Hundreds of thousands of its users Twitter they made the decision to “connect” to the app mastodonlooking for an alternative to Twitter’s post-acquisition authoritarian management Elon Musk. Many of them are journalists.

However, the impact of the bird symbol app is not expected to be limited, despite Musk’s tragic failures. Says journalist Adam Davidson: “When Musk allowed anyone who pays $8 to get a blue authenticity badge, he opened the door wide for fakes. Who can be sure that the account with my name and blue icon really belongs to me?

On November 4, Davidson created the journa.host team on Mastodon. Participants had to prove their journalistic skills by submitting samples of their work. The Mastodon application is based on 8000 separate servers, each with its own rules. Members of each group can communicate with each other and with other users of the app, though many details of the system continue to confuse new members. Everyone has to learn on the fly.

The alternative app, chosen mostly by journalists, is more relaxed and free of hate speech.

Those who post or short text (Mastodon allows you to post longer texts than Twitter) prefer not to mention the name of Musk’s popular app, referring to Twitter as “Birds Page”, “Birds App” or even “The Bad Part”. Discussions about Mastodon have nothing to do with the furious verbal exchanges on Twitter, whose users are sharply critical of the Musk app. “Full of hate, narcissism and under the boot of an unpredictable billionaire” were some of the criticisms heard.

Davidson says he’s been bothered for years by the “extreme emotional involvement” that Twitter evokes and encourages. The slower pace and calmness experienced by Mastodon users convinced Davidson to maintain a presence on both apps, recognizing Twitter’s value as an investigative tool.

“So far, there aren’t any Nazis on my Mastodon page,” says Columbia School of Journalism professor Bill Gruskin, who expressed concern that easing Twitter bans would increase the presence of extremists on the app. While Gruskin’s Mastodon page has remained untainted by far-right elements, the professor has already received two messages from users posing as women asking for a meeting and “whatever happens…”, a common method of attracting clients from call agency pages. .