Where did you find the actual study? The link in the above article leads to https://purl.stanford.edu/vb515nd6874 which has an abstract, but I can’t see the study.

For those wondering what this is about, I quote:

This is a retrospective post about my experiment Searchtodon, an attempt at building a privacy conscious personal timeline search tool for Mastodon.

This is one of the most pleasant home feed UIs I’ve yet tried. It’s not that much different functionally than the default Mastodon, it’s pretty basic, but it feels good. Spacious, with nice big images, and a cozy functional colour scheme.

Here’s a link to a running instance of the actual app, for those who don’t want scrape through the github readme to find:

https://elk.zone/

Security through obscurity raises it’s head again… we’ve been down this fraught road so many times.

If control is wanted over this privacy/discovery balance, better build it in fast. Or, third parties that prove themselves significantly more useful than what is built in will soon take over, once the network reaches a significant size. Search becomes a key feature of every network and communication/sharing platform there is.

Unless of course the hope is that by limiting the utility of the network it remains small and therefore obscure and less used as a whole.

The linked article is thoughtful and covers many of these points from multiple sides already though.

Also, Fedilab android client can schedule posts and boosts. It’s free on F-Droid, but can be supported by buying it in the play store.

(I don’t know anything about Sengi desktop client, but there’s a link to it that works.)

It should be noted that the linked article concluded that, in the authors’ opinion, moving to Mastodon IS ethical, despite vasuous issues.and concerns which the article catalogs.

Though it would seem we overwhelming and vehemently disagree with those that suggest there might be unethical to abandon them on the birdsite, we also should not just dismiss those who do think or feel that. Especially marginalized people trying to express the good thing they found.

It seems pretty clear that most humans do not prioritize “freedom” very highly compared to comfort and familiarity. And I can see a logic where, unfortunaltely, marginalized people whose lives tend towards experiencing more discomfort than most would be especially resistance to letting go of what little comfort they have found.

And the network effect is biggest boss to overcome (as all the vc feuled corps know very well).

All we can do is keep trying to make a place that is useful enough and iteratively more comfortable. If we care about these people, and the concept of decentralized freedom.for all. And we need to seriously listen and consider, and maybe even compromise, as the linked article has tried to do.

On android the official mastodon app is the weak. Long established third party Tusky is better. And Fedilab has by far the most features.

But bring on more apps, by all means. One of the nice things about reddit is how many apps there are to choose from.