As a new user, I’m enjoying Mastodon’s vibe so far but the one thing that is a letdown is the trending hashtags. I’ve been checking them regularly over the past couple of weeks and it seems like they’re pretty much always like this.
Even on days with big news stories, people on Mastodon are only talking about what day of the week it is like company employees on some internal message board?
Is there anything that can be done to liven them up a bit?
Probably lack of marketing. It just is what it is. If you want to see what the latest #dance is or #icebucketchallenge, that’s probably on TikTok, Instagram, or Twitter…it’s easier for influencers to monetize their content.
Mastodon feels empty because most people probably aren’t using it as intended (following people you want in your timeline, following/using hashtags, etc). Also, it is empty compared to the popular platforms - they only have like 2M users which is a lot but not compared to Twitter or Threads.
I actually use an ad blocker to block that section on the instance I use. “Trending” anything is of zero interest to me on any platform. It’s anti-interesting when it’s on a platform whose selling point is hand-curation.
Because mastodon doesn’t have an algo that promotes division and controversial topics.
These hashtags are what normal, everyday people talk about. Drama isn’t its strongest side.
I guess the reality is that I want at least SOME controversy. I don’t know why the only two choices have to be “fascism-enabling hellscape” or “nobody saying anything interesting ever.” There has to be at least some possible middle ground!
I can imagine some alpha-cunt Tate-esque grifter selling courses on how to “Just Shout at People” like it’s some sort of magic spell that mysteriously makes everything that you want happen.
Selling it like it’s the hidden secret sauce to the universe or whatever, rather than just being a dick to everyone.
Would the community even be any worse, I wonder? :)
I agree. I want to see people’s opinions on the news of the day. By the way, I recommend following @[email protected] if you want a little controversy. He was one of my favorite posters from Twitter & has gone all-in on Mastodon.
Are you saying that Lemmy does have those algorithms? Because this shit is never boring lol so many instances I never wanted to see or know existed…
Slightly related: how many freaking instances of “yiff” shit do we need!? I couldn’t believe I was STILL seeing it after I blocked like 7 separate instances lol
Mastodon “Trending” is just stuff that wasn’t talked about, suddenly being talked about. That’s why constantly popular things don’t appear on Trending, but things like “BigBoobFridayWhatever” (or equivalent) gets trending (people don’t use the hashtag for a week, and everyone use it for that day). I see how they thought it’s perfect for world-wide events, but it just end-up being a bunch of “weekly” stuff.
Furries invade every tech space because they’re all programmers for some reason. Must have something to do with being bullied as a kid and/or never seeing boobs irl. I know because I like their porn but not their identity, I’d never wear a suit but a cat is fine too
yeah sounds like boring shit. I get that already from talking to actual people, not virtue signalling boomers on mastodon
the lack of algo reduces the quality of content to this garbage, but this is the same people who think more content is bad as well. I don’t want some breaking or interesting post to be hidden by some random person posting completely meaningless garbage
The amount of people on Mastodon who are like “ahh finally, nothing interesting to look at now that I left Twitter, I am at peace and can just scroll through pictures of someone’s dinner and obscure academic naval gazing :)” is so high
*useless only if you have no interests. There’s plenty of people talking hobbies and interests.
If you’re just shooting shit, I agree, it’s boring. And no, there’s no middle. Maybe Instagram is the middleground?
For a long while, before the twitter implosion, hardly anyone used them at all. My thought is it just never caught on for the most part. With the ability to follow tags now and more twitter migratees it seems to be more common to see them but still doesn’t seem as much of a standard practice as with other sites.
This is an issue I’ve had with many social media sites, it can be really difficult to find content that is interesting to you. Sure the bigger sites will have some sort of recommendation algorithm but that breaks down at two places. The first, if you don’t follow or engage with enough content it doesn’t know what to recommend you (but how do you find content to follow and engage with if you are are new). The second, you start to notice a pattern with the recommendations especially on something like YouTube. I get recommended the same like 20-40 videos even when I mark “not interested.”
However, I’m on a server (fosstodon.org) that has an active Local thread and plenty of users and the trending hashtags still look like this pretty much every day.
for hashtags id say its just not popular, they have fallen out of favor in a lot of groups on twitter as well, for example if you want to know about AI research, not a single AI researcher worth anything is posting with hashtags. You have to find and follow them.
Mastodon being even more indie is just reflecting this growing preference. Hashtags are tools of marketers thanks to twitter and fb, they won’t go away but thier cringe factor in casual social posts is likely to stick around for a bit.
It’s fundamental to mastodon… you can subscribe to hashtags, you can search hashtags, but you can’t (usually) search posts directly. That works for the most part, but does limit discoverability slightly.
Groups seem to be the new hotness, though… there are some 3rd party implementations already but a proper implementation in the core is upcoming: https://joinmastodon.org/roadmap
maybe, communities and forums worked great for decades before hashtags became common. Some might say its a cope for cheap and poorly developed search algos soon to be replaced by much more sophisticated systems.
I don’t know, but to me this isn’t really dull. I wonder if it is matched with actual current events? Like, for example, if an earthquake, #earthquake and similar hashtags will show on trending section
That doesn’t seem to be the case. For example, on the day that Threads was launched there was plenty of people tagging #Threads, but it wasn’t mentioned in this list.
If you have any specific hobbies / fandoms / communities you’re interested in, you could see if there are instances specific to those interests you could migrate your account to. The local feed and local hashtags are sometimes way more interesting if you’re on an instance you jive with.
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Probably lack of marketing. It just is what it is. If you want to see what the latest #dance is or #icebucketchallenge, that’s probably on TikTok, Instagram, or Twitter…it’s easier for influencers to monetize their content.
Mastodon feels empty because most people probably aren’t using it as intended (following people you want in your timeline, following/using hashtags, etc). Also, it is empty compared to the popular platforms - they only have like 2M users which is a lot but not compared to Twitter or Threads.
I actually use an ad blocker to block that section on the instance I use. “Trending” anything is of zero interest to me on any platform. It’s anti-interesting when it’s on a platform whose selling point is hand-curation.
You must be the change you wish to see!
Based on all the comments though, the reason seems to be baked into Mastodon’s design
It seems to be a clash of what two groups of users want since a few seem to be happy with how Mastodon does it.
I generally agree with this sentiment completely, but in this case the solution is beyond what I, as a single user, can achieve.
I’m wondering whether the hashtag ranking system could be filtered and tweaked to make the topics more varied and less boring.
mine are even worse, they should just gut the feature tbh
this is gen x level of entertainment, the same ones that preach no algorithms are somehow better
removed by mod
Because mastodon doesn’t have an algo that promotes division and controversial topics. These hashtags are what normal, everyday people talk about. Drama isn’t its strongest side.
I think the #tuesday hashtag isn’t really what normal people talk about, but probably people gaming the system to get on a reliably trending hashtag.
Wait, so the recent topics that occur suddenly on Twitter aren’t the normal things people talk about? So the hype on Twitter events are fake?
They are. But they’re also influenced by who talks about it, how many comments, replies, likes it has. How many people click on it. Etc.
On mastodon is just how many people used the hashtag in a short period of time.
I think as Mastodon gets more popular, we will see more interesting tags pop up
I guess the reality is that I want at least SOME controversy. I don’t know why the only two choices have to be “fascism-enabling hellscape” or “nobody saying anything interesting ever.” There has to be at least some possible middle ground!
I agree. The Trending algorithm needs improvement. Luckily, we can do that ourselves.
explain how
By creating a pull request in Github. (Don’t yet angry, that was supposed to be a lighthearted joke)
i angy 😡
I can imagine some alpha-cunt Tate-esque grifter selling courses on how to “Just Shout at People” like it’s some sort of magic spell that mysteriously makes everything that you want happen.
Selling it like it’s the hidden secret sauce to the universe or whatever, rather than just being a dick to everyone.
Would the community even be any worse, I wonder? :)
I agree. I want to see people’s opinions on the news of the day. By the way, I recommend following @[email protected] if you want a little controversy. He was one of my favorite posters from Twitter & has gone all-in on Mastodon.
Are you saying that Lemmy does have those algorithms? Because this shit is never boring lol so many instances I never wanted to see or know existed…
Slightly related: how many freaking instances of “yiff” shit do we need!? I couldn’t believe I was STILL seeing it after I blocked like 7 separate instances lol
Lemmy ““promotes”” upvoted stuff.
Mastodon “Trending” is just stuff that wasn’t talked about, suddenly being talked about. That’s why constantly popular things don’t appear on Trending, but things like “BigBoobFridayWhatever” (or equivalent) gets trending (people don’t use the hashtag for a week, and everyone use it for that day). I see how they thought it’s perfect for world-wide events, but it just end-up being a bunch of “weekly” stuff.
BigBoobFriday has to happen.
I will make it happen.
Needs more alliteration. #MassiveMammaryMonday
#TitularTitanticTittyTuesdays
Furries invade every tech space because they’re all programmers for some reason. Must have something to do with being bullied as a kid and/or never seeing boobs irl. I know because I like their porn but not their identity, I’d never wear a suit but a cat is fine too
yeah sounds like boring shit. I get that already from talking to actual people, not virtue signalling boomers on mastodon
the lack of algo reduces the quality of content to this garbage, but this is the same people who think more content is bad as well. I don’t want some breaking or interesting post to be hidden by some random person posting completely meaningless garbage
It’s boring and shitty. It’s hard to find interesting stuff. Good luck finding trending/newsworthy events.
you get from Mastodon what you put into it.
The amount of people on Mastodon who are like “ahh finally, nothing interesting to look at now that I left Twitter, I am at peace and can just scroll through pictures of someone’s dinner and obscure academic naval gazing :)” is so high
You sound like you might enjoy TikTok more.
Yeah it’s either useless boring small talk on Mastodon, or zoomer tik tok. Absolutely no middle.
*useless only if you have no interests. There’s plenty of people talking hobbies and interests. If you’re just shooting shit, I agree, it’s boring. And no, there’s no middle. Maybe Instagram is the middleground?
How can I search a mastodon hashtag from lemmy on voyager?
Here in kbin you have to know the whole long address
The @ of the person do you want to follow
The full @ of the mastodon server
For a long while, before the twitter implosion, hardly anyone used them at all. My thought is it just never caught on for the most part. With the ability to follow tags now and more twitter migratees it seems to be more common to see them but still doesn’t seem as much of a standard practice as with other sites.
The hashtags are near unreadable and almost never interesting. Please capitalize each word.
camelCaseForTheWin
#YouMeanPascalCaseNo?
This is an issue I’ve had with many social media sites, it can be really difficult to find content that is interesting to you. Sure the bigger sites will have some sort of recommendation algorithm but that breaks down at two places. The first, if you don’t follow or engage with enough content it doesn’t know what to recommend you (but how do you find content to follow and engage with if you are are new). The second, you start to notice a pattern with the recommendations especially on something like YouTube. I get recommended the same like 20-40 videos even when I mark “not interested.”
ive noticed hashtags are not very popular likely due to them being overdone.
like lemmy, your mastadon exp is highly dependent upon your instance.
The UIs make adding hashtags difficult, and then Mastodon users (like me) say fOlLoW HaShTaGs.
The truth is that Mastodon needs better discovery tools built in.
You’re right, it is.
However, I’m on a server (fosstodon.org) that has an active Local thread and plenty of users and the trending hashtags still look like this pretty much every day.
for hashtags id say its just not popular, they have fallen out of favor in a lot of groups on twitter as well, for example if you want to know about AI research, not a single AI researcher worth anything is posting with hashtags. You have to find and follow them.
Mastodon being even more indie is just reflecting this growing preference. Hashtags are tools of marketers thanks to twitter and fb, they won’t go away but thier cringe factor in casual social posts is likely to stick around for a bit.
Isn’t that a problem for Mastodon, then, since it’s far more reliant on hashtags to drive discoverability due to the lack of algorithm?
It’s fundamental to mastodon… you can subscribe to hashtags, you can search hashtags, but you can’t (usually) search posts directly. That works for the most part, but does limit discoverability slightly.
Groups seem to be the new hotness, though… there are some 3rd party implementations already but a proper implementation in the core is upcoming: https://joinmastodon.org/roadmap
maybe, communities and forums worked great for decades before hashtags became common. Some might say its a cope for cheap and poorly developed search algos soon to be replaced by much more sophisticated systems.
I don’t know, but to me this isn’t really dull. I wonder if it is matched with actual current events? Like, for example, if an earthquake, #earthquake and similar hashtags will show on trending section
That doesn’t seem to be the case. For example, on the day that Threads was launched there was plenty of people tagging #Threads, but it wasn’t mentioned in this list.
Is #ThickTrunkTuesday not about men with large cocks? That sounds pretty exciting to me.
If you have any specific hobbies / fandoms / communities you’re interested in, you could see if there are instances specific to those interests you could migrate your account to. The local feed and local hashtags are sometimes way more interesting if you’re on an instance you jive with.