In this post I share three tips that have helped me find great people on Mastodon.

In contrast to your regular corporate Big Tech social media, the Fediverse is not packed with algorithms that build your world for you. You have to do it yourself.

To be sure, this has advantages. For example, your digital world will be a more active product of who you are and what you like, rather than what some algorithm thinks you like, on the basis of some superficial reading of who you are. Also, it prevents a few popular accounts from getting even more popular, which helps to spread and share the community’s attention more equally.

At the same time, it also requires a bit extra effort. And given that we’re trying to convince people to leave a tech industry that employs an army of designers and pyschologists to minimize all forms of resistance and discomfort, we should probably make this effort as painless as possible.

So here are three tips that have really worked well for me on Mastodon. N.b. the third and last tip is a real game changer, so don’t leave halfway ;)

Tip 1. Create lists#

I like lists.

For example because they allow me to make a distinction between accounts whose posts I really do not wan’t to miss (friends, colleagues),¹ and accounts whose posts I don’t mind missing every now and then.

But also because they allow me to club together accounts on different themes and topics. In my personal case, I for example like to have a special list for accounts that post from/about Colombia.

Creating a list is not hard. You simply go to the “getting started” overview (the three horizontal lines, next to “settings” and “log out”), and then to “Lists”.

Another way is to click on someone’s account, and then on the three dots next to the “follow”-button and choose “add or remove from list”.

Tip 2. Visualize your lists in columns#

When it comes to running Mastodon in a browser, I personally really like the multi-column view. You can then “pin” your lists permanently to their own columns.

To turn on the “multi-column” view, go to settings and tick the box of “Enable advanced web interface”. Don’t forget to save the changes.

To pin a list in a column, go to the “Getting started” overview, go to “Lists”, and click on a list. You will now see your list in a column.

To “pin” the list (i.e. make sure that it does not disappear), you click on the little gear on the top right of the column, and click “pin”.

Now, whenever you visit the Mastodon desktop environment, accounts appear in their own columns.

Tip 3. Use relays to build rich lists#

Discoverability on the Fediverse#

To introduce this last, third point, we need to briefly recognize an important difference between the Fediverse and other digital social networks: the Fediverse is not one big, central server that connects everyone with everyone; it consists of many, federated servers, or “instances”, that link up with each other in a decentral way.

We all have an account on (or are users at) a specific instance. Whenever I post something, my own instance of course “knows” about this message. That means that it can show this message to the other people who also have an account on this same instance.

When people from another instance follow me, my post is also sent to their instance. From that point onwards, that other instance knows about my message, and can show it to the other users of that other instance. If they for example follow the tag #Colombia, and I post something with that same tag, they will see my post, even though they are not on my instance.

However, if no one on that other instance follows me, my post is not sent to that other instance. This means that that instance does not know about my post, which means that the users of that instance will never know my post ever existed. They might follow the tag #Colombia, and I might use that tag, but they will never see my post.

Some people think this is a strength of the Fediverse. For example because it ensures that the network grows more “organically” around specific communities, much like real life.

At the same time, this “lack of discoverability” can also make Mastodon feel a bit quiet. Especially if you’re on a relatively small instance, that only knows a relatively small part of the Fediverse.

This is where relays come in.

Relays#

A relay is basically a node in the network that tracks a lot of messages across the Fediverse. Small instances can then in turn keep track of that node, to “get to know” more messages in the Fediverse.

I myself am using https://relay.fedi.buzz/ and I relay like it 🥁. Let me explain how I use it, in combination with the other two points mentioned above:

Three steps to bring Fedibuzz into your life#

1. First you can use this page to create a link that allows you to follow a tag through the relay. You simply create the link, paste it in the search bar of Mastodon, and press follow. You will now get all messages that use that tag, that the relay knows about (which is much more than your own instance knows about).
2. Now it gets more interesting: as the page shows, you can also create a link that allows you to follow all messages of an entire instance. In my case, I have always kind of wanted to be part of https://col.social/, but since I’m already committed to social.edu.nl I never could. Now, with Fedibuzz, I can follow their entire timeline from my own instance. I simply (again) create the link on the Fedibuzz page, paste the link in the Mastodon search bar and press follow.
3. Here comes the finale: since the two relay options (for tags and for instances) are basically themselves “accounts that you follow”, you can put them together in a list!² And then you can put this list in a separate column! 🤯 So in my case, I have a column that shows me a list, that contains all messages that the Fedibuzz relay tracks that 1) mention #Colombia, or 2) mention #Medellin, or 3) are part of the col.social instance. This gives me an great overview of what the Fediverse has to say about Colombia.

And I could of course repeat this for other interests. I for example also have a column for a list that contains all messages that the Fedibuzz relay tracks, that 1) mention #EarthScience 2) or #Aardwetenschappen or 3) #Climatechange or 4) #Klimaat. And if I ever find an instance that contains a lot of interesting EarthScience people, I might add that entire instance to the list as well!

I know (and respect) that some people prefer their Fediverse small, and that they would like the growth to be organic. But I believe that tricks like this can help newcomers feel less alone: this way, it’s easier to find the people that you want to hang out with! And over time, you might see that you depend less and less on the Fedibuzz relay!

Do let me know if you have any questions, tips or suggestions.