Diaspora* official Twitter account

The official project Twitter account is @joindiaspora (https://twitter.com/joindiaspora).

It is maintained by a few community members.

Discussion relating to this outreach account here.


Note: This discussion was imported from Loomio. Click here to view the original discussion.

Proposal: Rename diaspora* Twitter account to something else than @joindiaspora

As I think the main maintainer of the Twitter diaspora* account, I constantly see people confuse it with the pod joindiaspora.com.

Since this account is an official account for the project, and has no direct relation to the pod joindiaspora.com, except via history, I’m proposing renaming the account username to something else.

Changing the username will mean some people might have trouble mentioning diaspora* on Twitter. Otherwise it will have little effect.

Vote:

  • YES - change it to something else (follow up proposal to choose what it should be)
  • NO - keep as is

Outcome: We will rename the account once/if a suitable name is accepted in further proposals.

Votes:

  • Yes: 14
  • Abstain: 5
  • No: 1
  • Block: 0

Note: This proposal was imported from Loomio. Vote details, some comments and metadata were not imported. Click here to view the proposal with all details on Loomio.

What does rename mean? Can you change your twitter username or do you have to create a new account? What would be the possible new names?

Changing your username will not affect your existing followers, direct messages, or @replies. Your followers will simply see a new username next to your profile photo when you update. We suggest you alert your followers before you change your username so they can direct @replies or direct messages to your new username.

From https://support.twitter.com/articles/14609-changing-your-username

So basically everything stays the same but others doing mentions will be more tricky, assuming they are used to mentioning @joindiaspora. I’m confident Twitter live search maybe helps to map username changes, that would seem logical :slight_smile:

What would be the possible new names?

Will have a look at some free ones tomorrow. But I’d leave deciding on what a new name should be to a follow up proposal.

Is @diaspora available?

Well, I wouldn’t agree to this proposal if there’s no good name available.

I’m not sure. While “joindiaspora” isn’t great, I don’t know if it’s worth loosing all the mentions from the past.

I’m confident Twitter live search maybe helps to map username changes

Just tried it… nope. :frowning:

@flaburgan nope.

Some free ones:

@diasporafoundation, @diasporasoftware, @diaspora_project, @project_diaspora, @diasporasocnet

I definitely don’t think we should kill the JD account, but there should be one for the project separate from the one for the pod.

Brent, the @joindiaspora account is not a joindiaspora.com ( http://joindiaspora.com ) account any more - it IS the official account to promote the project as a whole.

This exactly, is the confusion that I see all the time. Though, whether which is better, keeping as is or renaming it, hard to say :slight_smile:

I have a fair bit of experience managing twitter accounts and I think this is a sensible move.

Best practice is to rename the account then immediately register a new account under the old name so you can fill in the profile to direct people to the new name. Then post an announcement of the change.

From a mentioning point of view it will make much more sense for people if the name at least begins with @Diasp rather than @Join as twitter has autocomplete for people you follow. Old mentions won’t update but if you do as above at least if people click on a mention they’ll end up at the right account.

I agree, there’s cause for confusion here. If we can come up with a better name, it’ll be worth having a vote on changing the twitter handle to that name. Until then, a vote seems a bit meaningless.

I’m not sure. While “joindiaspora” isn’t great, I don’t know if it’s worth loosing all the mentions from the past.

I wouldn’t worry about that. I’ve just checked back on an account of which I changed the handle a couple of years ago, and @mentions right back to when I opened the account now have the new handle. So it looks as though mentions in old tweets do get updated when you change a handle.

Somebody should check if we’d lose our “verified” badge during a name change.

this account is an official account for the project, and has no direct relation to the pod joindiaspora.com

So if you did rename it would this account then solely be used for the foundation and the pod would need to go setup a new Twitter account? (if the podmin wished to do so)

So if you did rename it would this account then solely be used for the foundation and the pod would need to go setup a new Twitter account? (if the podmin wished to do so)

How’s that different from the existing situation? That account was always a project account, never a pod account (although the founders might have used it for pod news on occasion during the early days).

@goob

Until then, a vote seems a bit meaningless.

What point is there to discuss names before deciding to change it? :slight_smile:

@rich1 the current account is not used by or for joindiaspora.com. Exactly why I created this proposal, there is constant confusion about this…

AFAIK joindiaspora.com does not have a twitter account.

Ok, thanks. I was just trying to get a better understanding of the actual issue.

From what I understand the problem is that more people come to @joindiaspora with issues relating specifically to that pod itself, rather than coming to @joindiasopra with issues relating to the Diaspora project itself.

With that in mind, I agree with Brent’s comment in his vote, which I’ll echo in mine.