Technologies

What Is Mastodon, the Alternative Social Network Now Blocked by Twitter?

Learn everything you need to know about Twitter’s open-source competitor.

Since Elon Musk took control of Twitter on Oct. 27, the social network has been roiled by controversy. First, half the staff was laid off via email, and an ill-advised new implementation of its «blue check» verification system left the site plagued by trolls and fake «verified» accounts. Now, Twitter has banned accounts that Musk promised to protect and suspended several prominent journalists who report on Elon Musk.

Twitters users concerned about changes at the company are looking for other social media options, and the open-source network Mastodon has been a big beneficiary. Mastodon Count, a bot that tracks usage on the network, showed a 400% increase in the rate of new account signups on Dec. 15, when Twitter suspended the journalists who cover Musk.

The growing popularity of Mastodon might partly explain why Twitter is now blocking many links to Mastodon servers and suggesting the URLs are «harmful» or include malware. Twitter has also suspended the official account for Mastodon, prompting a joke from creator Eugen Rochko about never having to check Twitter notifications again.

Read on to see how Mastodon works, how to sign up, and how it compares to Twitter. For more, see how to delete your Twitter account, and get the latest on Twitter’s verification badge plans.

What is Mastodon and how is it different from Twitter?

Mastodon is a free social media service that functions much like Twitter. You can post «toots» (instead of tweets), follow other people and organizations, and favorite (like) and boost (retweet) posts from other people.

Mastodon was created and originally released in October 2016 by Eugen Rochko, the CEO and lone employee of the nonprofit organization Mastodon gGmbH. In May, Rochko explained the service’s oddly named substitute for «tweet.» He says the original button was called «publish,» but a committed supporter promised lifetime support of the Mastodon Patreon account if he would change it to «toot.» (On the iOS and Android apps it says «publish.»)

In an interview with Time Magazine, Rochko said he began developing Mastodon when he realized that «being able to express myself online to my friends through short messages was actually very important to me, important also to the world, and that maybe it should not be in the hands of a single corporation that can just do whatever it wants with it.»

Read more: Mastodon Is No Twitter Replacement

Instead of one town square for everyone, however, Mastodon is composed of thousands of social networks, all running on different servers, or «instances,» that can communicate with each other through a system called the Fediverse. The Fediverse also contains other social networks like PeerTube for videos, Funkwhale for music, PixelFed for photos and NextCloud for files.

Mastodon servers aren’t required to be connected to the Fediverse, In fact, the most famous Mastodon instance is Truth Social, the social network of former US president Donald Trump.

How do I join Mastodon?

The hardest part of Mastodon is getting started. Since there’s no one common Mastodon area for everyone — as with Twitter — you’ll need to register on a specific Mastodon server.

Servers can be based on a geographic location, subject interest, professional background or literally anything an administrator can think of. For example, the folks at dolphin.town are only allowed to post the letter «E,» while the literary buffs at oulipo.social are forbidden from ever using the letter «E» (in honor of OuLiPo writer Georges Perec’s lipogram «La Disparition«).

Two of the biggest Mastodon servers, aka instances, are mastodon.social — the official server of the Mastodon project — and mstdn.social, though both have temporarily paused registrations. Another large general server that I recently joined is mas.to. Other popular Mastodon instances include masthead.social for journalists and fosstodon.org for open-source software.

Don’t worry too much about which server you pick — you can join as many as you want and leave or switch servers at any time. And you can follow people across servers, so picking one doesn’t keep you from communicating with those on other instances.

One good place to find a server to join is the official Mastodon website at joinmastodon.org. The site currently lists about 80 servers that have committed to the Mastodon Server Covenant, an agreement to enforce moderation, make backups of the site and give at least three months warning before ever shutting down an instance.

Each server’s «about» page will tell a little bit about the Mastodon instance and list the server’s rules. If you don’t find a server that you like on joinmastodon.org, you can try other Mastodon directories, such as instances.social, which offers a wizard for picking a server as well as a sortable list of 16,412 instances.

Most Mastodon servers with open registration will only ask for your email address and a password to get started. Once you respond to a verification email, you’re ready to start using Mastodon. Other, more private Mastodon servers may ask you to make a request to join and then wait for an invitation.

How do I use Mastodon?

Like Twitter, Mastodon lets you post short messages to the world or to select people, but instead of tweets, Mastodon posts are called toots. And many of Mastodon’s other features are a lot like Twitter’s, too, with slight differences. Each post is limited to 500 characters (instead of 280), and you can include links, images (JPG, GIF or PNG, up to 8MB), audio files (MP3, OGG, WAV, FLAC, OPUS, AAC, M4A and 3GP up to 40MB) and videos (MP4, M4V, MOV, WebM up to 40MB).

Your posts on Mastodon can be set to be public, only for your followers or completely unlisted from all timelines. You can create polls for your followers and use all your favorite usual emojis, plus custom emojis created for specific servers.

Any post can be marked with an explanatory «content warning» that requires a click before viewing, and Mastodon users take advantage of the feature often.

You can even edit posts on Mastodon. Each version of your toot remains available for review, and people who reblog your post are notified after it’s edited.

Just like Twitter, Mastodon uses hashtags that start with the «#» symbol, such as #Gaming, #Anthropology or #Veganism. Since there’s no algorithm to suggest your posts to nonfollowers, using hashtags to categorize your posts for people who might be interested is even more important than on Twitter.

You can follow any account on Mastodon, whether or not it’s on your own server instance, and the account’s posts will be added to your Home feed in chronological order. Know that for some accounts, you need to request permission to follow them.

Free web apps like Debirdify, Fedifinder and Twitodon can help you find accounts you followed on Twitter that have migrated to Mastodon.

If you don’t want a particular account following you, you can block them just like on Twitter, or you can choose to block an entire server.

Mastodon lets you «favorite» posts, but the favorites count doesn’t appear on timelines — if you want to promote someone else’s posts, you’ll need to «boost» or reblog them. Unlike Twitter, there are no «quote toots» on Mastodon, a deliberate choice to discourage «dunking» on other people’s posts. A separate «bookmark» feature lets you save toots on Mastodon without notifying the account that posted it.

Mastodon does have a feature called Direct Messages, but the name is a little misleading. Rather than providing person-to-person messages, Mastodon’s feature sets the visibility of a post to only the people mentioned in it. In other words, they’re toots that only certain people can see, rather than actual direct messages.

How do the Mastodon timelines work?

Whereas Twitter just has one timeline (sorted chronologically or by «top stories»), Mastodon has three: your Home timeline shows all the posts and reblogs from everyone you follow, your Local timeline shows everything from your own server instance, and your Federated timeline shows all posts from all Mastodon servers on which you follow someone.

Using a web browser, you can set Mastodon to look like Twitter, showing one feed at a time, or you can view multiple feeds and notifications simultaneously (much like Tweetdeck) by selecting «Advanced view» from your Preferences.

Are there any mobile apps for Mastodon?

You bet. Due to the open-source nature of Mastodon, you have a lot of choices for apps on both iPhone and Android.

Your first and easiest option is the official app from Mastodon gGmbH (for iOS or Android), but there are other solid third-party apps. The two most popular alternative Mastodon apps right now are Metatext for iPhone and Tusky for Android.

Mastodon apps for iPhone:

Mastodon apps for Android:

If you do get started with Mastodon, make sure to follow me @peterbutler@mas.to. (And say hello!)

For more about social media and Twitter, follow a timeline of the Elon Musk purchase and read about the big changes that could be in store for Twitter.

Correction, Nov. 7: A previous version of this story incorrectly described Mastodon’s features. Mastodon added the ability to edit posts in March 2022.

Technologies

Lemon8 and TikTok Could Be Banned. Here’s How the Apps Are Different

TikTok and Lemon8 are owned by the same parent company, but they offer different experiences.

TikTok faces another sale deadline Saturday, and unless a US buyer intervenes — or President Donald Trump extends the deadline again — the app could disappear for US users. If the ban goes into effect, TikTok wouldn’t be the only app to disappear: TikTok’s sister app, Lemon8, could be caught in the crossfire.

Read more: A VPN Alone Probably Won’t Bypass TikTok Bans. Here’s Why

Lemon8 is owned by ByteDance, the same parent company that owns TikTok. It’s one of the top Lifestyle apps in Apple’s App Store, and it has more than 10 million downloads in the Google Play store.

«Lemon8 is a lifestyle community focused app powered by TikTok, where you can discover and share authentic content on a variety of topics such as beauty, fashion, travel, food, and more,» the app’s description reads in both stores.

Here’s what you need to know about Lemon8.

Note: I reached out to ByteDance for this story, and the company did not respond for comment.

What is Lemon8?

Lemon8 is a video- and photo-sharing platform that eschews the vertical-scrolling format of TikTok in favor of a Pinterest board-style format. But what Lemon8 and TikTok do have in common is that both have Following and For You tabs to show you posts from creators you follow and posts the app thinks you will like.

Lemon8’s content is split into six topic tabs, plus a seventh tab called All. The other tabs are Fashion, Beauty, Food, Wellness, Travel and Home. These tabs can be found across the top of your screen, and tapping into these tabs shows you recommended and suggested posts.

Posts can be swipeable photo collections like in Instagram, or TikTok-style videos. Some creators add text to their photos to label clothing or a product. Some will also include the price of the item in the text.

How is Lemon8 different from TikTok and other apps?

Lemon8 is different from other apps in terms of what is posted and how it’s presented.

Lemon8 has a lot of influencer ads and product recommendations. It’s difficult to tell what is and isn’t sponsored content, and this appears to be the norm across the app. TikTok also has sponsored content, but usually these are marked as such in the bottom-left corner.

There aren’t a lot of memes or jokes on Lemon8 compared to other apps, either. You can find memes on Lemon8, but various hashtags associated with «memes,» like «funnymemes» and «catmemes,» have fewer than 1 million views (as opposed to hundreds of millions on Instagram). This could be because Lemon8 is still catching on in the US, but my suspicion is Lemon8 isn’t meant for memes. It’s meant to be more of a guidebook to help you achieve a certain lifestyle or aesthetic.

There’s also a lot of writing in Lemon8. For example, post captions might include instructions for a recipe or a deeper breakdown of an outfit. TikTok captions can have useful information, but those captions are more about connecting posts to hashtags to get more views and don’t necessarily add new information to the TikTok post. Lemon8 uses captions in a similar way to Instagram posts, but Lemon8 captions have one key difference from Instagram: templates.

Lemon8 lets you use templates for your posts to help you quickly format and to give you an idea of what to caption your post. There are caption templates for fashion, shopping finds, beauty, food and travel.

Lemon8 reminds me of a mashup between the magazines Martha Stewart Living, Muscle & Fitness and Travel + Leisure. You can find some useful tips in Lemon8 to help you achieve a desired aesthetic or find some vacation inspiration, but it’s not clear what is and isn’t an ad.

What are people saying about Lemon8?

People’s reaction to Lemon8 is seemingly positive so far. One TikTok creator posted a video calling Lemon8 «Pinterest, but interactive.» Another said Lemon8 is a combination of Pinterest, Instagram and TikTok.

However, this positivity could be artificially inflated. ZDNet reports that many TikTok posts about Lemon8 have described the app with similar language, making some believe ByteDance paid these creators.

And some Lemon8 creators’ claims make this theory sound more viable. One Lemon8 creator told Insider that ByteDance paid them to post on the app. Two other Lemon8 creators showed Insider emails that outlined the app’s payment structure.

Who owns Lemon8?

ByteDance, the Chinese tech company that owns TikTok, also owns Lemon8. According to ZDNet, ByteDance is positioning Lemon8 to be an Instagram rival as more users stop using, or abandon, Meta’s app.

According to the Wall Street Journal, a leaked internal memo from Meta showed that Instagram engagement was declining. ByteDance executives could be hoping to capitalize on this by giving Instagram users an alternative app in the form of Lemon8. And while Lemon8 was released globally in 2020, the app’s recent growth might show ByteDance’s gamble is paying off.

Will Lemon8 be banned alongside TikTok?

Since Lemon8 is owned by ByteDance, which also owns TikTok, it’s possible that the app will be banned alongside TikTok on April 5.

The law requiring the sale of TikTok could be applied generally to other apps that are owned and operated by ByteDance and its subsidiaries. When TikTok shutdown operations in the US in January, Lemon8 was shutdown alongside the app. If TikTok shuts down again, Lemon8 likely will as well.

Should you download Lemon8?

Even with a shutdown looming, Lemon8 is free, so you can download and try the app now before the sale deadline. Just know the app’s posts resemble instructional guides more than memes to share, and many posts feel like advertisements.

What’s Lemon8’s privacy policy?

Most of Lemon8’s privacy policy seems standard for social media apps. It states Lemon8 collects personal and location information to provide you with a better app experience. Some collected information includes your IP address and browsing history. But part of the app’s privacy policy might raise eyebrows.

«The personal information we collect from you may be stored on a server located outside of the country where you live,» the policy reads. The company has servers around the world, according to the policy, so your information could be stored in any of them.

This is different from how Lemon8’s sister app TikTok stores some user’s data. The company stores US-based user data in Oracle servers. TikTok CEO Shou Chew said ByteDance employees in China can access this data, but with «robust cybersecurity controls and authorization approval» overseen by a US-based security team.

For more on the TikTok ban, here’s what to know about the Supreme Court’s decision, here’s what could happen next and here are other apps users are flocking to.

Technologies

Today’s NYT Connections: Sports Edition Hints and Answers for April 4, #193

Three of the four categories are especially tough today. Here are hints and the answers, for the NYT Connections: Sports Edition puzzle, No. 193, for April 4.

Looking for the most recent regular Connections answers? Click here for today’s Connections hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle and Strands puzzles.

I only solved one of the four categories for today’s Connections: Sports Edition on my own, so if you need help, you’re not alone.

The yellow category was pretty simple, but after that I couldn’t make any connections. It might help if you know a lot about a certain NBA player’s resume. Read on for hints and the answers.

Connections: Sports Edition is out of beta now, making its debut on Super Bowl Sunday, Feb. 9. That’s a sign that the game has earned enough loyal players that The Athletic, the subscription-based sports journalism site owned by the Times, will continue to publish it. It doesn’t show up in the NYT Games app but now appears in The Athletic’s own app. Or you can continue to play it free online.

Read more: NYT Connections: Sports Edition Puzzle Comes Out of Beta

Hints for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups

Here are four hints for the groupings in today’s Connections: Sports Edition puzzle, ranked from the easiest yellow group to the tough (and sometimes bizarre) purple group.

Yellow group hint: Do better.

Green group hint: March Madness.

Blue group hint: Six-time all-star.

Purple group hint: Think Wimbledon.

Answers for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups

Yellow group: Not meeting expectations.

Green group: Teams in the Women’s Final Four.

Blue group: Teams Kawhi Leonard has played for.

Purple group: Ends in a piece of tennis equipment.

Read more: Wordle Cheat Sheet: Here Are the Most Popular Letters Used in English Words

What are today’s Connections: Sports Edition answers?

The yellow words in today’s Connections

The theme is not meeting expectations. The four answers are bust, disappointment, dud and failure.

The green words in today’s Connections

The theme is teams in the Women’s Final Four. The four answers are Bruins, Gamecocks, Huskies and Longhorns.

The blue words in today’s Connections

The theme is teams Kawhi Leonard has played for. The four answers are Aztecs, Clippers, Raptors and Spurs.

The purple words in today’s Connections

The theme is ends in a piece of tennis equipment. The four answers are bracket, eyeball, horseshoes and internet.

Quick tips for Connections: Sports Edition

#1: Don’t grab for the easiest group. For each word, think about other sports categories it might fit in – is this a word that can be used in football, or to describe scoring options?

#2: Second meanings are important. The puzzle loves to use last names and even college names that mean other things, to fool you into thinking they are words, not names.

#3: And the opposite is also true. Words like HURTS might seem like a regular word, but it’s also the last name of at least one pro athlete.

Technologies

Skip Your iPhone’s Lockscreen: Here’s the Hidden Flashlight Trick You Need to Know

A couple of taps can really make a difference on your iPhone.

Not long ago, your iPhone’s lockscreen would only allow two app shortcuts that you couldn’t change: camera controls and a flashlight toggle. However, iOS 18.2 allows you to customize these shortcuts to almost anything you might want. This small but impactful change is one of many ways iOS 18 supercharges customization for iPhone and iPad users. But what if you still want an easy-to-access way to toggle your flashlight without unlocking your phone?

Apple introduced an accessibility feature in iOS 14 that, once enabled, allows you to perform actions by just tapping on the back of your phone. The feature is called Tap Back and it remains a sleeper feature that’s sneakily hidden away in your settings menu. Enabling Tap Back essentially allows you to create a button on the back of your iPhone to perform an action without needing to take up any space.

Once you have Tap Back enabled, it doesn’t take long to see how much of a game-changer it can be with its added convenience. Below, we’ll show you how to set it up so a couple of taps on the back of your iPhone will let you launch just about anything you want.

For more, check out what’s in the latest iOS 18.4 release.

How to set up Back Tap on iPhone

Whether you want to link Back Tap with your flashlight, camera or launch a different iPhone app, the path through your iPhone settings begins the same way.

On your compatible iPhone (iPhone 8 or later), launch the Settings application and go to Accessibility > Touch > Back Tap. Now you have the option to launch your action (in this case, your flashlight) with either two or three taps. Although two taps is obviously faster, I would suggest three taps because if you fidget with your phone, it’s easy to accidentally trigger the accessibility feature.

Once you choose a tap option, select the Flashlight option — or a different action if you prefer. You’ll see over 30 options to choose from, including system options like Siri or taking a screenshot, to accessibility-specific functions like opening a magnifier or turning on real-time live captions. You can also set up Back Tap to open the Control Center, go back home, mute your audio, turn the volume up and down and run any shortcuts you’ve downloaded or created.

You’ll know you’ve successfully selected your choice when a blue checkmark appears to the right of the action. You could actually set up two shortcuts this way — one that’s triggered by two taps and one that’s triggered by three taps to the iPhone’s back cover.

Once you exit the Settings application, you can try out the newly enabled Back Tap feature by tapping the back of your iPhone — in my case, to turn on the flashlight. To turn off the flashlight, you can tap on the back of your iPhone as well, but you can also just turn it off from your lock screen if that’s easier.

For more great iPhone tips, here’s how to keep your iPhone screen from dimming all the time and canceling all those subscriptions you don’t want or need.