Discussion
There is a built-in mechanism in Mastodon's server software which reduces how often you see the same post boosted again and again.
If you have seen a post boosted, boosts of the same post are automatically hidden from you until 80 other posts have passed through your timeline.
This mechanism previously allowed boosts to repeat after 40 other posts. The developers recently doubled this to 80 other posts, so repeated boosts should be much rarer now.
It would be, and it's been suggested by lots of people on the Mastodon Github page, but the developers don't seem to be keen on it for some reason. Possibly causes technical headaches that aren't obvious?
Eighty, four hundred, whatever. I don't want to see repeats the same day. And that's still going to happen
@FediTips it would be nice to have more generalized duplicate reduction.
Some people have multiple accounts and post the same thing with the same hashtags to all of them. Following one of those hashtags gives a couple of posts that look like duplicates, but of course they're not actually the same post.
I'm not sure why they are posting 100% identical content from different accounts on the same network? Possibly they don't realise that posts from different servers end up on the same feeds of their followers?
@FediTips@social.growyourown.services @idiot@mastodonapp.uk I think some people are used to having to crosspost on Instagram + Twitter for example, so if they have both pixelfed and mastodon they may think it's the same thing where they need to post on both separately? maybe different followers on each too
@FediTips huh. on the one hand, i see the value in it. on the other, so much for: "just the posts from people i follow, in the order they happen"
@fishidwardrobe @FediTips If you want only that, you should disable boosts. Press the double arrows button ("Show settings") on top of the Home section and switch off "Show boosts".
The boosts you see in your Home timeline are from the people you follow.
The mechanism only comes into play if several people you follow are boosting the same post at around the same time. The idea is to avoid a situation where e.g. ten of your followers all boost the same post and you see it ten times in a row.
You can switch the mechanism off if you want though, it's at Preferences > Other > Group Boosts In Timeline (untick it to switch it off, then click "save").
@vintprox @FediTips no, no, no. without boosts this place is nothing at all. people don't understand that. boosts are what make the fediverse *work*.
the expectation (rightly or wrongly, for better or worse) is that if someone i follow boosts something, i see it on my timeline at that point.
maybe the fediverse is better off for this not being literally true! i don't know!
but.
@fishidwardrobe @FediTips Ah, I understand THE concern. You refer to having a boost in chronological order as well. I see some value in such a setting, would help some people that really struggle with concentration.
Boosts' reappearing nature kinda breaks through this constraint and have a life of their own. Meanwhile, getting creative with the time of publishing a post is nonetheless important to get a few more eyes to it.
But I wish we didn't have to do this at all and just chillax: less boosts, more control over reading flow, schedule, where one stops reading and gets a neat scroll-around to catch up with what they missed while being offline.
The way official Mastodon apps work right now is I have to scroll manually in reverse chronological order. And some replies don't ever make sense without seeing full thread, so why would I read them in reverse! Come on, Mastodon.
Maybe I should just get used to Phanpy. Alas, its loading speed on mobile often leaves me in dismay.
@FediTips What I'd like to see is a feature to ignore self-boosts from accounts I follow. I've looked but haven't see such a thing. Have I simply missed it?
There's nothing specifically about self-boosts (which are usually just used to reach different time zones), but you can hide all of an account's boosts if you want: https://fedi.tips/blocking-and-muting-on-the-fediverse/#JustBoosts
@FediTips@social.growyourown.services @vextaur@blog.taursnd.haus
Not yet
@FediTips@social.growyourown.servicesoh, great! are the repetitions suppressed only if I haven't seen the post? Or do the boosts simply appear every ~80 posts in my feed (visualised or not)?
It's the second option, the boosts are allowed to repeat (if someone you follow boosts them) after 80 other posts have scrolled through your timeline.
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@FediTips maybe it would be nice, if this number was configurable?