisting, blocking and/or silencing instances"
• Mastodon Apps: official list of apps available or in progress
• kitty.town (home):
  • Domain Block List: list of problematic instances (as determined by the Mayor of kitty.town)
  • promotional flyers
• First Toot: look up the first message posted on any public instance

compilations

• Artodon: Mastodon Art gallery (curated from multiple instances) (via)

posts about

• 2021-02-11 delve’s Mastodon Resource List, v1
• 2020-09-26 Decentralized Social Networks vs. The Trolls (video) (h/t): moderation on Mastodon, with a brief introduction to the fediverse; what happened with Gab
• 2018-09-14 Twitter's Emerging Competitor Doesn't Want to Be Twitter
• 2018-07-06 [official] Cage the Mastodon: An overview of features for dealing with abuse and harassment (h/t) by Eugen Rochko: includes an explanation of why they won't ever support quote-boosts ("QB"). I am skeptical.
• 2018-03-23 The new technology that aspires to #DeleteFacebook for good (via)
• 2018-01-22 The Mastodon In The Room (via) by Sadiq
• 2017-11-30 Update and retrospective
• 2017-10-19 [official] Mastodon 2.0: The Big Emoji Update by Eugen Rochko
• 2017-08-01 [official] M for Mastodon by Eugen Rochko
• 2017-07-07 Connection: Meeting a Mastodon for Lunch (IRL) (toot)
• 2017-06-15 I have to say that it's slightly irritating when new users (wrongly) imply that...: some myths about Mastodon
• 2017-05-07 One Week of Mastodon
• 2017-04-23 Mourning Mastodon (share and)
• 2017-04-09
  • Mastodon, pineapples, social media and other unanswered questions (via) by Johanna Drott
  • What I wish I knew before joining Mastodon (via)
• 2017-04-05 Mastodon is dead in the water
• 2017-04-04 Mastodon Is Like Twitter Without Nazis, So Why Are We Not Using It?

instances

• social.targaryen.house has repeatedly shown that they will passively tolerate free speech trolling

service providers

Managed hosting for Mastodon instances:

• MaaStodon stopped accepting new accounts on 2018-05-15
  • run by CobaltVelvet (also admin of octodon.social)
• masto.host: hosting for Mastodon instances; they provide maintenance
  • run by hugo@masto.pt

technical

Official:

• Using the API
  • OAuth details
  • Testing with cURL: it's possible to get OAuth tokens with client_id, client_secret, email, and password too

tools: web

• Nerdpanel: reads your Mastodon posts and lets you search them; does not store anything on a server

tools: code

• Mastodon.py: Python wrapper for Mastodon API
• Mastodon Tools: PHP code that interfaces with Mastodon in various ways
• Halcyon: a PHP client for Mastodon, and related stuff
• SupportBot: "A framework for making social media bots for multiple networks" written in Python
• Mastodon Bridge: cross-correlates your Twitter and Mastodon account, and shows commonality (only for users who have used the same tool)
  • https://github.com/tootsuite/mastodon-bridge - source code (Ruby); good example of how to allow an app to access Mastodon, which effectively includes authentication
• mastodon-backup: "Archive your statuses, favorites and media using the Mastodon API (i.e. login required)"

Notes

Wish list:

• a way to set up auto-replies filtered by instance [1]
• where X is a set of users chosen by user Y, collect stats about users who follow them or are followed by them (e.g. list users who follow a lot of them or are followed by a lot of them, possibly for autoblocking) and make those stats available to user Y.

Other stuff:

• 2017-06-26 Moderation hotfix - mst3k.interlinked.me, coales.co (archive): note about a reverted block