Hans van Zijst

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

Professional nerd and grammar nazi, writes in Dutch and English. Can read some German, French and Spanish too. Learning русский.

Location:: Netherlands

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 00:00:44 +0200

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

The next few days we're going to see a lot of posts complaining how much talk about #Twitter there is on the #Fediverse. And I agree, up to a certain level.

But I love the shared #Schadenfreude about the rapid demise of a 44 billion dollar website, and the total clown Eloon had proven himself to be. That's something that a lot of us have in common, so let's just enjoy it while it lasts.

show all 34 Comments

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 00:03:10 +0200

Adam Hunt

gander22h@diasp.org

I think it is worth noting here on D*, as when Twitter finally sinks to the bottom of the ocean there will be no record of it there!

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 00:06:10 +0200

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

@Adam Hunt Indeed. Twitter is ephemeral 😂

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 00:07:31 +0200

｛Hans｝

hans@hubzilla.hopto.org

Although I partly agree I do hope they stay there. Been exploring Mastodon again and I can only conclude that only tech things changed (they seem to flood less these days ). The people on Mastodon are Nagging, resharing, complaining, fighting.... on it. It still is Twitter, only with a differen name.

Besides that? Yeah, I think it indeed is funny but loosing 1 million customers that never did want to pay a dime .... that is not much

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 00:10:46 +0200

Mastodon Belgium Admin

admin@mastodon-belgium.be

@hans It's going to be a rather interesting case study to see how long an owner can keep running a once profitable website further and further in the ground before investers take action.

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 00:16:09 +0200

Adam Hunt

gander22h@diasp.org

The only other place will be archive.org...

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 00:17:35 +0200

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

@Hans I disagree. Sure, there are wankers on the Fediverse, just like on Twitter and IRL. But I hardly ever come across those, and I like to think that's because of the self-cleaning nature of the Fediverse.

If one or two people block a troll, nazi or otherwise annoying person, he won't show up in my public stream anymore; no moderation by server admins needed. I love that algorithm 😉

And the more the Fediverse grows and polarizes, the better that process works. Blocking entire servers becomes easier as well, adding to the effect.

Let every Twitter user come to the Fedi, I'm sure all the trash gets weeded out in no time.

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 00:17:36 +0200

tom grzybow

tomgrzybow@diasp.nl

It's a Norwegian Blue.

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 00:21:10 +0200

｛Hans｝

hans@hubzilla.hopto.org

@Hans van Zijst Well, I've seen them busy on Mastodon ( that is not the same as the fediverse )

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 00:22:40 +0200

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

@Mastodon Belgium Admin Twitter was never profitable, even though it was certainly successful until Eloon bought it.

But indeed it's going to be interesting to see how long it takes before he decides it's not worth spending his own money on it. He has very deep pockets, but at some point he's going to come to the conclusion he fubar'ed it.

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 00:23:59 +0200

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

@tom grzybow And it's most certainly stunned 😂

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 00:25:27 +0200

Kenny Chaffin

kennychaffin@diasp.org

Yep, I agree with @Hans van Zijst ... I've not seen many Trolls, Nazis etc or either mastodon.art or on mastodon.social

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 00:27:16 +0200

Quantum

QuantumAspect@mastodon.social

@hans I don't see the implosion just yet. The aviary of hate still has hundreds of millions users. And which part of that went to Mastodon? At most a mere 10 million.

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 00:27:30 +0200

Mastodon Belgium Admin

admin@mastodon-belgium.be

@hans IIRC they were sometimes profitable.
But since Elon's "optimizations" things indeed took a nosedive instead of going up.

Wonder how long it'll take for him to see that his tactics are having the opposite effect than intended.

So far it looks like he's guzzling his own cool-aid.

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 01:38:53 +0200

Adam Hunt

gander22h@diasp.org

I just noticed that you can't see "public posts" on Twitter anymore unless you are signed in. That makes it pretty useless for public information dissemination.

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 06:50:34 +0200

tom grzybow

tomgrzybow@diasp.nl

^ This is good.

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 09:17:50 +0200

Wilco Roos

wroos@diasp.org

That will drive companies away that are now stupid enough to use the platform for costumer support and contact, good, may its demise be messy and a joy to watch

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 09:34:35 +0200

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

@Wilco Roos

may its demise be messy and a joy to watch

It has been so far!

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 09:46:51 +0200

Wilco Roos

wroos@diasp.org

Anyone any idea how much 'worth' Twitter has lost from the original 44 Billion?

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 09:51:44 +0200 last edited: Mon, 24 Jul 2023 09:52:41 +0200

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

I heard it's lost about half its value. Then again, that's value on paper, I don't think that means a lot in the real world.

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 09:58:36 +0200

Mastodon Belgium Admin

admin@mastodon-belgium.be

@hans It does if you're one of the serious investors who ponied up several million dollars.

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 10:06:51 +0200

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

@Mastodon Belgium Admin Oh yes, the debts are real 😎

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 13:42:00 +0200

Filbert :misskey:

thisisfilbert@misskey.social

@hans@social.woefdram.nl I'm still wondering why he wanted to spend $44 billions without concrete plans. Well, I guess he can use that much of money to buy Meta and ruin it.

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 14:10:01 +0200

Adam Hunt

gander22h@diasp.org

Anyone any idea how much ‘worth’ Twitter has lost from the original 44 Billion?

Its value today is determined by how much anyone would pay for it. Musk has destroyed it, so I would say it is worth nothing. They don't even own their own servers or office space and haven;t been paying rent on them. Just no goodwill or value left. I mean how much would you give Musk for it today?

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 15:22:29 +0200

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

Some parties might be interested in the name, but he destroyed that too 😂

I wouldn't give him a penny for it, mostly because I wouldn't be interested in a closed source walled garden anyway. Why use that if there are much better alternatives? Only reason to do that, would be to get rich. And although I'd love to have a bit more money than today, getting rich isn't one of my life goals.

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 15:28:22 +0200

Adam Hunt

gander22h@diasp.org

Only reason to do that, would be to get rich.

Musk seems to be doing the opposite, burning cash at an amazing rate there.

Tue, 25 Jul 2023 01:26:48 +0200

tom grzybow

tomgrzybow@diasp.nl

Hmmm, cocaine?

Tue, 25 Jul 2023 01:56:47 +0200

Adam Hunt

gander22h@diasp.org

Well he calls it "autism":

https://www.washingtonpost.com/arts-entertainment/2021/05/09/elon-musk-hosts-snl/

Tue, 25 Jul 2023 02:07:17 +0200

tom grzybow

tomgrzybow@diasp.nl

Rash and overconfident decision-making? Autism? Well, whatever.

Tue, 25 Jul 2023 16:14:49 +0200

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

Oh boy, seems like this is again one of his "rash and overconfident" decisions, as @tom grzybow said:

https://www.reuters.com/technology/problem-with-x-meta-microsoft-hundreds-more-own-trademarks-new-twitter-name-2023-07-25/

"There's a 100% chance that Twitter is going to get sued over this by somebody," said trademark attorney Josh Gerben, who said he counted nearly 900 active U.S. trademark registrations that already cover the letter X in a wide range of industries.

Tue, 25 Jul 2023 16:20:37 +0200

Adam Hunt

gander22h@diasp.org

LOLz. Wait, you mean he didn't do his homework. I'm shocked.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Te1uEfgwfg

Tue, 25 Jul 2023 16:26:08 +0200

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

Hehehe, seems like there are at least two stable geniuses in the US 😏

Tue, 25 Jul 2023 16:57:38 +0200

Adam Hunt

gander22h@diasp.org

Three, if you count Wile E Coyote.

Tue, 25 Jul 2023 16:58:55 +0200

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

True, he's been stable for decades.

Tue, 25 Jul 2023 17:09:09 +0200

Adam Hunt

gander22h@diasp.org

When Trump used the term I assumed he meant he lived in a stable.

Mon, 03 Jul 2023 18:21:10 +0200

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

Whatever #Musk thinks he's doing, I hope he keeps doing it. It's good: people start looking around, see if there's an alternative for this craphole. And yes, there are (as we here already know).

This is easily the worst thing Musk has done since taking over the site, and his most obvious smokescreen saying this is about protecting the site from evil AI scrapers. If that’s true, it’s effectively like burning down your house to kill a couple mosquitos.

Well: "burn, baby, burn!"

https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2023/07/02/no-one-believes-elon-musks-explanation-for-breaking-twitter/

(Thanks to @Laurens Verhagen for bringing this article to my attention)

#TwitterMigration

Mon, 03 Jul 2023 18:33:15 +0200

tom grzybow

tomgrzybow@diasp.nl

Ironic, huh, that Elon Musk has lately been the strongest force directing people to the Federation.

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 11:42:06 +0200

The Master Mariner

KhunKai@stranger.social

@hans
Glad I deleted my twitter account some time ago.

#twitter #musk #elonmusk #twittercesspool

Sat, 22 Apr 2023 15:42:47 +0200

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

"If Jack has given up on #Twitter, why are we still here?"

Good question.

https://nitter.net/Carnage4Life/status/1649119588435783681

Sat, 22 Apr 2023 15:47:17 +0200

CassandraZeroCovid

CassandraZeroCovid@mastodon.social

@hans

Jack sold out to Musk and said nice thinkgs about him - why would we care what either of them says or does?

Sat, 22 Apr 2023 15:50:32 +0200

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

@CassandraZeroCovid You don't have to care, I hope people who still use the free-for-all-hellscape start wondering wtf they're still doing there.

Tue, 24 Jan 2023 11:46:21 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

I finally understand why #Musk carried that kitchen sink.

"I'm going to flush #Twitter down the drain."

Mon, 19 Dec 2022 03:09:15 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

Apparently Eloon launched a poll, asking if he should step down. I sincerely hope he remains in control for at least a few more months.

He's doing a fantastic job convincing people that open, federated systems like #Mastodon are the way to go. It's in the best interest of the whole world that he be given the time to drive #Twitter completely into the ground.

Mastodon Users wrote the following post Mon, 19 Dec 2022 03:00:11 +0100

8,643,998 accounts
+3,707 in the last hour
+56,960 in the last day
+275,758 in the last week

Tue, 22 Nov 2022 17:41:52 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

If you're new to the #Fediverse and/or #Mastodon and get this feeling that it's not exactly what you expected, please read this. This is an excellent piece about #FediCulture.

TL;DR This isn't #Twitter, and that's by design> Here's why.

Stefano Zacchiroli wrote the following post Tue, 22 Nov 2022 17:12:51 +0100

Must read on #Mastodon culture for everyone (considering) migrating there from #Twitter: https://uxdesign.cc/mastodon-is-antiviral-design-42f090ab8d51

show all 10 Comments

Tue, 22 Nov 2022 17:56:26 +0100

Kenny Chaffin

kennychaffin@diasp.org

Unfortunately you can't read the article unless you create a login/signup... :)

Tue, 22 Nov 2022 18:00:27 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

@Kenny Chaffin I see, this is at the top of the article for me:

You have 2 free member-only stories left this month. Sign up for Medium and get an extra one

A trick that usually works, is disabling JavaScript and reloading the page. Believe it or not, but many sites are stupid enough to put their paywall in the client that's visiting them, instead of the server that they themselves control.

Tue, 22 Nov 2022 18:02:58 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

And if that doesn't work, using Tor to get a different IP-adress will.

Tue, 22 Nov 2022 18:10:08 +0100

David

davidmorley@diasp.org

or https://12ft.io/https://uxdesign.cc/mastodon-is-antiviral-design-42f090ab8d51

Tue, 22 Nov 2022 18:13:25 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

@David Ah yes, that's a nice one too.

Tue, 22 Nov 2022 19:25:15 +0100

Tanja

tanja@hz.lazyteddy.eu

Very interesting read. Although it's all about Mastodon, specifically, most of it applies to the rest of the Fediverse as well, and some of it applies even more to Hubzilla / Streams. Hubzilla (minus AP) is definitely slower than Mastodon, especially if you sort your stream by "Posted date" instead of "Commented date", like I do.

Of course, I'm not exactly a prime example with my relatively small circle, but I did notice the difference between here and my Mastdon instance (which, incidentally, I ditched in the meantime.)

Tue, 22 Nov 2022 19:38:22 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

@Tanja Yup, this is a nice explanation of the fundamental difference between the Fediverse and the birdsite. It's not Mastodon specific, but the author seems to cater for the misconception of new users that Mastodon is the name of this world. Missed opportunity, but he does a very good job explaining that this is not Twitter.

I too have noticed that Hubzilla is a bit slower than Mastodon. I assume that's because the Mastodon client connects to a streaming service where it gets immediate updates, whereas Hubzilla seems to run a piece of JavaScript code every now and then, that checks if there's anything new to display.

Tue, 22 Nov 2022 19:54:30 +0100

Tanja

tanja@hz.lazyteddy.eu

@Hans van Zijst

I too have noticed that Hubzilla is a bit slower than Mastodon. I assume that's because the Mastodon client connects to a streaming service where it gets immediate updates, whereas Hubzilla seems to run a piece of JavaScript code every now and then, that checks if there's anything new to display.

I didn't mean slower in the sense of technology, but in the sense of the conversation.

I'm wondering if part of that is not due to the fact that there's no app that constantly bugs you with notifications. Maybe @Mario Vavti is right about the way desktop notifications are limited.

Tue, 22 Nov 2022 20:15:17 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

@Tanja I think the reason for that is simpler: there are far less people using Hubzilla than Mastodon. So, your messages aren't displayed to as many people as on AP.

Tue, 22 Nov 2022 21:33:19 +0100

Tanja

tanja@hz.lazyteddy.eu

@Hans van Zijst This is what I meant when I said I'm not a prime example, because on top of Hubzilla being the smaller network, I'm also keeping my contact list short

Sat, 19 Nov 2022 20:25:37 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

Chief TWiT :twit: wrote the following post Sat, 19 Nov 2022 19:14:56 +0100

I can't help but notice many toots from helpful newbies encouraging you to support the Mastodon Patreon.

It's fine to do that but understand it goes to just two big instances and the official Mastodon dev team.

It does NOT trickle down to YOUR instance. If you want to support your server, donate to it directly. Nearly all the costs of the explosive growth of the past few weeks is borne by local instances.

Mastodon is decentralized. There is no Mastodon Inc. This is not Twitter.

Sat, 19 Nov 2022 20:31:32 +0100

Eelco Maljaars 🇪🇺

Eelcom@mastodon.nl

@hans You can support both development of mastodon AND your local instance. Just transfer a small amount of money twice

Sat, 19 Nov 2022 20:37:52 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

@Eelco M 🇪🇺 🌻🇺🇦 And that would be a good idea too.

I think the last sentence sums it up nicely:

Mastodon is decentralized. There is no Mastodon Inc. This is not Twitter.

People will have to get their heads around that, it's a fundamental difference with all the commercial, closed source silos they're used to. #Twitter, #Instagram, #WhatsApp, #Discord, #TikTok, #YouTube and all the rest: those platforms are run by one single, commercial organisation. #Mastodon is not.

I'll write something about that subject later today, have to build a few machines for #Sidekiq first

Fri, 11 Nov 2022 02:10:04 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

Holy cow, after two weeks!

Separately, Mr Musk reportedly told employees that bankruptcy is not out of the question for Twitter.

BBC News (World) wrote the following post Fri, 11 Nov 2022 02:05:06 +0100

US regulator FTC says it is concerned about Twitter https://www.bbc.com/news/business-63593242

#Twitter #Musk

show all 5 Comments

Fri, 11 Nov 2022 02:30:41 +0100

Tom Grzybow

tomgrzybow@diaspora.freifunk-naila.net

Bankruptcy would be an attempt to rejuvenate that mess.

Fri, 11 Nov 2022 02:58:43 +0100

smellsofbikes@diaspora.glasswings.com

Wowie, from a $44B purchase to talk of bankruptcy in two weeks. The people who lent him money for this are gonna get soaked.

Fri, 11 Nov 2022 03:24:09 +0100

Tom Grzybow

tomgrzybow@diaspora.freifunk-naila.net

Tue, 08 Nov 2022 19:44:59 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

Things look bleak for he bird.

The shitshow we've been watching since #MuskDay isn't over yet, according to this article. Other than users migrating to the #Fediverse, #Twitter itself is crumbling. If you fire half of you employees, including those that have worked there for a long time and have accumulated a lot of knowledge of your product, you're screwed if something goes wrong. And things do go wrong every now and then.

We’re accumulating technical debt much faster than before—almost as fast as we’re accumulating financial debt.”

Let's prepare more Fediverse servers: #Mastodon, #Hubzilla, #Pleroma, #Diaspora* or whatever takes your fancy. We've seen a few waves of the #TwitterMigration but I expect this is only the beginning.

Here’s how a Twitter engineer says it will break in the coming weeks

One insider says the company’s current staffing isn’t able to sustain the platform.

fediverse

show all 13 Comments

Tue, 08 Nov 2022 19:49:33 +0100

Alexander Goeres

jabgoe2089@hub.netzgemeinde.eu

well, if the world famous architect sacks all the plumbers to save on maintenance and construction costs things like this are about to happen ...

Tue, 08 Nov 2022 19:57:42 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

Yup, and that's going to bite him in the ass soon.

Tue, 08 Nov 2022 20:01:12 +0100 last edited: Tue, 08 Nov 2022 20:04:11 +0100

Jeff Haluska

jhaluska@mastodon.social

@hans
He destroyed his advertising potential, annoyed half his customers / celebrities and removed the team responsible for keeping things running all while doing it in a chaotic manner.

I knew it was going to be bad, but man it has exceeded all my expectations.

Like is he speed running killing Twitter?

Tue, 08 Nov 2022 20:02:33 +0100

Jeff Haluska

jhaluska@mastodon.social

@hans Soon? It's biting in his ass since the lay offs. I expect he'll do some sort of weird Telsa merger to save face at some point.

Tue, 08 Nov 2022 20:03:01 +0100

JustSaying

ArrestJK@mastodon.nz

@jhaluska @hans I expected it to all go badly wrong, I didn't expect it to be this fast

Tue, 08 Nov 2022 20:06:05 +0100

Susan ✶✶✶✶

psychmesu@diaspora.glasswings.com

I don't think I've seen any Birbsite migration people wash up on the shores of Diaspora, have you?

Tue, 08 Nov 2022 20:10:07 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

@Jeff Haluska If he runs Twitter into the ground and has to pay for his loans, he'll have to sell quite some of his Tesla stock

Tue, 08 Nov 2022 20:12:15 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

@ArrestJK

I expected it to all go badly wrong, I didn't expect it to be this fast

Same here. A few days ago I had a discussion with a Musk fanboi who was certain that everything was going fine. We would continue our discussion a year from now, he said.

I think it's going to be a lot sooner than that

Tue, 08 Nov 2022 20:16:16 +0100

Jeff Haluska

jhaluska@mastodon.social

@hans Yep, it has the potential to massively destroy his net worth and I'm ok with that. 👍

Tue, 08 Nov 2022 21:43:25 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

@Piero Filippin

Do you think he is trying to light his cigar with Twitter?

Not sure if he's trying, but he's certainly doing it

Tue, 08 Nov 2022 22:21:13 +0100

Tom Grzybow

tomgrzybow@diaspora.freifunk-naila.net

They are begging some of the previous employees to come back. But it would be foolish to do so...

Tue, 08 Nov 2022 22:27:19 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

@Tom Grzybow Firing someone and then 2 days later begging them to come back is the worst fuckup I can imagine for an employer. How incompetent do you have to be for that?

Tue, 08 Nov 2022 22:36:18 +0100

Tom Grzybow

tomgrzybow@diaspora.freifunk-naila.net

Yes, the long-term prospects there are not so good...

Mon, 07 Nov 2022 10:58:49 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

Cat fight about the birdsite

https://nitter.net/jack/status/1589458463289397248

#Twitter
#TwitterMigration

Mon, 07 Nov 2022 11:05:57 +0100

Ontwerpfabriek@mastodon.social

@hans Battle of the birds 😅