Elena Rossini on GoToSocial ⁂

@KimSJ@mastodon.social @ainmosni@social.ainmosni.eu @xs4me2@mastodon.social @leanderlindahl@mastodon.social @pallenberg@mastodon.social so true 😂​

@TagHunt@infosec.exchange oh yes, I'm well aware. I tried that site with both my iPhone and GrapheneOS phone and now I treat my iPhone like kryptonite, LOL. I was asking because the CEO of W Social said in an interview that "high quality data" is the new oil and they will be collecting government IDs as a pre-requisite to sign up...

@emilymbender@dair-community.social @alex@dair-community.social I can’t wait to listen to it. Semi-related: I just started reading The AI Con and I’m enjoying it immensely 🙌

@mirou@mastodon.social thank you for the feedback! this time it stayed up ok 😅​

How to create an account on #WSocial in 13 easy steps: choose a usernamechoose a passwordchoose your interestsdownload the #WIdentity app to your phone (two options: Apple AppStore or Google Play Store)scan a QR codecreate a PIN code optional: enable biometrics; re-enter PINchoose whether you simply want to verify that you're human or if you also want to verify your namechoose the verification method (automatic photo review, request a manual review or scan your passport chip)scan your passport's picture pagescan your passport's chiptake a selfiescan a QR code to link the W Identity to your W Social accountenter your PIN code Congratulations, you're verified*! (* for two years) Demonstration in all its simple glory here: 📺​: https://inv.nadeko.net/Vcq4MiabpEQ Please save this toot as reference if you ever hear somebody say that IT'S TOO COMPLICATED TO JOIN THE FEDIVERSE BECAUSE YOU NEED TO PICK A SERVER 🤡​ #SocialMedia

@seedsignal@mastodon.social awww thank you! ❤️​

@soapdog hi! thanks for reaching out. @technomancy already gave you a perfect response. Just adding to it: the formatting you see at https://aseachange.com/@elena is the default theme of GoToSocial, but you could pick lots of other pre-packaged themes too for the style of the account page. To interact with people, there are SO MANY options out there. Right now I'm using https://masto-fe.superseriousbusiness.org/ because I love the multi-column view, but on any given day I also use https://phanpy.social to catch up with toots of friends. And there is also https://elk.zone that looks a lot like Twitter 1.0 (RIP). Keep me posted on how the installation goes and enjoy!!! P.S.: the first thing you want to do is upload Seirdy's Tier0 block lists https://seirdy.one/posts/2023/05/02/fediverse-blocklists/

Dear Fedi friends, Yesterday I posted a toot about #WSocial on this account (I typically talk about them on Mastodon, but I needed more than 500 characters, so I switched here). It was widely shared and discussed. Some of you may have missed my articles critiquing W Social. I have been following them - with a critical eye - and collecting evidence since their soft launch at Davos in January: https://blog.elenarossini.com/tag/w-social/ Anyway, some of you mistook the tone of yesterday's toot and thought I was ENDORSING signing up for an account on W Social. In reality I was being sarcastic 🙃​ I will make sure to spell out my intentions much more clearly next time. At any rate, my latest article about them made it to Hacker News yesterday (wild) and my research has been quoted in Dutch, German and French news outlets. The tide is finally turning (from fawning PR coverage to a more distanced, critical look). Thank you for your support as always! ❤️​ #blog

@me thank you for this Adam!

@benroyce@mastodon.social @pallenberg@mastodon.social #WSocial doesn't even need inflated fake numbers to "present a glowing, false narrative." Media organizations DO NOT fact check their claims. The European Commission didn't do any due diligence on the tech side. How do I know? W Social CEO Anna Zeiter claimed on the major German TV network SWR on May 28th that they had been onboarding 1000 users a day to prevent a server crash when they'd launch on June 17th. She boasted they had a waitlist of 50,000 users then: https://www.swr.de/swr1/leute/neue-social-media-plattform-w-social-das-steckt-dahinter-100.html How many users were on their PDS on June 17th then? After allegedly onboarding 1000 a day since late May? I know, I download their whole PDS every day. Why do I say the European Commission didn't do any technical due diligence? W Identity, the app required to verify one's identity and post on W Social has terrible reviews. 1.1 star average out of 5 stars on the German Google Play Store: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.widentity.app&hl=de I COME WITH RECEIPTS! And these people have a habit of misrepresenting their company... but media organizations and politicians just happily follow along...

@xavier@pony.social thank you... I think I sort of understand. I wonder if my problem is having a CDN turned on both on Hostinger and BunnyNet?

Asking for a friend: who is the most prominent dev you know on the Fediverse, who is seen as neutral and is great at explaining things to newbies, ELI5-style? #AskFedi

#WSocial state of the network - September 15th, 2026 There is a lot of misinformation regarding W Social and how active/successful it is. So, from time to time, I'd love to share some numbers. The beauty of #opendata! The network endorsed by the #EuropeanCommission may be the darling of Brussels political circles and European media organizations (who simply rehash PR talking points). But the look behind the curtain is really troubling. As @pallenberg@mastodon.social often says, this network is #DOA (dead on arrival). A social media graveyard, or rather, a simple moribund database. There is no way that Zeiter, Rentzhog & co. can start monetizing it in 2027. Numbers from this morning at 10:30am: Accounts on their PDS: 37,531Users with verified ID: 7,492Users with 1+ post: 3,388Users who have never posted: 34,143Users with 0 posts and who follow 0 accounts: 26,444% of users with 0 posts, who follow 0 accounts: 70,4%% of users who have never posted: 90,97% So, whenever you hear someone hyping it up, feel free to forward this post or point people to my articles at https://blog.elenarossini.com/tag/w-social/ The one thing I will give W credit for though is how good they are at lobbying and hyping up their image. While this playbook may have worked in the past, not anymore. On an open network, with open data, it's child's play to expose misrepresentations and show the real, raw data. sources: pdsls.dev, clearsky.app, atproto.at and the csv of their full PDS that I download daily 💁‍♀️​

@DataKnightmare@mastodon.xyz "As of 3 September 2024, Prof. Dr. Louisa Specht-Riemenschneider is the Federal Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information (BfDI). The Federal Commissioner is fully independent in the performance of her duties, and only subject to the law. With regard to the performance of her tasks, the Federal Commissioner, as an autonomous and independent supreme federal authority, is currently supported by around 350 staff members in Bonn and Berlin. " https://www.bfdi.bund.de/EN/BfDI/UeberUns/DieBehoerde/diebehoerde_node.html#:~:text=As%20of%203%20September%202024,Freedom%20of%20Information%20(BfDI) 🤷‍♀️​

@lastofthem@mastodon-belgium.be huge sigh of relief! for a great e-ink display, have you looked into Pimoroni(s)? https://shop.pimoroni.com/products/inky-impression?variant=56039376912763 disclaimer: I've never used them but I'm super tempted

@pierre_pebble@mastodon.ie that sounds incredibly ingenious! as a newbie I'm still a little intimidated by rsync but I want to tackle it soon 😅​

@etp@indieweb.social if you go into settings it will tell you the version number and the firmware number (the latest one isn’t jailbreakable sadly)

📣​ New post 📝​ "A newbie's guide to self-hosting: GoToSocial part 1 (installation and set-up)" 🔗​: https://blog.elenarossini.com/a-newbies-guide-to-self-hosting-gotosocial-part-1-installation-and-set-up/ Basically a visual guide showing how to install #GoToSocial via #YunoHost and set it up with some basic security. ⏱️​ From start to finish, it should take about 25-30 minutes. It's my act of resistance against tech bros... I love the idea of teaching people how to self-host their own social media instance, connected to the fediverse ✌️​❤️​ ​ Thank you @yunohost@toot.aquilenet.fr  and @gotosocial@gts.superseriousbusiness.org for empowering us all! #SelfHosting #Fediverse #newbie #MySoCalledSudoLife #blog #resist

🔓​ #KindleJailbreak chronicles - day 39 📖​ I'm sharing this in case it can motivate other people with e-readers to get back to steady reading habits. I setup a jailbroken Kindle with #KOreader and #SimpleUI a little over a month ago (39 days to be exact). I had been missing reading books and I knew that with quantification / a clear metric showing minutes spent reading every day I could get back in the habit. For context, ever since I started tracking my step count, I've been averaging over 10,000 steps a day - for 7 YEARS now! Anyway, 39 days in and my daily reading average (over the last 7 days) has been 56 minutes/day. I was aiming for 30. I guess that it also helps that Suzanne Collins is a great writer 😅​ A side effect of reading so much is that writing feels effortless now. The words just flow. Yesterday I published a deep dive on W Social (ICYMI): https://blog.elenarossini.com/the-untold-story-about-w-social-unconventional-beginnings-strategic-pitches-conflicting-signals/ Wishing you all a great day! #books #reading #habits

The sheer ignorance of some tech "journalists" INFURIATES me. Today the NYTimes featured on its homepage an article about how "The Netherlands blocked a U.S. company from buying a Dutch firm that handles its national ID system." 🔗​: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/09/technology/solvinity-kyndryl-blocked-deal-us-europe-rift.html So far, so good. But the journalist behind the article wrote in the comments section: "More and more, countries in Europe want to disentangle themselves from American tech. What's less clear is what exactly they can replace it with." EXCUSE ME ADAM SATARIANO, THERE IS A GALAXY OF EXCELLENT FREE OPEN SOURCE SOFTWARE THAT MANY EUROPEAN GOVERNMENTS ARE ALREADY USING.... OR EVEN BUILDING AT THE MOMENT. Maybe I should have gone into journalism after all #lesigh #rants

A story in two pictures: An article from Euractiv from July stating "Von der Leyen is expected to use her annual State of the Union speech to unveil plans for EU-wide age restrictions on social media". And then a pic of a W Social post announcing the live-stream of the EC state of the Union speech. This is precisely why I keep speaking up about #WSocial: We are at a dangerous turning point when it comes to online privacy and it seems that the European Commission has chosen this network because of its built-in age verification. Truth is: even if their PDS hosts 28k accounts, only 2612 people (as of this morning) have ever published a single post or reply on W. Their #WIdentity app is so broken, it has mostly one-star ratings on Google Play Store (yes, you read it right, the network of European digital sovereignty requires an app from Google or Apple to verify one's identity). Most egregiously, W Social does NOT do any content moderation to rein in hate speech. I find daily examples of racist, transphobic and xenophobic posts that are simply allowed. Thankfully on the ATmosphere, people can subscribe to Bluesky, Blacksky or Northsky labelers to hide hate speech. W Social leaders believe in "free speech absolutism" and keep saying that everyone is welcome. Alice Weidel of AfD too, by the way. I thought W Social would be in violation of the DSA for allowing these messages to stay up, but apparently they are too small of a platform for this rule to apply. Lately W Social leaders and power users have defined fact-based criticism as "disinformation" and targeted harassment: https://aseachange.com/@elena/statuses/01M0SDV98GRDWQNFF9VHVT9J18 I'm ok with being called a liar and a bully, if my screenshots and video captures of hate speech on the platform can help bring light to this problem. So be warned, there may be bad news coming at the EC State of the Union in September.

@DataKnightmare@mastodon.xyz thank you for the insights! A fascinating fact is that they have the German Federal Government's Data Protection Commissioner (Louisa Specht-Riemenschneider) on their board of advisors. I'm not sure how this is possible, like a public official serving as an advisor for a commercial enterprise from Sweden? 🤷‍♀️​

Dear Fedi friends, I know I had promised you a step-by-step tutorial for the installation of #GoToSocial on YunoHost... well, chapter one is 99% written. Thing is, I just discovered a potential little bug and I gave a heads-up to the YunoHost folks (something related to open registrations). If I don't hear back by tomorrow I may use CLI to go look into it in Terminal and try to change the setting that way (even if by default it's set to "false", I found that in reality the latest version does allow signups). I never changed GoToSocial settings in Terminal and it could be fuuuun. All this to say: thank you for your patience and the article will come as soon as I get an answer about the open registration issue. Wishing you all a great day, wherever you are 🌈​

File under: AI Resistance I'm reading – and enjoying immensely – @emilymbender@dair-community.social and @alex@dair-community.social's book #TheAICon. I've been learning a lot of things and something that really stood out recently is the need to be careful about the language we use to describe these systems. Bender and Hanna helpfully explain: "It matters what words we use when we talk about these technologies. For instance, in our writing, we don’t use the term “hallucination” to discuss the errors of LLMs, for two reasons. First, if it’s used tongue-in-cheek, it is making light of what can be symptoms of serious mental illness. Second, “hallucination” refers to the experience of perceiving things that aren’t there. But LLMs actually don’t have perceptions, and suggesting that they do is yet more unhelpful anthropomorphization. That means we also avoid assigning thought processes to these systems, or saying that they can “think”. Metaphors have power, they structure the frames of discourse, and they can subtly and insidiously encourage certain ways of understanding technology and the social systems it is embedded in." Antropomorphizing AI contributes to AI hype. Thanks Emily and Alex for helping me see things this way! #AIcritique #AIhype #NoAI #AIresistance #AI #books

👩🏻‍💻 my so-called sudo life - day 497: Mastodon stampede edition 🐘​ Dear Fedi friends, You may remember how last year I was dealing with self-DDoS attacks every time I shared a link to my Wordpress or Ghost sites. Well, I solved the issue with Ghost (#VinylCache is brilliant) but I never found a solution for my Wordpress site... not even with #BunnyCDN. I guess I wasn't tweaking the right settings. This is a pity because TBH the ActivityPub for Wordpress plugin is SO COOL and works flawlessly. I had to move my blog posts to Ghost and keep Wordpress as a static portfolio site. That being said, I never dared share links to my Wordpress site anymore because I would get about 4000 requests within 60 seconds and everything would freeze. I just looked into #BunnyCDN's settings again and tried to tweak them. So please bear with me for an experiment, sharing an old blog post and seeing what happens. Wish me luck! From the archives: https://elenarossini.com/2025/01/my-so-called-sudo-life-time-matters/ #BuyEuropean #CDN #DDOS #MastodonHugofDeath #MastodonStampede #Wordpress #blog #MySoCalledSudoLife

Good morning Fedi friends! On the agenda today: writing a first draft explaining to newbies how to self-host #GoToSocial with the help of #YunoHost. Now, to do a step-by-step installation guide I need to create a brand new account, so I can document everything. I'm a little stressed out thinking of which domain name to use and the fact it would be something like my 20th - yes TWENTIETH - ActivityPub account!!! 🫠 The things you do for the love of the fediverse 😅​ #MySoCalledSudoLife #SelfHosting

@lastofthem@mastodon-belgium.be understood... maybe some day soon 😢​

Come join me and @Gina@fosstodon.org in Luxembourg this October! #OSCL26 (Open Source Conference Luxembourg) has a brand new track devoted to “Decentralized Technologies for Digital Sovereignty”: 🔗: https://conference.opensource.lu We are looking for speakers interested in discussing these topics: Federated technologies in the public sectorDecentralized platforms for video, chat, communications, code, etc.Fediverse successes and challengesSelf-hosted solutions for individuals and institutionsInteroperability for resilience Apply here: 🔗: https://pretalx.com/open-source-conference-luxembourg-2026/cfp The conference takes place on Wednesday October 7th in Belval, Luxembourg. Please share! 🚀​ #Fediverse #FediAdvocacy #conferences #OpenSource #FOSS #FLOSS #TheFutureIsFederated #selfhosting #interoperability #DigitalSovereignty #activism

Asking for a friend: do you remember the fantastic https://w-social.eu website that explained to people what the Fediverse is and why it's a much better alternative to #WSocial? Sadly it appears to be offline / with an expired SSL cert. Do you know who is behind it? Any chances of reviving it? The folks behind W Social are launching the site this Saturday... they already got TV coverage in Germany last night 😒​ #AskFedi

Dear friends, Please gather around for a long post about #WSocial and how they are responding to critiques. I have noticed a trend: W Social leaders and staunch supporters are describing any critical posts about the company as "targeted disinformation." Its CEO said they will soon have a technical solution in place for this. Oh?!? 🔗: https://mu.social/profile/anna.wsocial.eu/post/3mtqufy6g4s2r I suppose the "targeted disinformation" claims are about recent posts by the likes of me and @pallenberg@mastodon.social about troubling hate speech that is allowed on W Social. Claims backed by hard evidence, in the form of screenshots and video captures. (I am increasingly doing screen recordings of problematic posts and interactions by W Social people because they have a tendency to delete evidence - like an infamous comment on a video by the Instutute for Remigration). ⬇️ ⬇️ ⬇️ Discrediting sources, renaming evidence as "disinformation" and creating a victim narrative has a long, storied history. ⬆️ ⬆️ ⬆️ But I'm digressing. I speak up about W Social because: Mainstream media runs PR fluff about them; Horrid hate speech on the platform is completely unmoderated. W Social is currently showing the limits of free speech absolutism. Its CEO wrote: "We don’t need W to become another echo chamber." Reminds you of something? Atmosphere user @echna.bsky.social astutely remarked that "W Social is on an X speedrun, without ever having been like Twitter." 🔗: https://mu.social/profile/echna.bsky.social/post/3mtqlknzork2t Bluesky, #Blacksky, and #Northsky have mechanisms in place to report hate speech - and I am super thankful for that. As of today, I cannot report to W Social posts by their users that contain hate speech. The W Social moderation list's only purpose is to make a distinction between verified users and bots. Compare it with Blacksky's moderation list and be amazed (see screenshots). What's the big deal about the lack of content moderation on #WSocial? Well, I am haunted by some posts by their users. A repeat offender (routinely posting racist and xenophobic posts) recently commented "Awesome news" to a newspaper article about a Palestinian family drowning in Sussex. His profile is still up and he's followed by W Social's CEO and its co-founder Ingmar Renzhog (yes I have evidence of this, via a video capture - so even if they unfollow him or delete his account, well, I have proof of my claim). I agree with "Echna" that W Social is on an X speedrun, allowing racist, transphobic and xenophobic posts. Evidence: 🔗: https://mu.social/profile/elenarossini.com/post/3mth3hwhvzs26 Instead of addressing these critiques head-on - and moderating hate speech - the W Social co-founders are lamenting being subjected to a "targeted disinformation" campaign. Oh ok? IMHO free speech absolutism ultimately only coddles far right extremists and is a very dangerous thing. Would you call this disinformation? Special thanks to my #GoToSocial account for allowing this message all in one go, without having to break it up in a hundred-post thread. TL;DR: W Social is taking a dark turn real fast. #SocialMedia

Good morning Fedi friends! Now that the stress of preparing for my keynote speech at #2MR in Hamburg is out of the way, I can return to #MySoCalledSudoLife adventures. What's next? More mesh experiments with my Heltec (now in Paris), hopefully trying to reach @leonieke@squilla.vitaulium.eu in the Netherlands. And getting an education in #ReticulumNetwork. But this morning I have the pleasure of speaking with some fellow Italians about bringing municipalities to the Fediverse. Onwards and upwards 🚀​ #FediAdvocacy

@tante@tldr.nettime.org yes, I've seen it. le sigh 😭​

#Signal troubleshooting - very odd support conversation Yesterday afternoon I had a quick video call with someone using Signal and then I went to pick up my child from an afternoon summer program. When I got home I realized that my phone wasn't receiving any new messages on Signal... but my computer was. Signal on my phone was completely frozen. I followed a prompt and sent the most recent log to their support email. Then carried on with my life. At some point, 2 hours later, I had a eureka moment: the last thing that worked was a call. Let's try the same thing. So I called my mom and hung up (she was in the same room as me). After the call, all the Signal messages that had accumulated during the afternoon magically synched. Everything worked again! And then I found a new message by Signal saying "Welcome to the official Signal release chat!" Ok. Glad I was distracted by my child and dinner because when I checked my email, I found a response from Signal support: "It appears the database is irrecoverably damaged. Unfortunately you will need to completely uninstall and then reinstall Signal. This will delete your message history. It cannot be recovered." Say what? 😳​ So I wrote back to Signal that I had fixed my issue by simply starting a call and then all the messages started synching again. I thanked them for their speedy reply and said everything was ok. I did the bedtime routine for my child and before bed I checked my email again. Two identical emails from Signal: "Hello. We understand your frustration. We feel it too" HUH? "There is no specific timeline for a resolution at this moment." WHAT RESOLUTION, I SAID I FIXED THE PROBLEM? "Please keep in mind we are a small team and have limitations as a non-profit organization. Uninstalling and reinstalling is the only action available." I feel for you Signal and I'm super grateful for all you do, but maybe your LLM support system needs some tweaking. Because this has got to be some LLM that misunderstood my reply. Thank goodness I didn't wipe 6 years' worth of messages, gaaah. Signal has been working perfectly ever since. Still, I'm now compiling a list of people I message on there as a contingency plan, should thing go awry again. I've been using #DeltaChat more lately and more and really love it. one more tale for #MySoCalledSudoLife #NoAI #LLM

@tootbrute@fedi.arkadi.one it takes a couple of minutes to download and install it and it's GORGEOUS

Good morning Fedi friends. Is anybody curious about how the #WSocial experiment is going? You know, the private, for profit "European answer to X" endorsed by the European Commission, which is a fork of Bluesky and has quietly gone closed-source before its beta launch (à la #TruthSocial)? I've got numbers for you! Nearly two months in, W Social has almost the same number of accounts as #Eurosky... You know, the European fork of Bluesky that does NOT require government IDs to post. W Social: 23.5k accounts Eurosky: 24.8k accounts In order to post on W Social you need to provide your government ID and go through a 13-step verification process. So far 4.5k accounts are verified but only 2036 (as of this morning) have ever published a single post or reply. There is a handy website - https://pdsls.dev - that allows you to monitor the "firehose" of any ATproto-powered PDS. Inspired by @pallenberg@mastodon.social and his awesome videos (example: https://mu.social/profile/palle.eurosky.social/post/3mskkqrrc522l) I have been comparing the live activities of the two networks. The difference is SHOCKING. W Social is largely a zombie, dormant network, with a high number of accounts that do not interact. Eurosky by contrast shows very lively activity. The screenshot I grabbed yesterday shows a side-by-side comparison of their firehose over a 27 minute period. W Social had a total of 240 events (follows, likes, posts...) whereas Eurosky registered 7596 events in the same time interval. A couple of days ago I downloaded their PDS and saw that 67,8% of their accounts have 0 follows, 0 followers and 0 posts. That's what I mean when I call it a "zombie network." W Social's CEO says they plan to start monetizing by introducing ads in 2027. WITH THESE NUMBERS?!? Sure Jan. I love how with the transparency of open data you can't really use the standard playbook of CEO hype and hubris. Because we can all see their numbers. And they are BAAAAD. I have been feeling very strong second hand embarrassment for the European Commission and especially Ursula von der Leyen - who went so far as to publicize the W launch in between G7 meetings in June. I wonder how they feel about it... and if they are even aware of how badly the network is doing right now. I suspect the network can be on life support for a year or two but things aren't looking good. Thought you should know! For my series of articles about W Social, check out: https://blog.elenarossini.com/tag/w-social/ I may have another one coming in the fall...

@me@social.k3can.us thank you for the great insights!

Another day, another opportunity to roast #WSocial. Grab your 🍿​ W Social had been hyping up the live broadcast of Ursula von der Leyen's State of the Union address for weeks. "Watch it on W!" (You'd think they had an exclusive). Nah, it was also shown live on YouTube and X and other places. The funniest thing is that co-founder Ingmar Rentzhog bragged in the live chat: "we are doing our best. The boradcast (sic) is truly Made in Europe." You'd think they had built their own live streaming service. Think again: they used stream.place by Eli Mallon, an ATproto developer based in Seattle. Last time I checked, Seattle is in Washington state? U.S.A.? W, the social network of European digital sovereignty! So I put Rentzhog on the spot and he became all defensive: 🔗​: https://mu.social/profile/elenarossini.com/post/3mvmmu5gua225 But it gets better! W Social had been bragging that only verified W users could comment in the live chat. Yesterday I found out that people with a blue checkmark by Bluesky could also comment. And I have one! It all went by really fast... At the end of the event I made sure to credit Eli Mallon and stream.place for powering the live stream. If W Social wouldn't do it, well, I would. I find it incredible that their modus operandi is to exploit open source infrastructure, giving the impression they built everything from scratch, without ever crediting anyone. #LSocial = Leech Social. The open social web is a highly collaborative space and it pains me to see the parasitic behavior of certain players who just take, take, take without ever giving anything back. The @EUCommission@ec.social-network.europa.eu was in the live chat. Von der Leyen took time out from G7 meetings in June to publicize the W Social launch. I strongly believe they picked the wrong platform, which is openwashing and sovereignwashing. I typically do not tag the EC Mastodon account in posts about W, but this time it's important. (Apologies in advance to their social media interns, I know these choices were not made by you.) We deserve better platforms. I will keep speaking up about W Social, the black flamingo of the open social web. And if you disagree with what they are doing, please speak up too. W Social leaders have started resorting to ad hominem attacks, calling my posts and articles "targeted disinformation." At first I was a lonely voice of dissent against them. Then @pallenberg@mastodon.social joined in. My wish: from a solo, to a duet, to a whole chorus of voices speaking up ⚡​ And if you want to catch up on all the W Social red flags, I wrote a series of blog posts about them: https://blog.elenarossini.com/tag/w-social/ (start at the bottom)

Dear Fedi friends, It may be time for a re-introduction: I'm Elena, an Italian creative (writer, photographer, filmmaker) living in Paris, France. You may have initially gotten to know me for my advocacy for the Fediverse (like my Fedi intro video: https://blog.elenarossini.com/fediverse-video/ or my blog or my Fediverse stock photo). So, you may have been a bit confused lately, over all my critical posts about the new network W Social. Why do I keep bringing it up? I believe that W Social - and its required, companion app W Identity - are an existential threat to the Fediverse. So I'm fighting tooth and nail to oppose and resist them. Why? The European Commission has enthusiastically embraced this new hard fork of Bluesky that requires age verification. Even Ursula von der Leyen advertised the launch of W Social in between G7 meetings last week. I have MOUNTAINS of evidence of poor planning, extremely lax security, use of U.S. Big Tech platforms for something that purports to be "based in Europe, for the world." Why is it a threat for the Fediverse? The only way to make sense of the European Commission's embrace of this platform is that maybe it sees it as a trial run for MANDATORY age verification for social media across the European Union. No Fediverse app has infrastructure in place to comply. And if a mandate is introduced, it would spell the end of the open social web and internet anonymity... like Chat Control, but basically killing the Fediverse. I find it EXTREMELY disturbing to see the enthusiastic embrace of W Social by the European Commission. It took them YEARS to change their website footer and add Mastodon and Bluesky instead of X. In the span of 5 weeks, they replaced the Bluesky logo (a butterfly) with the "W" from W Social. All my posts about W Social from last week went viral. My articles have been quoted in articles in French, Dutch and German news sites (https://blog.elenarossini.com/tag/w-social/) I have held back from sharing more evidence I found because I don't want to appear like a bully who promotes pile-ons. I'm a nice, sweet person, I promise! I take ZERO pleasure in writing about W Social, but I have unwittingly become an expert on them - after researching them for 5 months. So here I am. I will keep investigating them. If you don't want to hear about this topic anymore - I would understand - you can mute the hashtags #Wsocial and #DubyaSocial (that's a pretty apt way to describe them IMHO). Peace out. #introduction #reintroduction

@TagHunt@infosec.exchange it truly is an amazing site. afraid to try it with my laptop (where I'm typing this)

#3GoodThings 🏃‍♀️​ I started running using the 5k Runner app as motivator. My average daily step count has been over 10k for 7 YEARS now (yes, you read that right), but some family members were bugging me it's not enough cardio (fair) and that "I may be out of shape" (what the heck?) So now I run. Delighted to report that at the end of each run - using 5k Runner - I gave as feedback that it was too easy. This for 3 days in a row, after multiple adjustments. So 5k Runner is making me skip ahead to week 3 of training. Take that doubters! 💁‍♀️​ I've taken up running while vacationing with my extended family in Brittany and it's so cool to run in the countryside... yesterday I spotted / ran after 3 rabbits (I felt like Alice in Wonderland, LOL). It won't be the same thing in Paris, that's for sure. #jogging #5kRunner #ProveThemWrong

@tante@tldr.nettime.org and entire families, too. mostly male members 😭​

@rimu BRAVISSIMO! Go Rimu and PieFed! This is the way 🙌​ #NoAI

@marco197@livellosegreto.it Vivaldi!

European institutions seem to be all in when it comes to introducing age verification mandates for citizens in member states: https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/library/commission-sets-out-common-approach-eu-wide-age-verification-technologies I now have daily anxiety thinking about the future of the fediverse. So how do I channel this fear and turn it into something constructive? I'm going back to writing #selfhosting guides for newbies. It's a great distraction, which gives me a bit of hope. Especially the next guide, which will cover my favorite fediverse software - #GoToSocial (which is powering this instance) - and how to install and configure it. Your own little home on the fediverse! Lightweight and features-packed. Surely something like this would fall outside the scope of regulation. Right? Right? #MySoCalledSudoLife #YunoHost #VPS #AgeVerification #privacy #EUBigTech

I'm officially one of you. Whenever I see graphics about digital sovereignty and moving away from Big Tech, I go: "well, actually" - especially when I see Signal suggested as an alternative to WhatsApp. My first thought: Signal is pretty centralized, #DeltaChat would be a far superior alternative 🙈​🙉​🙊​ Disclaimer: I use both (Signal and DeltaChat) but I really wish I could move all my convos to @Delta@chaos.social. Slowly convincing one person at a time... #MySoCalledSudoLife #BigTech

@pa27@mastodon.social @pallenberg@mastodon.social totally Trumpian and Muskian vibes from the W Social folks. Plus the name is TERRIBLE from the POV of SEO 🤡