Introduction to Mastodon’s New Feature

Mastodon, a decentralized alternative to X, is planning to introduce a feature that has been a subject of debate among its users: quote posts. The company recently shared its progress on implementing this feature, which has sparked concerns over its potential for online abuse and bullying.

Controversy Surrounding Quote Posts

Critics argue that quote tweets played a significant role in ruining Twitter, contributing to a more toxic online community. Some Mastodon users strongly believe that quote posts do not belong on the platform, as they can be used to "dunk" on another person’s post, breeding negativity and potentially leading to a flood of abusive replies. On the other hand, other users want to see quote posts added, as they make it easier to reference another person’s post and its content when making a response.

Benefits and Drawbacks of Quote Posts

The introduction of quote posts would bring Mastodon more in line with its competitors, including X and newer rivals like Threads and Bluesky. However, the feature also raises concerns about online abuse and bullying. To address these concerns, Mastodon is working on implementing measures to mitigate user complaints.

Mitigating User Complaints

Mastodon is aware that quote posts are a source of concern for some users and highly requested by others. To balance these conflicting views, the platform plans to allow users to control whether their posts can be quoted at all. This would protect people from unwanted attention or hateful replies to some extent. Additionally, users will be notified if someone quotes them, and they will be able to withdraw their post from the quoted context at any time.

Technical Challenges

The implementation of quote posts also poses technical challenges, as there is no standardized way to build the feature in ActivityPub, the underlying protocol that powers Mastodon and other federated apps. Some third-party Mastodon clients already offer their own version of quote posts, but they lack the features that Mastodon wants to add for additional user control and privacy.

Collaboration and Development

To address these technical challenges, Mastodon is collaborating with others to create a specification that would allow all Mastodon apps and clients to access the same functionality. The introduction of quote posts will also affect other parts of Mastodon’s code base, including the ActivityPub-handling code, the public API, the web user interface, the moderation panel and capabilities, the administration panel, and the official iOS and Android applications.

Conclusion

While Mastodon’s announcement did not provide a specific timeline for the public release of quote posts, the company acknowledged that the feature will still take time to develop. As Mastodon continues to work on implementing quote posts, it is essential to balance the benefits of the feature with the potential risks of online abuse and bullying. By allowing users to control whether their posts can be quoted and providing measures to mitigate user complaints, Mastodon can create a safer and more respectful online community.

Mastodon noted in its blog post that it’s aware that the feature is both a “source of concern” for some and “highly requested” by others.
“Many people simply do not want their content to be reframed by others; or they may find that if it is reposted, they receive unwelcome attention,” the Mastodon blog post says.

The organization applied for a grant to help fund the development of quote posts back in 2024 after earlier discussions around the feature. Now, the team is sharing its progress, particularly in terms of how it hopes to mitigate user complaints.

For starters, Mastodon says it will allow users to control whether their posts can be quoted at all. This would protect people from being the recipient of unwanted attention or hateful replies to some extent. (Though, arguably, people could still screenshot someone’s post to circulate it more broadly if they intended to troll the user.)

In addition, users will be notified if someone quotes them, and they’ll be able to withdraw their post from the quoted context at any time. This latter option could help in the case that someone’s quote post goes viral, and the original poster starts to receive too much attention or even abuse, forcing them to reconsider whether they want their post to be quotable at all.

Beyond the potential for abuse, Mastodon says there are also technical challenges around the implementation of quote posts, as there’s not a standardized way to build the feature in ActivityPub, the underlying protocol that powers Mastodon and other federated apps.

Some third-party Mastodon clients also already offer their own version of quote posts, but they don’t include the features that Mastodon wants to add for additional user control and privacy. As a result, Mastodon is collaborating with others to create a specification that would allow all Mastodon apps and clients to access the same functionality.

Quote posts will also affect other parts of Mastodon’s code base, the announcement states, including the ActivityPub-handling code, the public API, the web user interface, the moderation panel and capabilities, the administration panel, and the official iOS and Android applications.

Unfortunately, Mastodon’s announcement didn’t share how much longer it will be before the feature is added or any sort of timeline for public release, only saying that quote posts “will still take more time to develop.”