My experience of the #fediverse :
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@andy @james @_elena I’m getting all the way up and down England and since a day or so ago Northern Ireland too, also, as well now on MeshCore.
On Meshtastic I’m able to get from home in Beckton Park to Royal Albert dock, which is about one stop on the DLR. There’s no conversation on it ever, nobody ever replies, but it has an impressive mesh map with lots of coloured blobs on. -
@fmors 14 years on Twitter (2008-2022) and I didn't learn a single thing.
4 years on the Fediverse and I feel like MacGyver
@_elena watch out! Speaking of MacGyver can be used as an age verification criterion...
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My experience of the #fediverse :
Year 1 (2023):
It feels a little lonely as 99% of my friends stayed on Big Tech platforms.Year 2 (2024):
I start a blog - #TheFutureIsFederated - to explain the fediverse to "normies"... and I make a lot of new (techie) friends.Year 3 (2025):
My techie friends encourage me to start self-hosting with #YunoHost... and I do! (GoToSocial, PeerTube, NextCloud...) I LOVE it.Year 4 (2026):
I plan to buy a Heltec to try out off-grid mesh radio communication
️@_elena I’d suggest buy two nodes, so you can tell if it’s working or not. The second one is always going to be useful if you put it somewhere near you and high up. Having two is reassuring when you see it working between the two.
In fact, there’s MeshCore and Meshtastic, it’s worth being on both depending on the exact area (some are more MeshCore, some are more Meshtastic), so really, I’d suggest getting four nodes!
You’ll end up buying more than that in the long run, maybe not all at once in one go.
I also wrote up a page on which nodes I recommend for giving to family members, once you’re into it and can’t stop buying nodes (too early to reveal that?) pikopublish.ing/u0421793/bolg/whichradio.xhtml -
@3rik given how quickly this escalated, I have no idea what I will be up to in 2027!
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My experience of the #fediverse :
Year 1 (2023):
It feels a little lonely as 99% of my friends stayed on Big Tech platforms.Year 2 (2024):
I start a blog - #TheFutureIsFederated - to explain the fediverse to "normies"... and I make a lot of new (techie) friends.Year 3 (2025):
My techie friends encourage me to start self-hosting with #YunoHost... and I do! (GoToSocial, PeerTube, NextCloud...) I LOVE it.Year 4 (2026):
I plan to buy a Heltec to try out off-grid mesh radio communication️@_elena I'm glad that your experience has worked out so well. My year 1 mirrored yours and has continued to be so largely bc the fediverse seems oriented toward and around techies. I'm not one and am not interested in becoming one.
So how do I find community here?
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My experience of the #fediverse :
Year 1 (2023):
It feels a little lonely as 99% of my friends stayed on Big Tech platforms.Year 2 (2024):
I start a blog - #TheFutureIsFederated - to explain the fediverse to "normies"... and I make a lot of new (techie) friends.Year 3 (2025):
My techie friends encourage me to start self-hosting with #YunoHost... and I do! (GoToSocial, PeerTube, NextCloud...) I LOVE it.Year 4 (2026):
I plan to buy a Heltec to try out off-grid mesh radio communication️@_elena I've noticed a load of people using Meshtastic and Meshcore on the Fediverse since my return. I haven't done any Lora stuff in a while (got multiple Heltecs and others plus a bunch of antennas). I might have to give it another go one of the days and see how busy the local scene is now.
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@_elena So recognisable!
(and yes, I've recently purchased a lilygo-tdeck for lora/meshcore communication)
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@james I'm on the east side of Wolverhampton (in a pretty dead spot for VHF comms) and tempted to flash a few devices with up to date firmware and give it another go. From Sedgley Beacon with a yagi I got 63 miles a couple of springs back and used to see plenty of nodes when driving with Meshtastic turned on on a tiny homemade j-pole.
Where are you based and what software/frequency are you on that it's completely dead?
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@_elena I've noticed a load of people using Meshtastic and Meshcore on the Fediverse since my return. I haven't done any Lora stuff in a while (got multiple Heltecs and others plus a bunch of antennas). I might have to give it another go one of the days and see how busy the local scene is now.
@naturepunk wonderful!
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People who use X are increasingly radicalised until they end up as Nazis.
People who use Mastodon are increasingly radicalised until they end up as C programmers.
@david_chisnall @_elena
"People who use Mastodon are increasingly radicalised until they end up as C programmers."
Some people just want to watch the world burn. -
@_elena I'm glad that your experience has worked out so well. My year 1 mirrored yours and has continued to be so largely bc the fediverse seems oriented toward and around techies. I'm not one and am not interested in becoming one.
So how do I find community here?
@rebelyn2 I would say follow a lot of hashtags of topics that interest you and you will find your people...
I love this about the fediverse, that you can simply follow hashtags and easily populate your feed with interesting content....
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My experience of the #fediverse :
Year 1 (2023):
It feels a little lonely as 99% of my friends stayed on Big Tech platforms.Year 2 (2024):
I start a blog - #TheFutureIsFederated - to explain the fediverse to "normies"... and I make a lot of new (techie) friends.Year 3 (2025):
My techie friends encourage me to start self-hosting with #YunoHost... and I do! (GoToSocial, PeerTube, NextCloud...) I LOVE it.Year 4 (2026):
I plan to buy a Heltec to try out off-grid mesh radio communication️@_elena so slow, I joined Mastodon in january and already am on Meshcore now ;-). The indoctrination pipeline has accelerated maybe? Looking into Reticulum now to integrate off-grid with grid communication.
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@_elena I’d suggest buy two nodes, so you can tell if it’s working or not. The second one is always going to be useful if you put it somewhere near you and high up. Having two is reassuring when you see it working between the two.
In fact, there’s MeshCore and Meshtastic, it’s worth being on both depending on the exact area (some are more MeshCore, some are more Meshtastic), so really, I’d suggest getting four nodes!
You’ll end up buying more than that in the long run, maybe not all at once in one go.
I also wrote up a page on which nodes I recommend for giving to family members, once you’re into it and can’t stop buying nodes (too early to reveal that?) pikopublish.ing/u0421793/bolg/whichradio.xhtml@u0421793 thank you for all the helpful insights Ian. I've bookmarked your toot and I will definitely use it as reference
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@_elena watch out! Speaking of MacGyver can be used as an age verification criterion...
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@_elena
I'm starting my Big Tech de-cluttering.
If it's not a secret, what else are you self-hosting?@banshee7076 awesome!
In terms of other things I'm self-hosting:
- Umami (a privacy-respecting, FOSS, Google Analytics alternative)
- LinkStack (a FOSS Linktree alternative)
- Pixelfed
- I just installed AppFlowy (a FOSS Notion alternative) but I have yet to set it up and try itEdit/Update: I'm not self-hosting it but paying for Linkwarden (a FOSS Pocket alternative)
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My experience of the #fediverse :
Year 1 (2023):
It feels a little lonely as 99% of my friends stayed on Big Tech platforms.Year 2 (2024):
I start a blog - #TheFutureIsFederated - to explain the fediverse to "normies"... and I make a lot of new (techie) friends.Year 3 (2025):
My techie friends encourage me to start self-hosting with #YunoHost... and I do! (GoToSocial, PeerTube, NextCloud...) I LOVE it.Year 4 (2026):
I plan to buy a Heltec to try out off-grid mesh radio communication️@_elena it's very hard to get people's on fediverse or #opensource platform. I barely managed to get 3 friends over signal from WhatsApp.
. Nobody wants to leave WhatsApp or insta 
.whenever I tell them about signal or Mastodon they laughed and asked me... What? Signal? Mastodon?
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