My only problem with instances is that... how can I follow people if I can't see them in the federated TL?
"Create an account in more instances to check out their local timelines" doesn't really escalate.
Picking your "first" instance feels like a decision that shouldn't be as important as it currently is. Choose wrong and your TL will suck and without a good TL what's the use of #mastodon?
Of course all of this is moot if you are in mastodon to socialize with people you already know.
@toooldforfandom I had a similar thought/question about choosing an instance. I ended up spending half an hour reading through the descriptions, but there was no easy way to compare. it was like trying to pick an IRC server back in the day.
@toooldforfandom @notjustbill Also maintaining multiple accounts seems like a lot of work, unless your other accounts are in really topic targeted instances where there's a clear reason to post in one or the other.
@brwarner @notjustbill Yeah, and even if you create multiple accounts then you get the cognitive load of "eh, in what instance should I post this?"
@notjustbill @brwarner Which is what you said now that I read your toot again. :v
@brwarner @notjustbill @toooldforfandom a lot of instances now have Ambassador bots that you can follow remotely, they boost popular posts so you can find people to follow easily. If there's not a link on the instance homepage, try putting instance.name/@ambassador in your browser search bar.
@notjustbill @toooldforfandom :P
I will probably try it though when I get a chance to read through some other instance descriptions.