That is a personal choice and one which I totally respect. But I do think Mastodon should be big enough, and open enough, to allow an "AI community" to form, even thrive.

Too many people in my replies don't seem to agree with that.

@ben But that's the very definition of a mono-culture. A vibrant community allows all of these topics, encourages them even. Then, with filters, who you follow, hashtags, and blocking you get the feed you want.

To get the culture you want by cutting off the supply is counter productive.

But I get pushed US politics all day by the main stream media & I'm not even in the US & current politics (here & there) is heavily slanted towards manufactured wedge issues.

AI is a similar, for me the moral and environmental arguments against are plenty before we get into the rest, yet as I work in software it's impossible to get away from.

So I come to a place where I can choose not to engage with it, I block/mute very little, I mainly ignore it if it ends up in my feed.

@ben and I want to support you, you have every right to view what you want. I'm not asking you to see anything you don't want.

I'm just saying that solving this issue by gatekeeping is a slippery slope. We need better filtering tools, not a purity test of who is allowed to post here.

let’s rephrase it then: I’m highly indifferent to journalists being on here. And that’s very different from “let’s change the culture of the fediverse to encourage them to join”.

And don’t get me wrong, the culture on here can be fucking annoying - I swear I will launch through the screen at the next humourless “yes, but” German furry response to one of my posts.

But if the nature of the fediverse isn’t inimical to journalism then is that something to change, or accept as a fact?

I certainly don’t miss people boosting their work for clicks or career advancement. And again, that isn’t the same as “professional journalists are unwelcome”. I just won’t engage with that. But will I engage with some producing interesting work that matches my interests? Certainly.

That I (and I suspect, others) don’t automatically see those as being the same thing is probably the issue.

@awfulwoman But my point wasn't *specifically* about journalists, it was just an example of one person that a) wasn't getting traction and b) the 1% of the deplorables wanted to chase them away.

My point way much more broad, about using this as a wedge example of allowing a much wider array of people into Mastodon. Just because you don't like self promoting morons (I don't either of course) doesn't mean we should be actively chasing them away. Not because I want them! But for a much simpler reason: It's very hard to objectively define what a "promoting moron" is. More importantly, they might do it AND be a really valuable person to the community.

There is so much simplistic black and white thinking about who someone is and so many are willing to say "Begone!" for the flimsiest of reasons.