(LACK OF) MUTUALS FEATURE FEELINGS

@danika

shitchosting internet adversary

she/her/they/them
danika.info/

@danika6/30/2022, 5:18 PM

(LACK OF) MUTUALS FEATURE FEELINGS

i'll be tagging my internet brain worm posts with #danikaposting and my non-internet brain worms with #danikachosting moving forward so people can choose whether or not they want to see the worms or the shitchosting! MOVING ON...

there is something extremely anxiety-inducing about not being able to see who follows a person that followed you that you want to make sure you have mutuals with to ensure they're a good person which makes no sense because who follows who has never equated to immediate endorsement, right?

this specific anxiety has been cooked up in a cauldron of a million other specific anxieties related to the internet that aren't rooted in much beyond a few bad experiences or the need to eventually unfollow a person because you realize their values/takes/whatever aren't ones you agree with or want to see on your feed.

not really sure where i'm getting at but i feel a mixture of anxiety and relief that i cannot see mutual followers on here.. i'm following people i'd normally not even see on twitter because of a) nightmare notifications tab that i try to avoid and b) we don't have mutuals on there. it's so much.. easier and less stressful this way despite my lingering anxiety thanks to the hell site, AND it's letting me interact with new people somewhere out there in the Wired!

(my anxiety about not knowing who people are because of new handles that are different from their twitter handles is another story but that anxiety mainly revolves around disappointing people i don't recognize by not following them back.. yet another horrible twitter brain worm built up over the last 10 years)

thanks for reading, i'd love to know what y'all think!

#danikaposting

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in reply to @danika's post:

izzy kestrel @iznaut6/30/2022, 5:37 PM

yeah tbh it's really hard to untangle what features i feel are "missing" bc Brain Worms and what is actually critical for me to enjoy using this site. rn i'm kinda just riding the high of it being a fun new thing and trusting that the invite system and human moderation is enough but i do have some feelings otherwise

i did a twitter thread a while ago about how i engage with it, tho it's mostly in terms of Posting and Interacting - i had meant to do a "part 2" at some point about the mental calculus i do when i see new ppl and decide if they're "safe" or not (something something mutual count + follower/following counts + do they have pronouns in their bio + a million other tiny things)

i like that cohost has some of this stuff built-in! like pronouns! but also that has now robbed me of a data point that i could use to decide if i want to follow someone (as does a lack of mutual counts and all that other stuff). currently i'm just following ppl if i know them from twitter and/or if they have Original Chosts that i like. again that's fine for now but i dunno if it scales

anyway i'm sure the cohost @staff has made a lot of intentional choices here (i wonder if there are blog posts or something that dive into it) but i'm curious how much of it has room to evolve based on What The People Want (or if The People is too nebulous a group to make those kinds of calls)

@danika6/30/2022, 6:01 PM

i share a lot of your feelings and your twitter thread is great! i'm hoping cohost can help me to move away from doing the mental calculus i do with literally everything i interact with on twitter.. i simply want to Have Fun!

natalie watson @natalie6/30/2022, 5:43 PM

i completely hear you on this!!

in some ways, i feel like a lot of the features cohost doesn't have butt up against my social media expectations. (e.g. no visible like count, following count, being able to view followings/followers etc.)

i think this is ultimately a good thing, even if it's taking a lot of getting used to!!

the friction i feel comes from years of being online and being inundated with numbers and defined social spaces, and i think there's a benefit to keeping that outside of this space. i really like a lot of the messaging that staff has put out about the mission behind cohost. it's not trying to replace other sites, it's trying to do something different and truly be its Own Site and experience

it's kind of nice to be free of a lot of that baggage and start fresh. cohost feels like i can just focus on the posts themselves, and it kind of feels like a relief to not be beholden to anything outside of that

@danika6/30/2022, 5:52 PM

YES the confliction i feel absolutely stems from years and years of numbers and takes and whatever other obsessions being force fed to me via twitter/fb/instagram/etc. social media trauma or whatever..

there's a ton of freedom in being able to like posts knowing only the person who made/shared the post will see that, and i don't feel a need to 'perform' thanks to the lack of numbers attached to posts. we are truly here to Have Fun and Interact 😎

natalie watson @natalie6/30/2022, 8:19 PM

100000000% this

@Bigg6/30/2022, 7:20 PM

This is a bit tongue-in-cheek but it's nice to return to a time where instead of being able to instantly confirm the existence of an impenetrable clique with a few simple clicks, now you get to do it the old-fashioned way by observing webs of interaction in realtime