What Are the Stories We Need to Tell, and How Do We Tell Them?

/2025-06/session/7-d/

Topics:

Convener: Kyle R. Conway (@K_REY_C@social.coop) and Georgia Mountford-Blake (@georgiagemo@threads.net)

Participants who chose to record their names here:

Charles Iliya Krempeaux (@reiver@mastodon.social)
narF (@narF@mstdn.ca)
Emelia Smith (@thisismissem@hachyderm.io)

Notes

First intros.

Kyle: Art, Comms, Theater, Art Background, moved to Open Source.
Georgia: Similar background, also interested in technology. Pulled towards art.
- Interestend in a novel. Conflict necessary (for interest).
- SciFi where internet is not authoritarian.
Charles: On fediverse (above).
- Built
  - Hootsuite
  - Created 2nd hosting in fediverse (spaceHost)
  - GreatApe
- Technical background, loves doing creative stuff.
  - Weird interests (human behaviour, genetics).
  - Why do we care about things (e.g. decentralization).
(unnamed)
- Two 4 y.o. grand kids, want an un-shittified future.
- Want to steer local community to decentralized web.
- Want to leverage self into the future and help the people close to me.
- Tech all career, effectively retired during COVID.
- PICO micro programming (loggers)
- Is there a killer app here?
Emelia
- Rather than thinking about apps, we need to think about audiences.
- Why would someone want to use the thing that we build.
  - e.g. Microblogging
    - Exchanging messages with each other (something we want to do).
    - i.e. networks outside of our networks.
    - Now: algorithm-focused delivery, and how these applications like tiktok can know stuff about you before you know it about you (e.g. there’s been lots of women learning that they’re lesbians through tiktok, because of the content they interacted with).
    - Not a desire to effort friendships
      - Entertainment focus vs. non-entertainment (i.e. Professional posters)
      - Think about the people and why they’re doing something at the moment.
Georgia
- If you don’t control the narrative they will.
- There are already stories being told: i.e. it’s boring on the fediverse.
Kyle
- Introduced people.
- It’s a “culture shock”
- They realize there are good people on the internet (again)
Emelia
- Tech evolution has also worn down the local community.
  - This is a loss.
- The loudest is not the best (e.g. influencer industry)
  - AdTech, etc.
- SHIFT from between friends to influencers/AIs/ETC.
  - The story to emphasize is getting back to community spaces.
  - Hachyderm - build community focus; protect community focus.
  - Alice LGBTQIA Space - Personally welcomes everyone to their community.
    - This is a great perspective shift.
    - Rather than: What are your interests/celebs, it’s “hello”
(unnamed)
- Darius Kazemi instance - a 1-on-1 video call for everyone who joined the server (before they joined).
  - A closer community as a result.
Emelia
- Also see this on Island networks - allowlist based networks.
- Smaller (and more trusted) as a result.
Georgia:
- 2nd & 3rd the importance of local/smaller.
- Young people are disenfranchised with social networks/ai/etc.
- What’s the story that’s not just “burn it all to the ground”
- There’s currently a good local group on facebook.
Emelia

Same: FB groups in local area to join and post questions and get answers.
Georgia:
- [on FB] - people are responsive in the positive to local, personal, updates.
  - Brings the community alive.
- Understanding is that it “fails” when people try to move it to another platform.
- What if part of moving to a new place was being give
- [Kyle missed some notes - ratelimited]
Emelia
- Bee attacks!
- On FB groups - 4-5 posts within the last 6 months to get the group off of facebook (mods ignore these posts)
  - Newsletter on substack, but even with monetary argument for Ghost shift did not sway them.
  - We have a problem with brand names over other things (e.g. Substack vs. Newsletter/blog)
- Working to introduce labeling of content - i.e. filter out content for under 18’s.
Georgia:
- Misinformation/Disinformation as a possible topic - what is the opposite story?
- Georgia volunteers to go through all of the notes and turn them into compelling stories (almost)
  - Maybe a wiki for possible story compilation.
  - Possibly use notes from FediForum.
Charles
- Working on project with 2 people in animation industry.
- Telling a story about fediverse in a fun way.
  - Personifying the struggle of the fediverse.
  - Transformations, battles, wars, sketches, etc.
  - e.g. Giant Mastodon monster fighting other platforms
narF
- Where can we learn more about the project?
- LINK: @reiver@mastodon.social
(unnamed)
- Stories I’ve found compelling are the Trans/Queer/Nonbinary background of the fediverse.
  - Fairly pro-trans as a whole is compelling.
- What can people not find on the other networks.
- Privacy & Big Tech are too abstract (even if true).
  - How true? Threads showing up put a damper on that argument.
- Presense of ALT Text on the fediverse is a draw - participate 1st class here on the fediverse.
- The story doesn’t have to directly match, but be consistent enough.
- Find the right story for the right groups, and accept that some people don’t want the fediverse (based on what they want).
- Having a strong local community is also a great thing (though not everyone’s 1st fedi experience).
  - And it’s hard to find, must be lead there by the hand.
Georgia
- Sci-fi in general has influenced the development of tech.
- Should the stories go beyond what it “is already doing”, but also/instead provide a road-map?
  - e.g. I envision a 3D flipboard of sorts. Social media not just “in a screen”
- Be a dreamer to lead developers.
Emelia
- On accessibility: the boom of TikTok lead to burned-in subtitles (as a standard). Allowing use without subtitles.
  - Understanding is that they’re not accessible.
    - Proposal: Add accessible subtitles to video (and possibly on-screen as well).
    - We don’t have to just copy things that exist today -> we can make them better.
      - Just cloning isn’t a great idea.
      - It won’t get people to the fediverse because it doesn’t do something different (or solve a problem).
      - Europe has an entire industry focused on creating clones. (e.g. Twitter… for Europe).
Charles
- Problem with Open Source in general (no UX/Design)
Kyle
- Ad idea: “What’s the killer feature of the fediverse” cut to different people: “the people”
Emelia (s.o. else mentioned Rudy first)
- Rudy Fraser at ATmosphere Conf. “You have to get past the horsedrawn carriage”
  - We’re not building a better horse, we’re building a different thing entirely.
- BSKY social graph to be used in many contexts (e.g. one account across different channels).
- Chicken & Egg problem - “Putting the cart before the horse”
Georgia
- Where did you get the idea for this [Elena’s intro to Fediverse video]?
Elena:
- Filmmaker by trade, but career on hiatus for kids.
- Articles on Fediverse are super-long and we live in a post-literate world.
  - TikTok, etc. - no interest in long-form articles.
  - Decided to make a video.
  - A few TikTokers published ~60s videos about the fediverse that were better than any article I’d read in the past.
  - “I’m a filmmaker, I should use my skills to make a video about the fediverse”
  - Was assigned 2 interns, thus able to film extra footage for the video.
    - The interns had never heard about the fediverse, and shared the script with them and they shared great points (from the perspective of someone who knows nothing).
    - I got the interns to sign-up for the Fediverse
      - I had a panic after they left about not telling them about ALT Text (because I thought they might be bullied) - so I contacted them right away.
      - Panic about them not knowing about the CULTURE of the fediverse.
      - Wrote a two-part blog post of the ethics of the fediverse.
Emelia
- Probably not possible to make a fedi-wide ethics list of rules.
Georgia
- We’re close to the end. Anyone have ideas for how this can continue?
- Elena, any future projects?
Elena:
- 1st steps on the fediverse video (with interns) - what to do next.
  - A lot of people are a bit lost.
  - Interns as protagonists.
Emelia:
- 1st question that people ask: Where the hell do I join?
  - Anywhere!
narF:
- At my workshops on fediverse - Join this one; then move later.
- We need some hand-holding for newcomers.
- Never be as slick as FB.
Emelia:
- New onboarding: https://fedidb.com/welcome
Charles:
- Proposed hashtags to share stories: #FediTellAStory

GEORGIA’S SUMMARISED VERSION OF THESE NOTES:

Key ideas:

Stories (whether fiction, animation, poetry, speculative design) are valid and powerful ways to shape perception and behaviour
Stories can be not only a way to explain or ‘sell’ the fediverse concept, but also act as foundational infrastructure showing how future technology is imagined, how it might be used, how it could be built (note the very real influence of sci-fi from the last few decades shaping our present reality)
Clear and compelling stories are how we align, build culture, and make decentralized coordination possible without central authority
If you don’t tell people the story, they will fill in the blanks (and usually do it wrong) - we either control the narrative or lose it
Other tips/ reminders:
- When describing alternatives worth believing in, frame things around what people want to DO and think about which people you’re telling you story to (ie younger users treat platforms more like entertainment than networking, they aren’t necessarily seeking community, they want fun, dopamine, vibes)

Current stories we need alternatives for:

The only solution to big tech / the current problems with social media is to burn it all down and boycott everything
“It’s too late to change anything”
“Social media is inherently toxic”
Fediverse is confusing, high friction for newcomers (overwhelmed with tools, poor onboarding, unfamiliar with cultural norms, platform migration fatigue ie “not another account to make”)
“Everything has to be frictionless, fast, and scalable to matter” (ignores the value of slow, human-scale, locally rooted movements)
“Mastodon is just a worse version of Twitter/Instagram”

Good examples of stories we need more of:

community examples (like Alice personally welcoming people)
incremental change works!
Blind users who said “I can finally participate like a first-class citizen” (paraphrased) because the Fediverse is one of the few places where accessibility tools like alt text are valued.
“I found out actually I am not alone” - there’s actually nice helpful real people on the internet! (and realted themes of pro safety, inclusivity, accessibility, local community)

ACTION STEPS - aka How to tell these stories?

remember people want conflict/drama in stories, maybe utopia doesn’t sell, but “fighting to protect something good” does
let’s collect stories like seeds - maybe make a shared wiki/zine/library of “story prompts for the evangelizing the open web” ?
good tip from elena: try to pull in outsiders early, ie test your story with someone who has no clue what the fediverse is let alone what activitypub is