Gratitude Day 21: Fediverse, my Beloved
Mon 21 September 2026
What can I say about the amazing place I've called my Internet-home for the past four and a half years?
The Fediverse is an amazing place. It consistently amazes me that there are just so many cool, kind, and amazing people on there. It's what social media should have always been.
When I say, "Fediverse, my Beloved," I guess I'm really saying "Humanity, my Beloved." Because somehow, even in the Year of Our Confusion Two Thousand and Twenty Six, I'm still such a huge believer in humanity, even though I see humanity's humanity tragically waning (just FYI, that's a bible reference — Matthew 24:12).
The fediverse has been an incredible source of inspiration, of comfort, of entertainment and information, of camaraderie, and of course, some serious weirdness. 😄
The thing is, the Internet (even nerdy little pockets of it like the Fediverse) is much, much, much too big for you to take in all at once. The evil gigacorps' answer to this problem is "The Algorithm," whereby your social feed is curated by them, most often to get you to buy junk or just feel enraged and hopeless.
On the Fediverse, your social feed is curated by you. It's curated by choosing your friends wisely, telling it to not show boosts from people who boost depressing stuff all day, occasionally blocking people and even entire instances when they're not well-behaved or operating in good-faith (or for any other reason, it's YOUR Fediverse, after all), and by setting up filters to just block subjects you're not interested in, or don't want to hear more about.
There are aspects of the Fediverse that are not healthy. There are people who are focused on just sharing the most distressing news, 24/7. There are (somehow?!?) political influencer accounts that just spew whatever they share on Twitter without ever replying to people on the fediverse. There are plenty of scams. There are large instances with poor moderation. (That's not counting the garbage instances tied to fascists, Meta's Threads, and the silly BlueSky or even Twitter bridge instances.)
More upsetting at times, there are people of good conscience who enjoy locking horns like mountain goats, shouting a lot and not listening much. But hear what I just said: "people of good conscience." People trying to scratch their heads and figure out how to make sense of the insane times we're living in. Not at all bad people.
Then, there are the fediblock "dramas" caused by people who are looking out for the welfare of marginalized people, who are quick to raise the alarm on individuals and especially instances that may be bad actors or otherwise a threat. It's more drama than some folks really want to deal with, but the core motivation is a good one, even if a few folks take things overboard at times.
Perhaps the Fediverse could be summed up with Madness' classic song, Our House
It's a bit of a mess, but it's our mess. It's not Meta's. It's not Trump's. It's not Musk's. It belongs to all of us, and for all of the occasional din and confusion, man, it's just so forking beautiful.
🥹
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