After months of careful exchanges, the whistleblower agreed to meet me in a park.

I was sitting on a bench wearing the pre-arranged distinctive green top, facing the ducks. On the far side of the lake, distant trees were grey with lingering mist.

A woman sat next to me. She seemed nervous.

"What's the time," she said, forgetting to make it sound like a question.

"Later than you think," I replied as we had agreed.

The ducks' chatter filled the silence.

Then she turned to me and said "The datacenters--".

She had gone silent. Her mouth was moving but there was no sound.

I looked at her lips, trying to lip-read. Her face pixelated.

She reached into her bag and pulled out something. What was it? A thumb drive?

I'll never know. It took me a moment to realize she had disappeared. Just deleted.

#microfiction #socialMedia

Have you ever met someone from the Fediverse in person to do something together?

I don't mean at a Fediverse-related event. If you have, I'd be curious to hear what kind of activity brought you together.

I've seen people from other social media platforms organize offline activities and meetups, Facebook and Instagram (Meta), Orkut (Google), and Twitter (now X), and I'm curious whether this happens through the Fediverse too.

Please, boost to find more activities, if any.

#SocialMedia #Meetup #Fediverse

I understand the intention behind bridging #Mastodon with other social networks. But I refuse to migrate to a centralized network just to engage with or reply to someone. Life is all about choices, after all, right? I'm sorry.

#mastodon #bridge #socialmedia

So, based on this, which do you find yourself using more on Mastodon; boosts or favorites? ❤️😊

#Mastodon #Fediverse #Fedi #MastodonPolls #Poll #FediversePolls #AskFedi #FediTalk #SocialMedia

I’m considering putting my foot down with my friends that just can’t seem to quit using Facebook messenger, even when I give them numerous other ways to get a hold of me. Sure, it’s a lot more effort to ask me what I’m up to rather than reading it online but I have my own website, I have my Fedi account.

The messenger app is slowly becoming unusable, the facebook app has so many problems I find it a chore to keep up with friends even when I am looking at their profile exclusively, and a whole canyon of other things.

I’m considering just leaving my friends with a final message and then deleting my account and if they can’t SMS me or send me an email, then they like Facebook more than me.

#SocialMedia

TechCrunch: Discord’s age verification era is upon us, despite community backlash. “Starting Wednesday, Discord, the community messaging platform, will roll out age verification measures to all users. The rollout comes after the company initially delayed its age verification plans in February due to backlash from users concerned that biometric scans and ID checks could jeopardize their […]

Why does social media get hostile?

The basic design of the social media platforms promotes hostility, but not in the way you expect. #socialmedia #disinformation

See the full video that talks about the effects of context collapse in social media at https://youtu.be/dcz8YzRNo5M

And the essay version is at https://www.baldurbjarnason.com/2026/03-why-is-social-media-so-humourless/

Are you great communicator? We have an opening for a writer for our websites and social media. The deadline is in 2 days!

https://discourse.gnome.org/t/gnome-foundation-seeks-paid-content-writer/38817

#GetFediHired #FediHired #SocialMedia #Socials

Alt...

Image with many colorful speech bubbles, on a blue background. There are emojis there as well.

#Meta bans ads for Virginia Woolf play in Spain because they relate to #feminism

The theatre was told that “any mention of civil rights, feminism or social reform [topics that are central to Woolf’s work] are usually classified as ‘social topics’ by our automatic system” and are filtered out.

To resolve the situation, Meta recommended removing “key words” so that the text doesn’t appear to encourage activism.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/sep/21/meta-ban-virginia-woolf-a-room-of-ones-own-barcelona-teatre-raval

#SocialMedia #Censorship

Europe plans to restrict social media access for under-13s. Cartoon for Dutch newspaper Trouw: https://www.trouw.nl/cartoons/tjeerd-royaards~bfbd9e2c/

#SocialMedia #Europe #SocialMediaBan #children

Alt...

Cartoon showing children eating from a house covered in candy with icons representing popular social media platforms (Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Snapchat, Twitter/X). The children are wearing metal caps that are connected via tubes to a massive machine on the roof labeled 'DATA EXTRACTOR'. The extracted profits flows through a pipe labeled 'PROFIT' into piles of money guarded by a suited businessman. In the foreground, children play outside behind a wall marked 'SOCIAL MEDIA BAN <13' while two European Union workers are putting the last section of wall into place.

> Meta Is Using Instagram Users’ Photos to Build a Universal Facial Recognition System for Its Hated Smart Glasses, Class Action Lawsuit Claims https://futurism.com/future-society/meta-instagram-users-photos-facial-recognition-lawsuit

Honestly, #DeleteMeta #DeleteFacebook #DeleteInstagram

#PervertGlasses #tech #corruption #exploitation #lawsuit #SocialMedia

Here's an intriguing proposal for an alternative to trying to age-gate social media platforms, in the comments of this SpinOff interview with Robbie Nichols. I'm not endorsing this, but I think it makes for a good thought experiment;

"I would rather they just make it illegal for any under 16s to own, possess or operate a smartphone under normal circumstances."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gz_PwCIBifc

(1/?)

#B416 #AgeGating #SocialMedia

Endlich wird mal das Problem #Algorithmus betont und nicht der Begriff #sozialeNetzwerke:

Australien sagt #SocialMedia-Algorithmen den Kampf an
https://www.heise.de/news/Australien-sagt-Social-Media-Algorithmen-den-Kampf-an-11445030.html?wt_mc=rss.red.ho.ho.atom.beitrag.beitrag

Wer das jetzt bereits nutzen möchte, kann sich mal #Fediverse ansehen: https://media.ccc.de/v/ask-me-anything-about-fediverse-mastodon-graz-social-our-instance

(Teilt das möglichst abseits vom Fediverse 😉)

Mafia #GAFAM:

"Protestowali przeciwko budowie luksusowego kurortu Kushnera. Ich konta zostały zablokowane. "Nowa era cyfrowych represji"

Dziesiątki kont na Instagramie, z których korzystali albańscy aktywiści, dziennikarze oraz lider partii opozycyjnej, zostały zamknięte lub zablokowane w związku z trwającymi protestami przeciwko budowie luksusowego hotelu powiązanego z zięciem prezydenta USA Donalda Trumpa, Jaredem Kushnerem. Eksperci ostrzegają przed "skoordynowaną kampanią mającą na celu ich uciszenie"."

https://wiadomosci.onet.pl/politico/protestowali-przeciwko-budowie-luksusowego-kurortu-kushnera-ich-konta-zostaly/j7760hw

#socialmedia #usa #monopol

Just donated to my Mastodon server maintainer @brian ( https://graphics.social ), to the @Vivaldi browser, and to the @internetarchive. It feels good to contribute to a healthier, more independent internet. 💚

Have a great weekend everyone!

#mastodon #fediverse #social #SocialMedia #donate #support #archive #InternetArchive #vivaldi