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on how #Mastodon, and the rest of the #Fediverse, invisiblize the #GlobalSouth.
I have argued a few times that for all practical purposes, the global south does not exist for Mastodon, and for the rest of the Fediverse. But many people I interact with do not quite understand how this works in practice.
This series of posts is an effort to illustrate that mechanism.
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Say there is a user X on random server Y. Assume that no user on mastodon.social (for example) follows user X. Assume that users on mastodon.social follow other users on server Y. Assume further that neither server has blocked the other.
User X writes a post containing the term, say, #Namibia. The post receives no reply, no boost, no like.
Later, someone searches for #Namibia on mastodon.social. The search results will NOT include user X’s post containing the term #Namibia.
(continues)
A relay may complicate the above picture slightly. But if server Y in the above example is an isolated #GlobalSouth instance, or if it is running software (such as Hubzilla) not based on #ActivityPub, then the relay will most likely not be pulling posts from there, so the example will still hold.
In this context, remember many instances do not add relays because the additional posts pulled in through the relay increase the storage and processing costs.
(continues)
Generalize mastodon.social in the above example to all mainstream, primarily #GlobalNorth, #Mastodon servers. No user on any of those servers will ever become aware of user X’s post containing #Namibia, even if some of them consciously search for the term.
(continues)
An overwhelming majority of #GlobalNorth users have no interest in #GlobalSouth topics. They neither follow users focussed on global south issues, nor boost or like posts on global south topics.
That’s their prerogative, of course; but that is also the root cause underlying the above dynamic. There is no obvious resolution to it, at least not within the narrow confines of the #Fediverse.
(continues)
So the user X in the above example could be any account focussed on #GlobalSouth topics. Replace #Namibia with any other country or topic concerning the global south.
The dynamic described above will play out in all these cases.
(continues)
That’s it, that’s the mechanism.
Forget #GlobalNorth users, even #GlobalSouth users cannot find fellow users from their regions, or find posts about the global south, even if both exist.
This happens with most global south users, and with an overwhelming majority of the posts on global south topics.
That’s how #Mastodon, and the rest of the #Fediverse, invisiblize the global south.
(continues)
As a direct consequence, the majority of #GlobalSouth users who drift into the #Fediverse get disillusioned, and return/move on to #Facebook or #Twitter or #Threads.
The #GlobalNorth users on the Fediverse never even become aware of this loss; though many of them perceive the monotony of voices/topics, and silently move out; leaving behind a tiny, malnourished social medium.
(continues)
In a follow-up thread posted at
https://union.place/@feralthoughts/114037639193329163
I placed the "global south invisiblization" problem in a larger context, and suggested a couple of steps that may remedy the situation.
@feralthoughts #Twitter in its pre- #Musk days had plenty of problems.
But its sheer diversity blew the #Fediverse out of the water. I easily connected with all sorts of people outside North America and Europe.
And I still miss that, even now.
@juergen_hubert @feralthoughts I miss it too - but I did find a lot of interesting people to follow in this thread, so that's something :-)
@feralthoughts I moved from South to North 5 years ago. It's noticeable - my Xitter list of (specifically) Africa-focussed users was far, far bigger than my Africa list here.
(I've also only been on here just over a year - so not exactly a veteren).
@feralthoughts All of this is correct, but I want to add an additional aspect--a lot of it is about the infrastructure in place. For much of the #GlobalSouth, centralized social networks are the internet. Telecom providers install #FB on people's phones, and this is how most access takes place. I can't speak for the whole South, as it is diverse, but most companies, organization, and other institutions don't even have websites. All marketing and correspondence occur on FB pages.
@feralthoughts Part of this is connected to webhosting, but not entirely. Due to debt crises (which are neocolonial in nature), many Southern countries place currency controls to ensure that foreign reserves do not flow outward, worsening debt crises and other financial structures. As a result, it can be difficult to register a domain and hosting with an outside company, the bulk of which are in the US, EU, or East Asia, and nearly all of which require dollars, Euros, yen, or renminbi.
@feralthoughts The lack of connection that the #Fediverse has to the #GlobalSouth is a symptom of largely infrastructural disparities between the North and South vis-à-vis telecommunications and financial instruments. There's been some written on technological leapfrogging, esp. in parts of Sub-Saharan #Africa, but the jump is more often to centralized, #BigTech social networks, not to the sort of decentralized connectivity that the #Fediverse values.
At the risk of derailing the original discussion, I suspect geopolitical rivalries will lead to internet balkanization (splinternets) in the very near future, with connectivity between sub-internets forbidden or tightly regulated. There will be at least two camps - one led by the USA, the other by China. There may be more.
This will lead to a splintering of social media, among the splintering of many other things.
That will render inconsequential all the discussion in this thread 
Yes - overall, I agree with your argument.
Put simply: the material conditions at present are NOT suitable for large-scale decentralized/federated or peer-to-peer social media to emerge in the #GlobalSouth.
@weaver @feralthoughts I live in West Africa, and indeed, what was called FreeBasics a few years ago did, and still does (under a different name), a lot to kill the understanding of what the internet is.
Most users who own a smartphone (there are still many feature phones) usually don't have the digital literacy to go further than FB, Whatsapp, Twitter for a few, and the likes of TikTok for the younger generation.
There's a second problem: how many instances in the Global South?
@weaver @feralthoughts I remember a decade ago, Zuck did a good job of partnering with local telcos in my country to provide free access to his app and limited data for everything else. Hence, inviting everyone to FB
@weaver @feralthoughts This is such an important, but little known, point.
Some of us had the luxury of experiencing the internet pre-techbro era, where we learned how it worked and knew all the ways it could be used and accessed. Especially those of us in wealthy countries. So many parts of the world, however, did not. These countries only know the capitalist, colonialist, filter of Facebook and it's ilk, only recently gaining access through these "services".
Also - for those who are interested in expanding their horizons southward, look for profiles on: https://mastodon.africa/explore
@GinevraCat @feralthoughts Indeed, but it's a small South African instance. Being from West Africa and here for quite some time, there aren't many accounts from the continent as a whole.
Tried to do lists and the like a few months ago, but there aren't many accounts to populate them...
And that's indeed a shame.
On the other hand, many are still on X (not BS), as they carved their niche by affinity and aren't all that bothered with what's happening in the rest of this white supremacist space.
@cybeardjm @feralthoughts I get why communities would choose to stay on X. It's a pity to not make alternatives welcoming and easy, though.
@GinevraCat Agreed, but unfortunately, as I said, many have their special area (e.g. I know the Beninese community under 229people or some Naija ones, incl. some spaces that are almost "women only") and it's almost impossible to make them move.
As someone wrote: how do you move a forest when you're just a tree?
It is a vicious cycle. Global South users have no way of finding relevant users/posts, no way of even knowing how many exist, so most of them simply abandon the Fediverse.
The global south servers/users may have been few to begin with, but there is nothing here to retain even those, or to attract new ones.
well outlined. only a workaround, but are there any lists of global south servers from each of which a single follow would enable visibility across my server?
@feralthoughts @anilmc
@augustocc maintains a list of Brazilian instances and also has lots of resources for newcomers
https://social.br-linux.org/@augustocc/110152359834473002
(All in Portuguese obviously)
@santiago @feralthoughts @anilmc @augustocc
Two mastodon instances from South Africa: mastodon.africa and mastodon.monoceros.co.za.
https://mastodon.holeyfox.co is a Nigerian instance.
mastodon.mg from Madagascar.
Sasa.africa is another African one.
Here is a map and list of instances by location:
https://umap.openstreetmap.fr/en/map/mastodon-near-me-fediverse-communities-by-country-_828094#3/
@nitrml @feralthoughts @anilmc @augustocc BTW that map misses a lot of Brazilian instances, including large ones. I suppose it takes data from the same sources.
I imagine a lot of European instances are missing too but given the quantities it isn’t as shocking on the map.
@santiago @nitrml @feralthoughts @anilmc
Coincidently I have just updated a list of brazilian microblog instances (Mastodon, Friendica, GoToSocial, snac etc.), as part of the #DiversiVerso project.
There's 86 of them on the updated list: https://diversiverso.disquete.online/br-servers-2025-02.html
@augustocc @santiago @feralthoughts @anilmc I think one can open a github issue or message the creator of the map, @jaz, to include missing ones, if I read that correctly
@nitrml @santiago @feralthoughts @anilmc @jaz
yes, I think one that uses and links that map should do that
@augustocc @santiago @nitrml @feralthoughts @anilmc friendica is not a microblog, and is completely different if you compare with mastodon pleroma GTsocial.....
@capirock @santiago @nitrml @feralthoughts @anilmc
oh thank you very much for your input!
@augustocc @santiago @nitrml @feralthoughts @anilmc
a completely different thing that characterizes the software created by Mike Macgirvin is that for example the comments/replies to a post are sent just to the server/site of the person who wrote the post, and then it is this that takes care of sending and just to his followers. If you think about it this is very different from what happens in the mastoverse (mastodon pleroma mitra GTsocial...), where everything we write, including our replies, is treated as a main post and distributed to our followers and not to the followers of the person who wrote the main post (at the beginning), and also obviously it is not a micro because it has no character limits in the posts, but you can use it as a real blog.
Obviously then if in friendica you also use activitypub in addition to the other protocols, then you try to adapt the thing to the mastoverse, trying to follow the "laws" that regulate this universe.
@nitrml @santiago @feralthoughts @anilmc @augustocc I'm really just spit balling and haven't thought this through, but I'm curious if maybe a bot would help here? I'm imagining a way to better concentrate boosts of posts from less visible geographic regions so that following the concentrator bot would be a better one-stop shopping point and also make direct federation to those servers happen?
@roadriverrail @nitrml @santiago @anilmc @augustocc
My feeling is that this will not improve the situation.
This isn't just about global south servers being invisible; low visibility users/topics on global north servers also remain invisible, they just don't get likes or boosts. So I suspect the bot will not be able to find them either.
But I could be wrong, I haven't really thought through all the possibilities.
@feralthoughts @roadriverrail @nitrml @anilmc @augustocc The best suggestion I could come up to extend the Fediverse outside the centre is for the “instance full” registration pages to just list friendly neighboring open instances instead of losing people forever via joinmastodon.org
@feralthoughts @nitrml @santiago @anilmc @augustocc I guess I thought that a server like botsin.space was more central. Guess I learned something.
Quite accurate and a direct consequence of the peer to peer nature of fediverse technology. This is an area which, to borrow a good term for @cwebber , the shared heap of Bluesky does better, since it creates a global pool for discovery. It doesn't have to be so, though. Participating in relays to see more traffic than your local userbase follows isn't as expensive as it might seem, because bandwidth and write capacity are fairly cheap.
@feralthoughts
ActivityPub is a difficult protocol for small servers which want to participate in the global conversation. It's quite ok for publishing, though not necessarily better than ATproto, and it's good for nominally sovereign hosting, but at the cost of pretty bad discovery. I have argued for some time that fedi needs service providers for search indices. Perhaps that would be a job for a well-rounded relay provider.
@feralthoughts
Only a big/rich entity can afford to host a resource-heavy all-seeing relay, so the relay would become a potential point of centralization and control---that's the argument against a single all-seeing relay.
I understand the argument, and even sympathize with it; perhaps community-control of the single relay could be an option; but I don't know how many people have the will and the bandwidth to work at it.
It's not as expensive as you think. Sure, for an individual it is, but amortized over, say, 1000 local users, not really.
@feralthoughts
I remember skimming through all the discussion about the Bluesky relay being extremely resource-heavy.
Why would this not be the case for a single all-seeing Fediverse relay? Is it because the number of users and posts/day are far lower than the equivalent numbers for Bluesky?
The key insight wrt this is that bandwidth, write performance, storage and capacity to handle read requests all scale at different rates and its the latter (needed for more users) which is expensive. Here's someone experimenting with a self-hosted ATproto relay:
https://bsky.bad-example.com/can-atproto-scale-down/
@feralthoughts
Still not quite clear to me, but that's not on you; I need to dig in and look at the numbers to understand why the resource-requirements for an all-seeing Fedi search relay are not as high as one may expect.
Will do at some point.
Thanks for the link, and for the lessons.
@feralthoughts I'm from the global north and currently in #Zimbabwe. The hash tag has very little traffic, and I struggled to find local users. It's a real shame. It's not as if there is a shortage of social media here generally.
@feralthoughts that’s a real issue, and we hope that https://www.fediscovery.org can be a good start to improve things here
In a follow-up thread posted at
https://union.place/@feralthoughts/114037639193329163
I placed the "global south invisiblization" problem in a larger context, and suggested a couple of steps that may remedy the situation.
I have no idea whether, and to what extent, it overlaps with your roadmap. Would appreciate your comments.
@feralthoughts most of those are on it. We need to carefully think about privacy and user choice but our Fediscovery project should be a good first step. You can watch David’s video on the website to see what we have in mind.
Happy to know those steps are on your roadmap.
Will search for the video you mentioned and check it out - thanks.
@feralthoughts I feel like this argument is conflating several roles of different providers under a single Mastodon banner.
I agree, if you walk into a social club where people do not speak your language and they're talking about things that don't interest you, it's going to be a boring social club. You will leave. That's expected.
But Mastodon isn't a social club. The dozen people who work there specialize in helping other people set up the social clubs.
And Mastodon helps find a club... 1/n
@feralthoughts it's right there on the join page.
https://joinmastodon.org/servers
Mastodon servers by region and topic.
If you want to be engaged with users from your region, you have to go find an instance in your region. If you go to a Singapore instance, you're not going to find a whole bunch of people talking about Texas high school football.
I'm not sure this is specific to the global south, More than it is simply an example of walking into the wrong Social club... 2/n
You probably posted the remaining messages of your sub-thread as new posts, they are not under the "1/n" post.
Can you bring them all here please - I don't want the conversation split across multiple mini-threads under different OPs.
@feralthoughts next post is right here, they all seem to be connected on my client.
Hmmm... yes, you are right, they are appearing as a sub-thread on mstdn.ca, with my OP at the very top.
But on my server, union.place, only the "1/n" post appears under the OP, I never received notification of the "2/n" post and don't see it anywhere, and the "3/n" and "4/n" posts appear as a separate thread.
I will DM my admin about this, with cc to you. (Edit: done)