A new Share button
Have you ever wondered why news articles around the web have buttons to share to some of those other social sites, but not on Mastodon? There used to be a legitimate reason for this: unlike legacy social, Mastodon isn’t a single monolithic website you can link to; there are over 8,000 places where a person could have a Mastodon account! Their account could be on `mastodon.social`, the large, official server run by us. Or `hachyderm.io`, a sizeable server for tech enthusiasts operated by Nivenly. Or `social.coop`, a Mastodon server operated like a co-operative, where all members pay towards the costs and vote on decisions together. Some people run their own Mastodon servers, on their hardware at home. The distributed nature of the network is the greatest strength of Mastodon, but it also means that having a share button that takes you to the “correct” Mastodon server for your account, is a lot more involved than a simple hyperlink. Third party solutions have existed before now, but none of them have become ubiquitous, or easy to discover for website owners. This changes today, with our new official Share tool.
If you are a website owner, you can go to share.joinmastodon.org to find instructions describing how to integrate this on your website. Of course, we’ve also made the code available and open source, the same as the rest of Mastodon’s code. That means you can check how it works, and even host a share page of your own (you don’t need to host anything, but you can, if you don’t want to use the version that we’re hosting - it’s your choice).
To try out what sharing something looks like right now, click “Share on Mastodon” on this very blog post (there’s a button to do it, at the top right of the page). The tool itself works entirely in your browser: there is no tracking data, and it does not store any information on the server. If you have multiple Mastodon accounts, you can add more than one, and choose which one to share to when you post.
One more thing to mention here: back when we released Mastodon version 4.4, tucked away in the release notes, we mentioned that server administrators have the option to send a referrer header when a link is clicked. If the owner of your server has enabled that setting, then websites whose links get shared will see traffic coming from Mastodon - yet another way to share how the community is growing.
We’re looking forward to seeing the Mastodon logo on more websites - possibly, alongside other social media platforms; and maybe even as the “main” sharing link, like here on our blog.
We've got something to Share! We hope you'll find it useful. https://blog.joinmastodon.org/2026/03/a-new-share-button/
02.03.2026 17:51
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Mastodon is for the people
Hi, I’m Hannah. I’m a community builder and long-time professional social media poster, though most of my “greatest hits” weren’t under my own name. I’ve managed and contributed to social accounts for a blowtorch manufacturer, a fancy hand soap maker, a Chicago-based foodservice company, and ultimately, tech companies. (That last one is how I found my way to open source — but that’s a rerun episode for another day)
Now, I’m Mastodon’s Community Director. I joined because this work is personal to me. My early professional experience gave me a front-row seat to the ways traditional social media companies do harm to people and society. I believe that the social web, and Mastodon as part of it, has a vital role to play in charting a new path forward for our digital social spaces. I’m thrilled to be here building with you.
Alright — enough about me. :) Let’s get to the part where we talk about what Mastodon is doing for you this year!
## Introducing the Mastodon.social Help Centre
Our team runs mastodon.social to provide a safe landing place for anyone, especially for newcomers to the social web. It’s also an important example to others of what a Mastodon server looks like when it’s up and running. For those reasons, and because we feel it’s the right thing to do, we want mastodon.social to be accessible and safe for anyone who chooses to host their account there.
Today, we’re announcing a new resource for mastodon.social users: the Help Centre. We intend for the Help Centre to be a place where people can learn how to use Mastodon’s software. It will also include more information about participating on mastodon.social in a healthy, safe, and accessible way. In the future, we’re planning to migrate this site to a free and open source software (FOSS) backend, and integrate links to user-facing tutorials directly into Mastodon’s software.
We have a lot of ideas about the kinds of resources we want to add to the Help Centre. We’re announcing it now because we think it’s important to show our work as we go, and we want your help. Throughout 2026 community team members Zora and Amelia will continue to add guides and tutorials about Mastodon, and we’ll ask for your input along the way: What kinds of resources should we add? Are we on the right track? How can we improve? Let us know by getting in touch with @staff@mastodon.social.
We also haven’t forgotten about mastodon.online. We want to do something wildly different there and push the limits of what the software can do. We have some thoughts, but we don’t really know what this looks like yet! If you have ideas about neat or useful things we could do with mastodon.online, send a message to @staff@mastodon.online.
## Default server recommendations and server discovery
As people fled from traditional social media in late 2022, we made a strategic decision to send new sign-ups directly to mastodon.social. This choice was driven by our desire to reduce cognitive load for new users and ensure a stable onboarding experience. While we want people to feel safe and welcome on mastodon.social, we also know we can do more to help deliver on Mastodon’s decentralised promise. Our ultimate goal is to reimagine Mastodon’s onboarding process (you heard about that yesterday from Renaud and Imani).
For now, we want to run some onboarding experiments to test our ideas and learn what can work for us and for everyone on the network. Our first experiment is Default Server Recommendations. (If you were at FOSDEM or following along at home, you may have seen Andy Piper and I announce this or post about it!). Practically, we will replace the “join mastodon.social” button with a button that recommends a server from an opt-in pool that we will be hand selecting to start.
At first, we’re planning to recommend the closest geographic server in the correct language based on data surfaced by the app store, so it will only be available initially on the Android and iOS apps. We may also experiment with other logic for recommending a server, including random distribution. We’re listening to your feedback as we move forward with our planning. (We hear you on open sign-ups and spam. We’re already talking about what we can do.) No matter how we’re routing sign-ups, the experiment will be designed to ensure that server admins remain in control: meaning, they will have the power to opt in and out as needed, or reduce the percentage of sign-ups flowing their way. If you want to be a part of these experiments, complete this form.
We also intend to improve server discovery by improving our Server Directory. This starts with moving the directory to a new pull-request-based system so admins can submit, update, or remove entries themselves. Another change we want to make is to add more and new ways to “classify” different types of servers including demographics, interests, and geographic regions. Once we have that kind of information, we can start to explore new ways to incorporate it into the onboarding process.
## We’re getting off Discord: Join us on Zulip
We’re taking concrete steps to demonstrate our commitment to our values by moving as much of our digital infrastructure to FOSS as possible. This is a long-term project. We’re going to move slowly, and we’re not committing to moving everything to FOSS. We’re taking our time because we need to balance achieving our mission with evolving our operations. That being said — today, we’re taking an important step that we feel will make a big difference for us and for our community: We’re starting the process of moving our community chat space from Discord to Zulip.
Our first step will be to migrate the people on our existing Discord servers to Zulip, which we plan to do soon. Currently, only Patreon donors are granted access to the Discord. On Zulip, we’ll grant access to donors no matter where their gift comes from. We also want to extend access to more and different kinds of people who are deeply engaged and actively contributing to Mastodon and the social web. However, we want to be thoughtful about how we do that. Running these spaces is important, but they do add coordination and moderation overhead to our small team. We’ll keep you updated as we make progress.
* * *
## Stay tuned
That’s all for now, folks! Thanks for reading and stay tuned: We plan to start sharing more stories and exciting things happening from across Mastodon and the social web right here on our blog.
If you liked the projects and direction you read about here and over the last two days, please consider sending a donation our way to support this work and Mastodon’s future. If you’re already a donor: Thank you!
Next up: a feature interview of Yehuda, the server admin of turtleisland.social.
See you there 👋
### Thank you for supporting Mastodon
We develop and maintain the free and open source software that powers the social web. There is no capital behind this — we rely entirely on your support.
Donate to the project View our sponsors
The third in our blog post series is by @haubles - sharing our work and ideas around how to grow and nurture the community, for everyone. #Mastodon #Fediverse #SocialWeb
https://blog.joinmastodon.org/2026/02/mastodon-is-for-the-people/
19.02.2026 13:39
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RE: https://mastodon.social/@Mastodon/116086899600949599
I want to expand on the age-verification working group plan, to avoid confusion. The goal is to create an informal group of experts in the areas of law, privacy, trust & safety, and technology. Their agenda is explicitly not to […]
19.02.2026 11:21
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Our technical direction
Hello everyone! I’m Renaud, and I’m the Technical Director at Mastodon. I’ve also been the technical lead for delivering Mastodon releases for several years now. This post is co-written with Imani, our lead product designer.
Mastodon continues to grow as more people seek alternatives to centralised social media and closed social networks. Today, we’re sharing our vision for making the Fediverse more accessible, diverse, and empowering for everyone—from first-time users to established creators.
At its core, Mastodon remains a microblogging, or short form text app. We’re building an app that enables anyone to connect with their friends, and share their thoughts and creativity. We are part of an ecosystem of interconnected social apps known as the Fediverse - built on common standards and protocols, a space where you can choose the apps and communities that are the right fit for how you want to express yourself, and participate how and where you are most comfortable.
Over the past 18 months, we’ve focused on growing our core development team and improving our processes to set us up for this phase of the project. We’ve gone from having one or two full-stack developers, to a broader team with expertise and experience across backend, web, and mobile apps, working with a dedicated designer who helps us to think deeply about how people encounter and use the social web.
You’ve seen us increase the rate of updates over the past eighteen months - three major new versions (4.3, 4.4 and 4.5), each with headline new features that the community has been waiting for: improved discovery; better onboarding; list management upgrades; new tools for server owners; and, of course, Quote Posts!
We’re far from done, and we plan to continue to deliver regular updates. It is important to understand that Mastodon is vital infrastructure for many, so we will also continue to spend a large proportion of our time on ensuring that the platform remains safe, stable and secure. This is a key reason why we take our time when it comes to evaluating new features.
## The broader roadmap
We recently reworked our roadmap, to make it more specific about what we are working on in the immediate future (three to six months). The roadmap on our site represents what we’re directly building in the current and following release cycles: we deliberately keep it focused, and want to avoid committing to add functionality when we may not yet be ready to support it.
As we think about our plans, we recognise that we are also part of the broader Fediverse. We make an effort to implement features in an open and interoperable manner, creating new specifications when needed. Recent examples include Quote Posts, Collections, and the Fediverse Auxiliary Service Provider specification - we’re excited to see other people build new implementations.
It’s also useful to provide a longer-term view of where we are going, so with that in mind, here’s a broader view of what we’re planning to build over the next 1-2 years.
### A social web for everyone
A thriving Mastodon ecosystem is one where anyone can participate, regardless of technical knowledge. We’re redesigning core parts of the experience to make this a reality: a streamlined sign-up flow that explains server choice without overwhelming newcomers, improved search and discovery tools to help you find communities and conversations, and clearer navigation throughout the app.
### Promoting indie servers
Right now, too many newcomers default to the largest servers. We want to change that - because Mastodon is best when communities are spread across many independent servers, each with its own character and focus.
We’ll be shipping new admin tools to help independent server operators manage moderation and maintenance more easily, like a feature to use external blocklists, extensible ways to set up content scanning to detect illegal content or spam, and ways to reduce your media storage usage by delegating serving remote posts media files from a trusted third party.
We’ll also be redesigning server discovery to showcase the diversity of communities available. You’ll hear more about this from Hannah, our Community Director, in tomorrow’s post.
### A decentralised platform for content creators
Public figures, journalists, and institutions are looking for alternatives to mainstream platforms – and we want Mastodon to be their first choice. We’re introducing features designed specifically for creators: a redesigned profile view that better showcases their work, and an enhanced compose experience. For organisations like public institutions, we’re working on a new email notification option that allows people to follow their updates even if those people don’t have a Mastodon account yet. This means creators can reach their audiences wherever they are – whether they’re active in the Fediverse or still exploring their options. Our goal is to give audiences and creators a way to connect on their own terms, free from algorithmic manipulation.
### Onward, together
These upcoming changes represent our commitment to building a social web that puts people first. Mastodon won’t ever harvest your data or chase engagement metrics. We’re focused on creating spaces where authentic connection can flourish. If you have thoughts on software improvements, send us an email.
### Support Mastodon
We’re a small team building software to power the Fediverse. Unlike ad-driven platforms, we operate entirely on donations – and _every contribution matters_. See our donation page for ways to support us.
### Thank you for supporting Mastodon
We develop and maintain the free and open source software that powers the social web. There is no capital behind this — we rely entirely on your support.
Donate to the project View our sponsors
In today's blog post, we have @renchap (with @imanijoy) updating you on the project roadmap, plans, and technical direction.
https://blog.joinmastodon.org/2026/02/our-technical-direction/
18.02.2026 15:15
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Activity Growth - indieweb.social
Cool: this server, ndieweb.social has crossed over 12,000 registered users.With about 1K+ monthly actives, and conversations growing well. Thanks again to @newsmast for their stewardship of this very special social media home base.
If you made your home here […]
[Original post on indieweb.social]
17.02.2026 02:51
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Original post on mastodon.social
@everton137 Thanks for the suggestion. The @Mastodon team has in fact been in Brussels the week before and the one before that as well :) I agree we can get better at communicating this. Rest assured we absolutely see the value in travelling there regularly although it will always be a question […]
13.02.2026 13:43
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Original post on hci.social
Hello #fediverse! Thanks to my new DFF grant, I'm now looking to hire a PhD student to join me at AAU in Aalborg 🇩🇰 to work on "usable decentralization", i.e. on making distributed and federated cloud services accessible to the everyday user. For more details, see link below, and please don't […]
02.02.2026 12:29
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Original post on mastodon.social
A big and warm thank you hug to all the friends I met and talked to in Brussels this time. Two packed days of events before #FOSDEM including an awesome prize ceremony, then two intense days at ULB where I must have talked to more than a hundred persons. All the positivity, the appreciation, the […]
02.02.2026 09:08
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Now we have @mayel and @ivan presenting @bonfire!
31.01.2026 16:12
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Just shouted out some important things to come like working with @anewsocial and @bsky.brid.gy and with @swf on encryption
31.01.2026 16:26
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Up next is @hongminhee talking about Fedify
#Fediverse #FOSDEM #FOSDEM2026 #SocialWeb #SocialWebFOSDEM #SocialWebFOSDEM2026
31.01.2026 16:33
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Original post on btfree.social
@andypiper@macaw.social just said at #FOSDEM that 2 years ago Mastodon had a booth. Last year Fediverse had half a day. This year, there's a FULL TRACK of #fediverse !
THAT is growth! That is EXCITEMENT! That is people spreading this thing. Keep up the amazing work ALL of you!
ALL OF US MAKE […]
31.01.2026 16:34
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I think @badgefed (OpenBadges + #ActivityPub) is a great idea 👏🏻 @mapache #FOSDEM #SocialWeb
31.01.2026 15:38
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Original post on mastodon.social
We are excited to share that we are beginning work on a new onboarding experiment for #Mastodon: Default Server Recommendations.
Our intent for this experiment is to recommend the closest server geographically that is in the correct language during the sign-up flow. We will be running this […]
31.01.2026 12:51
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@haubles just dropped the massive news that Mastodon is going to be changing the default signup flow on mobile apps to choose an instance thats geographically close to you instead of choosing mastodon.social by default!
31.01.2026 10:27
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Great news from @Mastodon at #FOSDEM: they're going to change the default server recommendation away from mastodon.social, to a geographically and linguistically appropriate instance for all new users.
It'll be opt-in for server admins, too, which is great. ❤️
31.01.2026 10:25
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hong minhee in a red shirt and grandfather identica throwing an ap gang sign
AP gang with @evan and @hongminhee tonight
30.01.2026 23:19
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How to grow the Herd #fosdem2026
31.01.2026 10:26
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A great talk on the policy behind the implementation of open source by the Dutch government by @Gina
Good to see large public bodies appreciate the value of being present at #FOSDEM and understand the value of supporting open source projects.
31.01.2026 11:29
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FOSDEM 2026 - Legal & Policy
Started the #FOSDEM #Legal & #Policy devroom now with our first speaker, @fsfe's Gabriel Ku Wei Bin: https://fosdem.org/2026/schedule/track/legal/
31.01.2026 10:08
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RE: https://openbiblio.social/@voebb/115988589889340103
In #Berlin mag ja vieles nicht funktionieren. Die #Bibliotheken aber sehr wohl.
#glatteis
31.01.2026 09:46
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FOSDEM 2026 - Fedify: Building ActivityPub servers without the pain
By the way, if you're attending #FOSDEM 2026 and are interested in #Fedify, an #ActivityPub server framework, please consider checking out my talk in the Social Web Room on Sunday.
#FOSDEM2026 #fedidev
30.01.2026 17:34
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Original post on backend.newsmast.org
Last week I hooked up with @jaz from Tŵt Cymru, the community-owned Welsh social network. We’re combining forces to launch the first Tŵt app on March 1st, Dydd Gŵyl Dewi Sant (St David’s Day).
The Tŵt mobile app is vibrantly Welsh, easily accessible for new users, and a model for social […]
28.01.2026 16:45
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A Mastodon mascot embracing the FOSDEM logo, alongside the text:
Meet us at #FOSDEM
Stand F.04
Talk: "Tending the Herd: Community at Mastodon™
Social Web Track (H.2215) 11.30am Saturday
Busy week! We're preparing to meet the community at #FOSDEM at the weekend. Some members of the team will be at various events around Brussels from Thursday. As well as @haubles talk on the #socialweb track on Saturday, @mellifluousbox box will be on a panel […]
[Original post on mastodon.social]
26.01.2026 14:49
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Hi, I'm coming to #FOSDEM next week. Who wants to meet up?
24.01.2026 08:20
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@jaz Maybe it's a nod to the power of the fediverse: all these instances (even m.s) are so small they disappear once you zoom out enough on the map with very little power concentration compared to the logos listed 🙂
22.01.2026 18:05
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WSOCIAL map showing no platforms in Europe
Jaz's map showing many, many social media platforms in Europe
This bizarre, hurried cut-and-paste Bluesky clone called "W" (wsocial.eu) says it will fill this huge gap in Europe where no social media platforms exist.
Meanwhile... https://umap.openstreetmap.fr/en/map/fediverse-near-me_828094#3/25.80/29.79
22.01.2026 13:17
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Five people sitting on a stage in front of a red curtain with an audience in front of them and the title of the panel "Debating Europe - What Do the Tech Bros Want?" and the name of the panelists above them
Great panel at the event series "Debating Europe" at Vienna's Burgtheater with @francescabria calling out Mastodon as a positive counterexample and explaining EuroStack, @MarietjeSchaake making excellent points on Palantir and AI infra, sponsored by […]
[Original post on mastodon.social]
18.01.2026 14:54
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Original post on hachyderm.io
I have trying to create a list for #fosdem26 and realized that (ironically) most of the people in the socialweb track ... does not have a fediverse account listed there.
I am also at fault, btw, so shame to me.
If you know someone who is presenting at #fosdem26 please send them my way. I will […]
27.12.2025 23:43
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