Convener: narF (@narF@mstdn.ca)

Participants who chose to record their names here:

• Sam (@samliebeskind@mastodon.social)
• Jeremiah Lee (@Jeremiah@alpaca.gold)
• Travis F W (@travisfw@fosstodon.org)
• Daniel Gultsch (@daniel@gultsch.social)
• @johannab@cosocial.ca, @johannab.ca
• Liz Pendleton (@mediarevolution@mo-me.me)
• @chewie@mammut.gogreenit.net
• Walter Selent (@walter@selent.ca)

Website: https://nextcloud.narf.ca/s/s2iGJxDE2MAWjkn

Intros

• narF - based in Canada, runs workshops on alternatives to big social media as volunteer at XTerra(?) Lab - making video games/games that help people think about ecology, social issues; community organizer for nonprofits
• Sam Liebeskind - New_ Public - nonprofit R&D lab exploring how to create healthier digital public spaces; working on a new platform for geographically-local communities (towns, small cities) as an alternative to Nextdoor and filling the gaps left by decline of many local newspapers; thinking about how to market it
• Daniel - Fediverse user. Jabber/XMPP developer. Might have made some similiar experiences when it comes to onboarding users to niche federated networks
• Jeremiah - Stockholm, Sverige, software developer
• Travis F W - android developer

Notes

narF

• Presentation they used in sessions: “How to Quit X and Meta”, started earlier this year (not claiming to be an expert!)
• Did this presentation for non-profits
• Realized there are multiple different audiences
  1. Users/Consumers
  2. Promote thier own work (artist)
  3. Organization - Group/Nonprofit (or could be company) who has community/members - but those people are mostly on Facebook so what do we do? especially if audience is older or not as tech-literate

Makes the sessions interactive - to be able to adapt it based on people’s interests. This is super important. We want participants to connect with one another. Together, they know much more than they realize!

Why do we want to quit? (set up first so the audience gives their answers, b/c everyone has different reasons)

• many people are bothered by a) ads b) endless scrolling / waste so much time

Workshops felt more like ‘group therapy’ than a regular workshop; ended up feeling like friendship

Recommendation: do this in small groups, ideally in person

What’s good about the alternatives?

• portability
• interoperability
• data sovereignty
• privately owned / anti-capitalism (alts are mostly done by volunteers / nonprofits) Really had to define what those mean! were super transparent about that…

We ask: what are alternatives to Facebook?

• Some people say: WhatsApp. We have to break the news that it’s the same company :(

Thoughts on Bluesky as an alternative? Is Bluesky = mastodon.social - an aggregator instance? Bluesky is just one example of what could be but isn’t yet a whole landscape of connected

Facebook Groups

• people are going to WhatsApp, Signal…Discord (but also proprietary, and has ads)
• Framegroupes (by fermasoft) - more email-group based

People looking for alts for Facebook Events (end Eventbrite, Meetup -

• Mobilizon
• Zeffy (for nonprofits)
• -> see Lauti
• email newsletters

Facebook marketplace replacements:

• Kijiji
• https://codeberg.org/flohmarkt/flohmarkt (example instances here: https://codeberg.org/flohmarkt/flohmarkt/wiki/flohmarkt-instances)

Tiktok replacements:

• loops (https://loops.video/)

How to market the social web?

• When someone say they hate this or that from mainstream platform, offer alternatives