I consider myself somewhat plugged into social media (Twitter, Insta, Tiktok, etc). But I admit I didn't know what Fediverse was and though it was some kind of government project, maybe for contractors to share documents relating to grants.

Still don't understand the connection between "Fed" and "Mastodon". I think a Mastodon-based social network should be called "Tuskverse" or "Pachyverse" or "Stompverse"

The connection is that Mastodon is just one of the "applications" built on top of ActivityPub protocol. Others are Pixelfed, Pleroma, Peertube, Writefreely, and several more.

Being based on the same protocol, they are all to some extent interoperable - e.g. you can follow Pixelfed users from your Mastodon account.

"Fediverse" is the umbrella term for all of these applications working together. It is a portmanteau for "federated" and "universe". The "federal police" association is unfortunate, but it is something USA only - rest of the world doesn't really see this.

>but it is something USA only

The US holds no monopoly on the concept of a federation. Germany (Föderale Bundesrepublik) is one too, so is India or Russia.

It's the first time I hear someone take offense with the name. I think it's nice honestly, captures the essence of the network well.

It doesn't hold a monopoly on the concept of a federation, but it does (as far as I know) hold a monopoly on the association of "fed" = (federal) police in people's minds.

Intriguingly, "fed" is British youth slang for the police despite Britain not being a federal state and there being very few national police. A US cultural import, presumably.

The Fed is short for Federated. Fediverse is an ensemble of federated servers. It’s use more broadly than mastodon.

They should rename it to something cute like Twitter did. Maybe Soap Bubbles, Soap like soap opera for all the pointless drama, and bubbles because you never hear from anyone you dislike or disagree with.

Shots fired. Prepare to be proven right with downvotes and flags for your problematic true statement. :P

The "web" also doesn't sound so appetizing, esp. for people with arachnophobia. At least it is short. "Internet" is a rather technical sounding name. Metaverse? For people who want to be all meta? Or subjects of Meta? Once you get used to a name, it doesn't sound so strange anymore.

Sure, if you hear something often enough, it stops being special. However, I don't think I will get particularily used to it, because I am likely not going to have any contact with it. FaceBook is the last platform I have. All the hip new stuff like TikTok, Instagram and whatnot can stay where they are. I learnt my lesson in the few months that I happened to be on Twitter. I can see 1000 other things I'd prefer doing over scrolling through one of these modern depressants.

I never used Facebook and Instagram, yet am used to the names. "Face book", a book of faces? "Insta gram", hmm instant telegrams, old-fashioned? They are equally weird imho.

Yeah it bothered me at first too. A relic of the euro-centric history of the network. It helps (marginally) to think of it like Star Trek's Federation.