So Long Snowdin dot Town
Date of Posting 12/01/2024
NOTE: This article was mostly written a little while after I left snowdin.town for my own self-hosted fediverse server, final.town (August-September 2023). It then languished in editing hell for a while as I got distracted by other things, so I'm finishing it off and publishing after the fact because I still think it's worth having online.
Arrival on Snowdin
I joined Snowdin dot Town in February of 2023, a few days after THE EVENT that led to the demise of Mastodon dot lol (see my other article on the matter). A couple of my friends from dot lol had migrated to there, shortly before THE EVENT and while searching for places to which I could also migrate, this seemed like the obvious choice. It held the same values of anti-fascism and queer safety that dot lol did, while also being a smaller and quieter instance which felt more likely to be sustainable. So it didn't take long for me to choose there to move to.
The most obvious change between the two was that Snowdin ran on Akkoma, meaning we had access to far more features than were (and in most cases still are) provided by Mastodon. Quote posts, huge character limits, reactions. It was honestly a bit difficult to get to grips with due to the differing UI, but with some patience it all became clear. I really appreciated what I saw as improvements and wouldn't wish to go back to running on a vanilla Mastodon server without them.
A Good Space
The culture on Snowdin was also noticeably different. It was younger, more online, and less...horny? I certainly saw a vast drop in the number of surprise dick-pics making their way onto my time line, you can be sure of that. One thing I would definitely say about snowdin's vibes is that it was more "comfy" or "cozy", however you would define that. If you weren't causing problems for people everyone would just be nice to each other and in my experience there was an atmosphere of general friendliness overall. Dot Lol was nice but it was also pretty chaotic due to its scale, it was fun but otherwise hard to get a consistent read on. This was a space small enough to have it's own distinct energy, and I liked that.
I'll admit I did have a run in with the mods earlier on. I didn't like it at the time, but we had a decent chat, and I learned a few things. It's the first time I've ever been in a space where I'd experienced a moderator just come to me about something directly instead of abstracting everything behind reporting. I appreciate the discussion we had and consider it a growth opportunity, and a chance to re-evaluate some unrealised prejudices I was unthinkingly participating in, and to do better.
However after that point everything felt pretty smooth. I enjoyed my time on Mastodon dot lol, but my time on Snowdin was where things really started coming together for me as a participant in the Fediverse. I had a consistent circle of friends on there, I posted often enough to get better at writing and communicating my ideas in general, and in general had a lot of fun. Something that Snowdin had, which I'd never really experienced before in any online space, was a sense of community. Hanging out with the regular posters, just chatting shit, and having a good time. Being silly on the internet, perhaps even mischievous. A bit cheeky, but not malicious, in my experience at least.
Before I start discussing some of the problems *other people* had with us, I'd like to make it clear that I just enjoyed being on Snowdin a great deal. I cannot commit so many words to expressing its virtues as I can to explaining challenges simply because that's how the brain's negativity bias works, plus we can pick apart negatives and try to understand them better to learn lessons. It's much harder to express in complex detail why something is good, nor does it feel as necessary. I liked it, and it was mostly very good.
Brewing some trouble
Over the course of that 6 months on Snowdin though, I did eventually become aware of something. I discovered that our server couldn't interact with several others, because we had been added to a widely distributed block list known as "The Bad Space". Here begins my ongoing period of being critical of the list we were on for unclear reasons with no recourse, a thing which definitely never became a more significant problem across fediverse as a whole foreshadowing.
I'm not going to name names or really get into the details of it here, but our being on this list, and our being known for being on this list, was definitely a source of friction at times. I came to understand that, for reasons unknown and never-ever elaborated on, Snowdin had a bad reputation with some other servers. To the best of my knowledge, this is a result of things that happened a fair while before I joined, and the particulars seem to had been largely forgotten about. Something about edgelords? 4chan? Nothing I experienced during my actual time on the server. Yeah we liked posting silly nonsense sometimes and could output a lot of absurd crap, but we weren't engaged in harassment or posting loads of racist or fascist trash. I was literally there and the stuff we were rumoured to be responsible for was not happening.
I still don't have proper answers as to why we were on this list, and asking has simply gotten a negative response, as though it's sealioning to question why you've been accused of doing unspecified harm. Some entries are clearly there for totally arbitrary reasons or have been added through an automated system. I understand it's a work in progress, and also understand the value of such systems, conceptually. It's not a bad idea. I think this one is poorly managed and questionably implemented. Perhaps that will improve in future.
I have had personal run-ins with multiple people responsible for maintaining this system. Again, I'm not interested in naming names here, that would be extremely unproductive. But I think it reflects poorly on the people responsible when any relatively mild criticism is responded to with insistence that everybody else on the fediverse block you immediately.
Eve
Later in the Snowdin lifespan, it emerged that an individual by the name of Eve Summers had been credibly accused of abuse, manipulation, and grooming younger fedi users. I didn't know Eve, and I don't think I'd even heard of her before these allegations emerged, followed by substantial evidence backing them up.
However, my understanding is that Eve had once been on Snowdin before leaving for another server. She had been friends with a lot of people both on Snowdin and in the local bubble, and was especially close to our admin (sfr). This was obviously pretty devastating for everyone involved, and likely contributed to their eventual decision to close down the server.
I count myself lucky to have not known Eve, she sounds terrible.
Endings
In the end, sfr simply decided to close down snowdin.town. No specific incidents were pointed to, to broadly summaries, it was a level of stress and responsibility which was not worth maintaining in their life and it was time to move on, and I completely understand. There are no hard feelings from me to our former admin, who I think did a great job and ran a fine server for the time I was there.
Also shout out to Vel, our moderator, who was also excellent.
Thank you.
Moving On
After receiving the news, I thought about moving elsewhere for a while, but given that this had happened twice now, I was feeling frustrated by being forced to relocate due to things outside my control. No, if I had to migrate again, it would be to somewhere that I was responsible for.
It took me a while to get going, as I'd never done anything like it before, but within the month period of Snowdin's remaining life, I'd created my own fediverse server, Final Town . While it was stressful to set up and annoying to maintain, that is vastly offset by knowing that I'm in charge of what happens, who we do and do not federate with, and that ultimately I'm the one who decides if it closes. Plus, I don't have to worry so much about the ripple effects of ruffling the feathers of the self proclaimed Fediverse Council. I am 95% of the userbase on Final Town, so my actions have very little chance for negative spillover to my fediverse friends if some dipshit calls a fediblock on us for something made up.
Remembering Snowdin
Snowin dot Town was a good place in the fediverse. When I joined mastodon dot lol, it was during a terrible time in my life, and I appreciated having a new space where I could actually start making friends online, and have fun with a new community of mostly friendly and cool people. When I moved to snowdin, things were still hard but they were getting better, and as a smaller and more cosy space, it provided me opportunities to grow into myself on fediverse.
I'd had fun on dot lol, but looking through my archive, a lot of it is clearly me working to post through it during a severe depressive period, with little insights and strained humour. I much more strongly came into my own on Snowdin, given the space and support (and character count) to develop my fediverse relationships and my ability to post coherently, and I started actually spending time writing longer form pieces again as a result of this. Snowdin was probably a contributing factor in my creating the website you're reading this on now, actually.
Snowdin was for me a place of growth and learning. I got to see and talk with a lot of people I wouldn't have on Dot Lol. I got to post more in depth work, and see things from different sides. I got to experience what it's like to be called out by a guy with several thousand followers while I was watching the Barbie movie.
Snowdin was a good place. A cosy place. For many, a safer place.
We remember it by its icon, the Undertale save star, representing determination.
Thanks for everything.
