Two soups, Twitter and moving
Hello.
Illustrator Chris Barker has produced some wonderfully cheeky remixes of popular works of art. See them all on an epic Twitter thread; his "Two Soups by Jack Vettriano" is just perfect.
As Twitter looks increasingly at risk from Elon Musk's deranged 'troubleshooting', a lot of people have been looking for a backup plan. Mastodon has gained a great deal of attention. A federated, open-source social network similar in nature to Twitter's microblogging offering, it might be a tad more confusing (it sits across various locations, or 'instances', rather than on one domain) but it has been around for some time, cultivating a supportive and tolerant community and trying desperately to avoid ending up like Twitter (Nazis, trolling, aggression). Mastodon signups have exploded in recent days and there is good conversation to be had there, and more of the people you already knew on Twitter. I'm on Mastodon at @mrnathannelson@mastodon.social. Maybe see you there.
Meanwhile, I blogged (I've been doing it a lot more recently and greatly enjoying it) about Elon Musk's aspirations for Twitter to be the digital town square and how Twitter is really more just like an overcrowded bar overlooking the square.
I'm staying on Twitter for the time being. It has been a very useful tool and a brilliant source of humour for me over the years and is too important for Musk to screw it up, but the recent nonsense is a reminder that none of these places we call home online are permanent and we should probably meet in different places. For me, that also means putting the phone down and meeting in the real world more. That isn't a luxury that everyone has though, and it is key communications infrastructure and not just for posting cat videos, so for what it's worth I really hope Twitter survives Musk.
Well, it is my final week at Deepdale Farm. After three years, a pandemic, organic conversion, floods (literally) and other dramas, Mrs N and I are now looking forward to building a new life in Devon. Better start packing, meanwhile I'll keep this email going with updates on what's coming next.
All the best
Nathan