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A kind observation that exclusively calling this place "Mastodon" has a bit similar energy as saying "I just sent a GMail."
"Fediverse" (or "fedi") is a more inclusive, general term.
Mastodon is just one of many software projects that talk to each other to create this multi-instance social network:
https://axbom.com/fediverse/
(kudos to @axbom for this fantastic infographic!)
There are blogs, Reddit-like communities, video instances and many more, all part of fedi.
@rysiek “I sent you a Gmail” is like “I sent you a Mastodon” - people don’t say that. “I’m on Mastodon” or “I’m on Gmail” is something they do say.
The "fediverse" is a technical implementation detail for developers and enthusiasts - but irrelevant for most users. I think podcasting could be a decent comparison - powered by RSS, but most people don't know that. The fact RSS is so well hidden from average users is a big reason for its success.
@seb @rysiek Because they’ve been taught there is a bigger world out there. There were services before Gmail, Yahoo, and Hotmail.
Let’s look at the World Wide Web, or the web for short.
People don’t care about the webserver, it’s an implementation detail. It could be Apache HTTPd, Nginx, IIS, Lighttpd, or something else.
People say, “I’m going to setup a webpage.”, or “I’m going to this webpage.” They embrace the larger concept of the web.
Fediverse is the larger concept which Activity Pub and Mastodon are implementation details of.
@jollyrogue @rysiek The mainstream services before Gmail, Yahoo & Hotmail were AOL, Compuserve and Prodigy.
You're right that "implementation detail" is the wrong word, though. What I mean is: It's an irrelevant detail until it becomes useful for large numbers of people in its own right.
At the moment, I think it's great that loads of people are joining Mastodon.