A gentle note to our fellow QOTO users.

[ originally posted as a series of un-edited Toots at the QOTO.org mastodon instance ]

Folks, good morning, hope you all are well. A personal request of mine.

Please consider trying to reduce the amount of General posting, as we have so many short messages with momentary thoughts that more serious posts are getting buried.

A couple of things to suggest, which I think could help:

a. If you post a topic, and follow up with a reply to it soon, talking to yourself with an update, etc.

You can greatly help reduce clutter in the Local timeline (and all the federated ones) if you set the privacy level of the Second and further messages as 'Unlisted'.

They WILL go out, and anyone interested in the first post will see the following replies. These replies will NOT appear in the Local, Home (for your Followers) or Federated feeds.

Keeping it simple - - First post, you can use the Globe icon, Public setting.

Replies to follow - - Use Unlisted, the one with the Open Padlock icon. See illustration below.

(continues on next message)

b. If you have friends in other servers and simply wish to chit chat with them - mostly, not the local users.

This can be done without clutter, if you select 'Unlisted' , the open padlock icon too.

Insert their @ usernames, and they WILL get notified and respond to you, all without cluttering Public timelines.

People who Follow you WILL see Unlisted messages -- they are NOT Private !! 😮

c. Need Privacy?

Use the Direct Message privacy level, and it's like an email - from you to the people included in the message ONLY.

Will not show in any followers feeds, or on your personal profile!

(continues!)

d. About messages that are kind of private, but you don't want them in your Profile Toots List?

You can get that result, some privacy and NOT showing in your profile to a default or anonymous user - - by using the * Followers Only * (closed, locked padlock icon!).

• Your Followers will see the message in their Home feeds.

• They WILL get a notification if their usernames are included.

• They WILL ALSO be able to see those messages later, if visiting your profile.

(continues)

Thank you for being a valued user at QOTO.

At this Moment, I am simply a very active user, although I have been nominated for a Staff Moderator position in our December election as announced here.

The opinion expressed here are my own, and might differ from the instance administration.

But I think we NEED some clarification as explained above, or we risk losing valuable members who come here for what QOTO is UNIQUE for.

The S T E M community, Science, Engineering, Tech and Math interested people.

Your comments are welcome, thank you for your attention and considering these suggestions.

You can reply either here or via Direct Message to me if you prefer.

Enjoy your stay, friends. Let's make this place better and nicer everyday.

RG signing out. 😉 @design_RG@Qoto.org