Creating Sakurajima Social, Another Way to Bring Anime Bloggers/Fans from Twitter to the Fediverse

If you recall, I pleaded to explain why people should finally leave Twitter earlier this month. WordPress and several apps dropped support for it. Mastodon might look hard to use as the Fediverse looks like the Future of social networking.

Didn’t you know that there is another option that looks more like Twitter but was initially made by someone in Japan? Yes, it’s Misskey or Calckey, as we set one up.

Why not BlueSky? No, BlueSky isn’t it.

After leaving Twitter after Elon Musk ran it to the ground by banning third-party links, I have zero trust in Blue Sky. It’s because it’s run by Jack Dorsey, who sold Twitter to Elon Musk. Even before it got sold, Twitter wasn’t a pleasant place with moderation issues from harassment, among other things.

Blue Sky is like Twitter, but worse, they don’t moderate anything. Instead, they use labels to hide content, which relies on AI and the community. This means you have trolls, racists, spam bots, and far-right extremists remaining on the platform. It’s challenging to boot them off the platform, which is a bad thing for safety. Also, you have stuff like blocks, which are haphazardly implemented, being available to the public, which should remain private for obvious reasons.

Besides the terrible Terms of Service, Jack said Blue Sky is just a temporary proof of concept, meaning it will disappear. This can explain why there are no direct messages and other features. Not to mention, Blue Sky has yet to demonstrate federation, and it might not even come to fruition.

Either way, after you read my toots on BlueSky, I hope I convince you that BlueSky isn’t the Future. Instead, ActivityPub, the open web standard that powers Mastodon and various decentralized social networking applications like Misskey, Calckey, Pixelfed, etc., is the Future. After all, WordPress is working to bring ActivityPub support to its blogging platform. Also, Meta and Tumblr are looking to add ActivityPub support. Once they deploy their own implementations, using BlueSky is pointless.

I will make this clear: I do not intend to create a BlueSky account.

So why Misskey or, rather, Calckey?

Misskey is decentralized social networking software started in 2012 by syuilo. Recently, Misskey is gaining popularity in Japan. Twitter heavily inspires it with its user interface. Unlike Mastodon, it has full-text search, quote posts, reactions, and other features like storage, chats, pages, etc. The name of Misskey actually came from a lyric from the opening song of “Phi-Brain” sung by May’n, “Brain Diver.”

In Japan, Misskey tends to be more popular. However, there are Japanese Mastodon instances like Pawoo (banned/suspended in most servers for poor moderation), mstdn.jp, and Fedibird. You might be surprised that a good amount of Japanese artists are on Misskey, such as:

• Misskey io (the Official instance for Misskey)
• Misskey art
• Misskey design

Since Misskey resembles more of Twitter than Mastodon and its Japanese origins, it’s a no brainer. Calckey is a more recent fork of Misskey, which improves on it, and brings more useful features, some that Mastodon has, but not Misskey.

So why start a Calckey Server?

Of course, this is not what you are here for. We started a Calckey server to make the Fediverse more accessible to regular users. I feel that some haven’t joined Mastodon since they think the Fediverse is that. It’s more than just Mastodon, and besides Misskey, Calckey also can communicate with Mastodon servers. It has a better user experience that resembles Twitter more than Mastodon.

Moreover, it also has features that Misskey doesn’t have, such as better accessibility, the ability to edit posts, complete account migration (yes, you can import posts), and more. Calckey will eventually work with all Mastodon clients, although it’s far from being done in its current state. Best of all, it has all the features that Twitter users expect that are still not on Mastodon, such as full-text search and quote posts, two controversial features which have their uses.

I started a Calckey server, which is Sakurajima Social (sakurajima.social), since I want to see more who are on the sidelines on joining. The old Twitter is not returning, and getting your content out there is becoming more difficult. So I think it’s time for people to move on.

This is why I created the Mastodon server at sakurajima.moe when Elon bought Twitter at the end of October and a Calckey server at sakurajima.social just recently. There is no need to figure out what server to join. If you create content around Japanese Media or are a fan of it, these are places to join. Also, I am running these servers long term with the ability for users to help support it through Patreon.

If you are on Mastodon Social or Online, I highly suggest moving to a smaller or medium server. The official Mastodon servers already have enough issues with moderation from its spam bot waves and other moderation issues. These issues will worsen as it is basically the default server on the official apps, and they don’t have enough moderators. As a result, some instances may just silence Mastodon Social and Online or even suspend it altogether. Plus, the local timelines are practically useless for obvious reasons.

Twitter is the past. The ActivityPub-powered Fediverse is the Future

Let’s face it, Twitter doesn’t have much of a future as it’s basically because 4/8chan with it promoting far-right content and rampant misinformation. Not to mention, Elon Musk supports Ron DeSantis, who is a racist, supports anti-LGBT and transphobic bills, and support far right ideologues. Also, I don’t think BlueSky is the Future. Once Meta’s Barcelona and Automattic release ActivityPub support for WordPress and Tumblr, it’s game over for BlueSky, besides the problems it already has.

I know it’s challenging to move communities that are established on Twitter. However, it’s probably time, so one won’t lose all the connections. Moreover, Twitter has become very hostile towards content creators regarding its API changes and reducing impressions unless you subscribe to Twitter Blue. That is why I created the Mastodon server and eventually expanded it to Calckey to give a place for Anime Bloggers (and content creators who make content around Japanese media) and fans.

If I convinced you to join, you could find our Mastodon server at sakurajima.moe and our Calckey server at sakurajima.social. Note that some Mastodon apps and tools will work with our Calckey instance. However, some features may not work in the apps as the Mastodon API is still a work in progress with Calckey. You can find me on the Fediverse at @chikorita157@sakurajima.moe. If you are on Mastodon Social or Online, maybe consider moving to our servers for reasons I explained above.

As always, if you need assistance, feel free to reach out by commenting this post.