Cory Doctorow: “Online, a lot of us have been unhappy with our social media platforms for a long time, but we hang in there, year after year, scandal after scandal, because as much as we hate the platform, we love the people who use the platform. We don’t leave because we don’t want to lose them. They don’t leave because they don’t want to lose us. It’s a hostage situation, and we’re all holding each other hostage.Collective action problems are hard problems…. The Big Tech platforms style themselves as “benevolent dictators.” Sure, they have the final say over your digital life, but they only wield that power because they want to help you. That’s the story whether it’s Facebook or Twitter blocking you from posting a link to a site like Distributed Denial of Secrets, or Gmail blocking independent mail-servers from reaching your inbox, or Apple blocking alternative Instagram apps that shield you from tracking and ads…There is a better way. The tech giants don’t have to run walled gardens, they choose to. We can make them choose otherwise.”

• See also Washington Post: They traded Twitter for Mastodon Social. Now what? “People are swapping Twitter for a tech-savvy replacement. The reviews are mixed.”
• See also Gizmodo: How to Join Mastodon, the Ad-Free Social Network Billionaires Can’t Buy. “A short primer how to join the great #TwitterMigration and what to expect from the servers you join.”