This weekend, I ran across a comment from a colleague on Facebook. I was a little irritated with the comment at first. 

“I really want your opinion on this platform. Since someone has to pay for the “server”, I am wondering what the host gets back.”

It irritated me because it seemed obvious. Then, I interrogated my feeling of irritation and realized that I was the one being silly. After all, shouldn’t folks ask WHY when someone else does something without apparent gain or benefit to themselves? What’s more, shouldn’t we ask why when someone has to pay for the benefit in terms of money, time, and effort?

In my irritation, I decided to ask Mastodon admins what they thought. Two responded, not necessarily the two I tagged in my initial query. I thought it would be worthwhile to share their responses.

Response #1: Stephen Cerruti

As a computer science teacher I have benefited from online professional communities but wished that they were not on platforms I rail against as being detrimental to our students and society.

I am willing to donate my money and, more importantly, my time to create a new space free of that stain. I hope that others well join me and share in the administrative and financial burden.

My investment is driven from the same place my teaching originates, hope for a better future for all.

Response #2: Simon Greenwood

I’ve been using open source software for a long time and #Mastodon and the #Fediverse represent what the Internet should be and something that services like Twitter and Facebook have eroded.

Big social media mediates discourse for profit and, as we’re seeing at the moment, is as prone to takeovers as the traditional media.

Mastodon can put social media back in the control of people who deserve to be heard.

My Reflection

I found both of these responses quite illuminating. While they confirmed what I had thought, that these folks were doing all this work out of their own beliefs and desire to see something amazing constructed, I realize now how easy it is to dismiss such altruism.

As an educator, I see how easy it is to do something to help others. There’s that desire to help the teacher across the hall, to go the extra mile to assist a student. For Mastodon Instance admins, I suspect it’s a combination of the following:

• The excitement of building something that benefits many
• The thrill of learning new things and sustaining a community with the technical skills one has

I feel a kinship with technical folks who want to put their skill sets to use to the benefit of others without remuneration. Why wouldn’t fellow educators see that, too?

Finally, I ran across a quote from Marcus Aurelius a few days ago. It wasn’t hard to find again, and I think it matches the situation well:

“We ought to do good to others as simply as a horse runs, or a bee makes honey, or a vine bears grapes season after season without thinking of the grapes it has borne.”