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Getting Started with Mastodon

Padraig Fahy

Padraig Fahy

— 13 min read
Getting Started with Mastodon
Photo by Rolf van Root on Unsplash

If you are joining Mastodon for the first time, you may have some questions about how to use the platform, what the shiny buttons do, etc. This page has everything that you need to get started.

⁉️
Missing or incorrect information? A feature that should be covered in this guide? Let me know @padraig@mastodon.ie
☝️
UPDATED 2023-09-28: Updated for Mastodon 4.2.0 & adding small bits.
UPDATED 2023-08-06: Added more 'Additional Resources'
UPDATED 2023-01-25: Updated to include "Creating Your Account" section.
UPDATED 2023-04-18: Added some more FAQ and some information about links.

Creating Your Account

Well, before you can read this guide, you are going to need an account. Now, you may think that going to joinmastodon.org and signing up would be the play, but it is not.

With Mastodon or the entire Fediverse for that matter, there is no one central server (like Twitter/X, Facebook or Instagram)

This is known as Federation. A more detailed explanation is given in the Federation section towards the end of this post.

But the best way to explain it is:

💡
Think of it like email.

You have a @gmail.com account but someone has a @outlook.com email address.
You can send and receive emails to and from each other already.

Same concept!

Go to the instance of your choice. and sign up (If it's open for registration)

Fill in the details and take note of your 'username', which is going to be the address that you can share with people or link on your website. @username@instance.com

Credit - Opal Stack

Congratulations! 🎉
You created a Mastodon account. Let's get you started!

Feeds

  • There are 3 main feeds. Home, Explore and Live Feeds.
    • Home - This contains all the public posts from everyone that you follow in chronological order (Newest posts at the top). This also includes #hashtags that you follow.
    • Explore - This contains public posts that are currently popular from users who are connected to the server. There are also different tabs for popular #hashtags, users and news.
    • Live Feeds - This contains 3 tabs:
      • This server - These would be all the public posts on the server that you are on. This was called "Local" until Mastodon 4.2.0 release.
      • Other Servers - These are public posts from accounts on other servers which are connected to your server. This was called "Federated" until Mastodon 4.2.0 release.
      • All - This is a combination of both This server and Other Servers feeds.

Customising your profile

Customising your own profile couldn't be simpler and should be the first thing that you do when you create your account.

Add a profile picture, header image and a description of who you are.

Don't forget to include hashtags and other profiles if associated.
🤖
Did You Know?: Adding #NoBot to your bio means that relay/follow bots do not follow you. While there is no ruling on this or preventing any bot or person from following you, it's generally respected by developers. 

You are also given the ability to add some links to your website.

How do you get the green box and the tick? Quite easy actually. On your website, you will want to link to your website but add a rel="me". 

<a rel="me" href="https://mastodon.ie/@padraig">Mastodon</a>

If you do not have the ability to add a link but have access to the <head> header scripts, you can add the following:

<link rel="me" href="https://mastodon.ie/@padraig"/>

Understanding a post.

This is a post. It contains their name, their Fediverse address, post privacy, time, text, pictures (or videos) and action buttons.

From Left-to-Right:

  • The user's avatar
  • The name of the user
  • The full Fediverse address
  • The privacy setting 🌎 [This will be explained more in-depth in 'Privacy Options' below]
  • How long ago they posted.

The post text and the image. An icon can be seen in the top left of the image which can be used to 'blur' the image should you no longer wish to see it.

From Left-to-Right:

  • The 'Reply' button and the number of replies.
  • The 'Boost' button reposts the post on your feed.
  • The 'Favourite' button alerts the user that you like the post.**
  • The 'Bookmark' button allows you to store the post in your own private feed for you to come back to in the future.
  • With the menu button on the far right, you will find various options:

First Follows

As a new user, you are probably wondering who to follow and what to post

  • Check out posts that are in your 'Live Feeds' > 'This Server' feed to see if anyone catches your eye.
  • You can browse the 'Profile Directories' to find random accounts.
  • If you have a Twitter account, use a service like Fedifinder to find out which followers are on the Fediverse.
  • Always share your full address if you are mentioning your Mastodon account. Eg: @padraig - This only applies if the user that you are telling Mastodon about is on the same server as you. The best way to share your address would be the full address. Eg: @padraig@mastodon.ie
  • If you are given an address, you can use the Search function to find the account. Either @padraig@mastodon.ie or https://mastodon.ie/@padraig would work.
  • You can also follow hashtags in the same way that you can follow users. Search for the hashtag and click the Follow hashtag button. These appear in the 'Home' feed. In Advanced View on the web browser, you can 'Pin' the timeline as a column.

Lists

You can create your own custom feed with accounts that you wish to have in your own tailored feed. You could add in your work colleagues, tech journalists, meme accounts or local friends. Like hashtag columns, you can pin them in 'Advanced View'.

To create a list, go to a user's profile and click on the ⋮ menu, choose 'Add or Remove from lists'. You can choose to add the user to an existing one or you can create a new list.

In 'Advanced View', you can edit the column to only show replies to other people in the list or to anyone.

Composing a post.

You have created your account and now you want to post. Great. Let's take a look at the composer:

  • At the top, you can enter your text content. On Mastodon, you have 500 characters to compose your post. Other services may have a higher or lower character limit.
    • If you add a URL to a post, it will only use 23 characters rather than the total characters of the URL. This is something that is carried over from Twitter and basically eliminates the use of services like Bit.ly or tinyurl.com.
  • Emojis and custom emoticons (which can only be used by users on your instance but can be seen by anyone) can be found by clicking on the monochrome 🙂 icon.
  • At the bottom, you will find 5 options.
    • 📎 - This allows you to attach up to 4 images or 1 video (you cannot mix and match)
    • The second option is for polls. Polls can have anywhere from 2 - 4 options. You can set a timer as to how long the poll will run. The time starts when you 'Publish' the post. Users who vote in the poll will get a notification when the poll ends with the results.
      • NOTE: You cannot use attachments when using polls.
    • 🌎 - This icon is for Privacy Settings. See 'Privacy Options' below for more information.
    • CW - This is 'Content Warning' or 'Content Wrap' - This allows you to set a title for the post and users will have a choice to expand the post in order to view all the text. Images/videos that are uploaded while using this feature will automatically be blurred. See 'Content Warning' below for more information.
    • EN - This is for the language. Users may set the language of their post to a different language and this is an indicator to show that post was created in a different language. The default is English. Support of this feature is dependent on the server.

When uploading images or videos, it is important to add AltText - AltText describes the image or video to users who may be hard of seeing or hard of hearing. Users who may have eyesight issues may be using a screen recorder to read out what is on screen. Having AltText means that they would not be missing out on anything. While it is not mandatory, it is considered 'good practice' to add it.

Not sure what to post? How about an #introduction.

  • A great way to attract new followers when starting out is to do an #introduction - The #introduction hashtag has become a tradition for all users and gives other users a synopsis as to who you are. Utilise hashtags for topics that you are interested in such as #cats, #technology, #politics and more. The more hashtags, the merrier. Remember to 'Pin' your post.

Editing a post

Did you post something and you either made a spelling mistake or forgot to add something? Don't worry, you can edit your post.

Once the post is live, click on the ... menu beside your post and click on 'Edit'. This will allow you to make edits to the text. The history of the edits can be viewed by clicking the pencil icon once it has been edited at least once.

Anyone who has interacted with your post prior to the edit (whether they favourited, replied, voted in your poll, etc) will get notified that the post has been edited.

If you forgot to attach media or you feel that it is worth a redo, click on the ... menu and choose 'Delete & Re-draft' which will copy the post back into the editor, ready to go again.

Additionally, you can edit the post and add AltText to images and videos in case you forget.

There is no time limit or the number of times you can edit a post.

💡
Did you know? You can pin up to 5 posts at any one time! *

Privacy Options.

Clicking the 🌎 when composing a post will show 4 options.

  • Public - Self-explanatory - The post will appear everywhere.
  • Unlisted - The post will be posted in the 'Home' feed for users but will not appear in the Local feed or the Federated feed. Users browsing your profile will be able to see it.
  • Followers Only - The post will only be visible to people following you.
  • Private Mentions - Only the accounts that you mention in the post will see it. This should not be treated as a 'DM' or 'Private Messaging' system. Use a messaging app like Signal or Telegram for that. This used to be called "Mentioned People Only" prior to Mastodon 4.2.0

If you reply to a post that has a privacy setting chosen, it will honour that option. You can change the privacy of the post but you should aim to respect the privacy option that is in place.

CW - Content Warning

Content Warning (or Wrap) is a function that you can enable on your post. It is a hotly debated topic within Mastodon about how it should be used and whether certain topics should exclusively be used within Content Warning. There is a loose set of 'rules' as to what should be placed behind a Content Warning.

Some examples of topics are:

  • Politics (Regardless of stance)
  • Current Events (ie. War in Ukraine, Uprisings and other major events)
  • Spoilers for TV Shows, Movies, Games or Books.
  • or simply a long post that you wish to wrap content in...

If you are unsure whether something should be in a Content Warning, seek out your Instance Admin and ask them before posting. Additionally, seeing what other people do in the 'Local' feed will give you an indication.

Something that I personally try and do is add (+) or (-) where applicable to the subject of the Content Warning to let the user know if the post is positive or negative.

Here is what a post with a Content Warning looks like:

@Connemaraweather@mastodon.ie with a Content Warning. The subject is presented with a 'Show More' button
@Connemaraweather@mastodon.ie with the full post once you click 'Show More'
A Content Warning post with an image on Mastodon. The default view.
Unblurring the image on its own
Showing the text within a Content Warning post. 

If you wish, you can adjust the behaviour of this to show all Content Warning posts and images without having to click on anything.
Go into 'Preferences' >> 'Appearance' and at the bottom, you will find the option:

"Need someone to follow? 🤔"
If you would like to get more Mastodon and other Fediverse-related content, you can follow me by clicking the button.

Follow @padraig@mastodon.ie

Managing Content on Mastodon

On Mastodon, you have a lot of control over what you see on the platform and you can fine-tune it to your liking.

Now, instance admins will block some other instances that are problematic or don't align with the values of the home instance. Unfortunately, you will not be able to follow or interact with users on those servers and vice versa.

If you encounter a user or even an instance you do not like, you can block the user or the entire instance. This will not affect other users. Instance admins should be contacted alerting them to the problematic instance so it can be banned server-wide.

To block someone or an entire domain, click on the user's profile and click on the ⋮ menu and click on 'Block @user' or 'Block domain <instance URL>'

Blocking options.

Muting

If you are in a thread and there is too much 'noise' from people liking, boosting or replying to your post, you can mute it. 🔇 This means that you do not get any notifications about the post. Go to the post, click on the ... menu and choose 'Mute Conversation'

Filters

Filters allow you to hide or outright remove certain phrases, topics, hashtags and more from your feeds.

You can have multiple filters set up at any one time with various options (ie. which feed it affects, whether they expire after X amount of time or whether you want certain topics to be hidden completely or be able to click to read it (like a CW))

Filters page.
  • Title - Set a title for the Filter list. This is for your view only.
  • Expire After - You can choose when this list expires.
  • Filter Contexts - You can determine which feed(s) this Filter list applies to.
  • Filter Action - You can choose whether filters are hidden with a warning for you to click on or whether to hide them completely.
  • Keywords or phrases - Here you can enter the phrases or keywords and whether they should match the entire word/phrase or part of it.

Accessing Mastodon.

There are multiple ways to browse Mastodon.

  • Web - Simple View - This is generally the default view for all new accounts. This is one column and you have to click on the 'Notification', 'Explore' and 'Live Feeds' feeds.

  • Web - Advanced View - This is a multi-columned layout for power users. Users who have used TweetDeck would be familiar with this layout. Additional columns can be added such as lists and hashtags.

    • To enable 'Advanced View', go into 'Preferences'. In the 'Appearance' section, check the box for 'Enable advanced web interface', and click on 'Save Changes'. Click '< Back to Mastodon' to view the new interface.

  • Mobile - There are a plethora of Mastodon apps available including the official Mastodon app, but I recommend using a 3rd-party app as the official app is missing features.

    • iOS - Metatext - Best free app. Ivory is a paid app from the developers of the former Tweetbot app for Twitter.
    • Android - Tusky is the best free app. Tooot is an alternative (I have not used this one personally but friends and other users have claimed it's good.)

  • Desktop - If you are looking for something that is not web browser-based but an actual application, then look at Whalebird or Hyperspace

    • macOS - Ivory

Federation

Federation is a term used to describe how multiple instances are connected together.

And it's not just Mastodon -> Mastodon either.
It can be Mastodon -> Pleroma or Mastodon -> PeerTube (A video hosting site) or eventually, it would be Mastodon -> Tumblr and visa-versa.

Over time, due to interactions with other users on other instances and platforms will it all grow. Day by day, week by week, month by month, it will keep getting bigger and bigger.

How this all happens can only be described through a diagram:

FAQ

Q: Who runs the Mastodon 'network'?
A: Mastodon is not owned nor controlled by one entity. Each server is run independently from one another. No one can take over the entire 'network'. It's not possible. Each server (or instance) is independently managed by either an individual or a small team.

  • The non-profit Mastodon gGmbH which was established in 2019, is the company that develops the Mastodon software. They also own and operate the mastodon.social and mastodon.online instances.
  • The 'Network' is actually a protocol in the same vein as SMS or Email - Mastodon uses the ActivityPub protocol, an open, decentralised method of communication that became an official standard of the Web by the W3C back in 2018.

Q: Can Mastodon be 'bought'?

A: Not in the same way that Elon Musk bought Twitter. At most, we could see the Mastodon non-profit company being sold and perhaps the IP and the development of it would change hands, but Eugen Rochko (The leading developer/CEO of Mastodon GmbH) has stated in the past that he has no interest in selling the company or the IP.

What would more than likely happen is that an individual or a group of servers can be purchased, but even still, that wouldn't disrupt the network.

A recent example of this was the acquisition of pawoo.net, Japan's 2nd largest Mastodon server by a company called 'Mask' which also operates social.coop

Q: I have seen some posts that are longer than 500 characters, how is this possible?

A: Mastodon has a default character value for posts at 500 characters. Instance admins can change this value as they see fit. On Pleroma (Alternative software), the default character limit is 5000. Users may be using tools and plugins to post large posts.

  • An example of this would be WordPress using the ActivityPub plugin which allows users to post full-length blog posts on the Fediverse.

Additional Resources

* This is based on mastodon.social's settings. Other instances may have more or less but that decision is down to the instance admin.

** Favourites do not amplify the post in any way. It is just a notification that you can send to the author of the post telling them that you like it.

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