I just did a long tweet thread over on the bird app about unlearning automatic protective behaviours I've had to develop to navigate Twitter. I'm going to edit and replicate much of that thread here, because it's also about adapting to being on Cohost.
I'm having to slowly re-train myself to use hashtags more on Cohost. I tend to use them sparingly on Twitter, and I've realised that's in part the kind of reflexive caution I've learned over on the bird app, where it's not always good to draw scutiny outside of my personal networks.
But over here hashtags really help everyone with discovery, plus some of the user experience design over here feels like it might cut down on what I'd think of as unfortunate rather than helpful discovery.
On the bird app things can get algorithmically served up to more people by virtue of getting more interaction from accounts with a large following or verified accounts - and sometimes that's good. But all it takes is one such account taking something the wrong way, and then there's an effect where the thing can garner more & more unwanted scrutiny even beyond their network, snowballing in a bad way.
Everything is just served up chronologically on Cohost. There's no extra algorithmic bump for large follower accounts interacting with it. If someone with a large following rechosts or comments, then yes, that will be visible to their followers. But if I were unhappy about the attention, and I blocked that account, that would cut down one vector of unwanted scrutiny, and again there's no extra algorithmic sauce on top.
As a result, I probably have to fear less that if I add on a bunch of extra hashtags - including something like "The Cohost Global Feed" hashtag, which is being used when people want a large general audience - that it may be harder to manage any extra scrutiny that I don't want.
I can even go and edit any post/chost I make, so if I put something on the Cohost Global Feed hashtag and then suddenly regretted the added random potential audience, I could simply go and remove that hashtag from the post, cutting down on extra scrutiny.
It's strange to realise how much reflexive caution I've come to automatically use on Twitter. But when you're marginalised safety is a big deal. I've been snitch tagged on to larger Twitter accounts that liked to dogpile people; I've learned to proactively block followers for some accounts. My block list on Twitter is in the tens of thousands.
So unlearning some of the necessary habits from there, and adapting to an environment that is just: "here's some posts displayed chronologically, and stuff that your network shared or commented on", rather than: "look at this random thing"... It's a strange feeling. I have a small sense of sadness, because of the amount of armoring I've had to develop to manage being in that place (and some others.)
So anyway, yeah, watch my hashtag use slowly increase on Cohost as I continue to relax & feel more confident here.
