Mastodon, a decentralized open social network with over 8 million accounts and approximately 700,000 monthly active users, plans to introduce a new feature called “Packs.”
The idea is similar to the functionality of Bluesky, another open social platform introduced last year.
Starter packs are designed to address the problem of “cold starting” joining a new social network. When you first sign up for an account on a new platform, you may not know who to follow or who is posting about topics that interest you.
Bluesky tried to solve this problem with their starter pack. This is a feature that allows everyday users to curate suggested collections. Today you can find starter packs that focus on almost any topic or introduce top users to apps and other recommendations.
The idea was so popular that late last year Meta implemented a similar feature for X’s competitor, Instagram Threads.
Now Mastodon says it’s ready to do the same thing, but with some key differences.
Mastodon believes that users should control whether they appear in Mastodon’s packs. This suggests making the pack an extension of the service’s existing account discoverability capabilities. That means opting out of the pack and disabling the “Discoverability Algorithm Feature Profiles and Posts” setting.
Additionally, users will be notified when included in a pack. Bluesky requires users who want to be removed from a starter pack to either report the pack or block the user who created it. Mastodon says it aims to provide a simpler mechanism for users to remove themselves from packs, similar to how they remove posts from the newly launched Quotes.
Mastodon GGMBH, the nonprofit organization developing Mastodon software, is collaborating with other Fediverse developers on a Fediverse Enhancement Proposal (FEP) currently on GitHub. Initial versions of packs and other onboarding improvements should be available with the Mastodon 4.6 release. (Currently Mastodon is at version 4.4.5.)
