The Fediverse’s first movers are staking their ground as curators. Meet Sabine Stoye, who runs one of Mastodon’s most beloved accounts for art and photography curation.
“The problem is more to find what one wants to curate because, well, you have to find your way…[Mastodon] is a great place because you have incredible choice and a rich and creative crowd out there.” — Sabine Stoye, Mastodon art and photography curator
You may have heard about a Twitter alternative called Mastodon. The service is a decentralized social network made up of independent servers organized around specific themes, topics or interests. It’s one of the largest platforms in the Fediverse — a space that Flipboard cares deeply about and sees as pivotal to the future of social media.
What’s it like being a curator in this new world? Ask @ViewFinderCurator, aka Sabine Stoye. A linguist with a passion for the arts, Sabine shares why she’s made her curatorial home on Mastodon and what she looks for when boosting artists and photographers on the platform.
Other highlights, inspiration and key learnings:
👋 Say "hi" to Sabine.
🔎 Browse the companion Storyboard to get the episode, plus Sabine’s own favorite newsletters and his curated picks.
➕ This podcast was created by Flipboard, the world’s first social magazine, where enthusiasts are curating stories they recommend across thousands of interests. Learn more.
This transcript was generated by AI, which may affect its accuracy. As such, we apologize for any errors in the transcript or confusion in the dialogue. Thanks for your patience!
Mia Quagliarello:
So, Sabine, who are you like we just passed it on, but I know nothing about you other than that you're one of the top photography curators on Mastodon so who are you?
Sabine Stoye:
I'm German, I'm by origin born in 1965. And now I'm living and working in France or in Spain. I'm studied linguist, which might be standing but I haven't been kissed by photography for a very long time in my life. But I have an affinity to art, literature, cinema and so on. And plus, I worked in it for about 25 years, knowledge engineering for semantic knowledge networks, and the last five years and technical documentation, for example, for biometric recognition systems, quite technical stuff, but always helpful when it comes to work, trying to find a connection to to have an interview. I'm practicing photography since 2012. Only and I started digital. I never did film, which I regret sometimes but okay, I'm, I'm fine. I'm self taught. And I started with travel photography, I love to travel especially near East all the countries in the Sahel, Arabian Peninsula, those kind of an especially deserts, and then I quickly turn to abstract themes. And now I'm dealing with representations of psychic landscapes and mental journeys. And then I came up to use my body as a freestyle projection surface. Well, just so to say, I actually am art Corp, because there's this word is art and body Corp. Coming from FRENCH, so we Yes, an invention.
Mia:
How did you get into mastodon?
Sabine:
Oh, well, I was when I was trying first to find an audience for my photographic work. Artists, friends of mine advised me to set up accounts on social media, for example, the classic ones via Facebook and Instagram, I hesitantly followed their recommendation. And I was completely dissatisfied with the results. meaning that th e rules, they're the kind of effort, meaning times and nerves I had to put in, and which for me, had nothing to do with the actual subject, namely my work.
Plus, I'm not a sales promotion type at all. I hate playing everybody's darling. You know, everybody's stalling is everybody's. And you do have to do a lick the boots have a lot of people there. I don't like that.
Plus, the more classic approach for looking for a gallery. I like the modicum of notoriety and notoriety. And the word ‘self taught acts’ like an automatic locking system, you you go to art you approach a gallerist and you tell yes, I'm, I'm self taught. And this is like, Oh, another bored middle aged person doing handicraft. Salto. You're not taking serious doors close faster than I can explain what I'm doing, actually. And things got even more complicated. The day I decided to follow my partner on his work assignments, well, we live a life of modern working nomads, and we are rarely in one place for more than a few months.
Sounds great, but it's rather detrimental to my working conditions. Imagine small Airbnb, Airbnb is no studio, no equipment, just very basic things. So as a result, I have to do most of the networking and prospecting and finding of prospects over the web. Then came Macedon. I read a bit of tech talk every now and then, and I happened to come across an article that discussed alternative approaches to the social media that which I don't like and Mastodon stuck in my memory. A curious curiosity did the rest and so I had had an account.
Mia:
Well, how would you explain Macedon and the fediverse to someone who's never heard of it?
Sabine:
Okay. Might be some I try this is this. Going back to my knowledge network activities, I would most likely describe the fediverse as a kind of network with many interconnected federated nodes instances, and Macedon being one of the Federer's ensemble of computer servers. each node is like a place of residence for a smaller larger group of users, who have created their identity on one of the servers. And it is hosted and governed independently of other places. So it has its own rules, code of conduct is more or less moderated and can exchange ideas with others. So “exchanged” means intellectual trade, data etc.
And also, there are themed instances, a certain art or metalhead club, just to name two, and more general ones with an not a special idea of what they want to represent. And as a user, you can select the instance whose policies you prefer. The big advantage, I see a Macedon is that it's crowd funded, does not contain ads, and the server support communication protocols that follow an open standard, it's always nice to be a little bit independent, so users can post the content, share the data with whoever they want, or they can block and Macedon uses community based moderation, which I like, so each instance of server can limit a limit of filter, undesirable content and disparaging messages. And there are many individual approaches to what is filtered or excluded.
So already to find your instance, your home base is sort of a challenge. But once you have found your, your set of rules or your community you like it, you are, well, for me, it's a protected space for the diversity of users. And many of them have had very negative experiences with any kinds of discrimination or worse in the so called social network.
Mia::
So can you explain you've talked a little bit about art core and sort of your vision for that, and it's photography using your projections on your body? What about viewfinder? How do you approach each of your two primary accounts on mastodon?
Sabine:
Yeah, exactly. So there's artcorps as my personal account, I have created it to present my photographic work to an interested community. And that means first and foremost, I published my photos and interact with other users, as long as they react to them. The curating aspect takes really backseat hidden here. But of course, I do boost other users posts if I want to spread them further, or if I like posts that I personally like without wanting to see them in my timeline. So for me, everyone who boosts contributions from others, is already a curator in the fediverse. And each boost is based on a selection.
On the artscorps account, these decisions are much more personal, instinctive and spontaneous than are the curator account. The viewfinder curated identity hasn't existed for very long. So I'm therefore one month now. And this means for me, and of course, this is reflected in the timeline, I'm still in orientation phase. So my strategy is a different one, it's quickly outlined my first milestone, and that's that I'm still accomplishing was to sort of subscribe to a sufficient number of photography related accounts, and as broad selection of topic related texts as possible.
So in order to also cover niche areas of photography, I currently still see myself as a kind of flow heater and multiplier. So to give many different optical and topic based incentives to propagate as many varieties of photography as possible, on mastodon.art and of course beyond the confines of my home instance. And the second milestone will be so I'm not yet there will be to present individuals thematic tags and their representatives. currently compiling lists what types of less well known and less well represented niche topics as well as the people who do photography in these thematic areas.
Similar to how some moderators suggest their community lists with interesting accounts or so called #followFridays, I will also handle this in in a similar way, as More test balloon for street photography of attack street photography got a few reactions already. So people just suggested additions to my naturally incomplete list so and third step but what's really a future could be to animate the community with curator prompts similar to hold the moderator of mastodon.art as with our silly curator Ponce de to present the theme photography, or to initiate small challenges. But the big difference between artskorp and viewfinder a curator is that the letter tries to be more neutral while because I personally have a completely different tastes. And I would probably not use a lot of the photographs. So they boost ask as a creator, when could negatively describe it as arbitrariness and quantity instead of quality. But I don't see it this way. Because, well, taste formation and ultimately, inspiration can only work and so for me can only work on the broadest possible basis. And I do not presume to exercise curator censorship. Well, it's a selection whatsoever, or even so a judgment on the quality, I wouldn't do that they're my personally, my person doesn't count there in a way. And by receiving a maximum of the most diverse input, I, myself have acquired my literary and cinematic taste, and this is how I think one should approach any kind of art. So with openness and curiosity, and I don't work, I want to feed them, I don't want to put them on a diet. This is the general idea behind Well, my, my curate my creative approach.
Mia::
So you really are almost stuffing your own personal taste in order to be be as widely applicable as possible.
Sabine:
Yes, because there are two different identities. It's a bit, boy, well, it's not as schizophrenic but I have the liberty to, on the one side, be very, very subjective on my artskorps account, and on the other hand, to be very open to everything. So, for example, there is a flood, really a flood of I don't know why I never have seen that before a flood of bird photography's, of a landscape of beautiful sun, sunrises, etc. I well have I've taken one or two myself, but not in this extensive way. And there's a big a big community for that. Well, I boost them. Of course, I wouldn't do that on my personal account.
Mia::
Why do you think viewfinder is emerging as one of the top curating sorry, why do you think viewfinder is emerging as one of the top curated photography accounts?
Sabine:
I was stunned to hear that I didn't I absolutely wasn't aware. Maybe it's because it's Well, I'm investing a bit of time but not not not as much as I would like to. And so I'm trying to spread my my tentacles everywhere. This is nice because the other account I have is helping I come across completely other photos there than I see on viewfinder. So I'm exchanging I'm I'm sending interesting accounts from outscore to you find it to their to boost them it's funny, I wouldn't have thought that and I'm I'm sometimes I even invite even a bit well, I don't know whether it's a good thing, but I have decided in some some cases to do so. I boost only photos with an with an extra text and alt text you because I think everybody should be able to, to profit visually impaired people as well as people who have no problem to see what what is posted. So sometimes I have even asked people to, if they wouldn't mind to add and outtakes to the beautiful photos, because I really would like to boost them normally that works. So yes, I tried to find like, like, yes, like a, like a dog who is searching for truffles, I try to find things which might be past unseen. And therefore I'm searching for tags, which are really not very, very popular or well known.
Mia:
speaking of tags, what are some of the essential tags that you think people should follow and participate in to be part of these photography communities.
Sabine:
In the beginning, I thought one has to take as broad as possible photography and art and artistic photography and self portrait and self portraits, etc, Master art and art, art matters, etc, etc. But this is just too broad. And now I would advise them to just follow photography, and then choose.
So if you follow this tag, normally, the people who post a photo will use this tag, after it's you, you come across a lot of a lot of photos in your timeline and looking at these photos, you will probably find some more specific ones. And so this is what this is how I found the tags to follow. So and this is how I tag always photography, it's the key tag, and then additional tags very precisely on the respective photo — like this is historic photography, for example, but nobody looks for this. But that was just an example for a very small one. Or I like I found I ignored completely that there was something like a Gameboy camera. I didn't know that. So I found this tag. And it's funny. And once I found such a tag, I tried to find the contributors, and I boost them one after the other as much as I can find from this tag. And so I tried to open up a new window and making people aware have a look at that. I've never seen that before. Yeah, this is what I would propose to take a one big one, one big tag as general as possible, but just to find your your, your your principal category, and then tag, according to your subcategory. So yeah,
Mia:
that's so amazing. I feel like you're really helping people understand how to use this new service.
Sabine:
There's always a bottom if I if I might add that too, because in knowledge engineering, we were always skeptical about well, this is an inflationary use of unmoderated textbooks is that meaning that everybody can take what they want and they can make up any as many texts as they want and this this is a source of errors because you you make a typo and you will never be found. I would like or such tech room for medic loads of really difficult to evaluate and much less less precisely for bundling I would I would have liked this is just my personal opinion, sort of semantic moderation for example on a specified specified specified fixed set of tags, which is of course expandable on users suggestion but which is moderated so that if you want to take something it just proposes the one, if you try to take something you will come across a lot of wrong versions of a word of attack. And there you see they have been set by users who just had made a typo. And this is the thing. One could one could modify. But it's just just my personal idea. Maybe it's would be seen as a kind of undemocratic restriction. I don't know. Well,
Mia:
yeah. Why do you think the Fediverse is a good place for curators? You've talked about some things that need to be improved, but what are sort of the pros and cons of being a curator in this new system?
Sabine:
it opens up a just a new world and a huge base of of content and how normally a curator has to has to find a base on to work with. And this is a rich really rich and diverse base of everything you could think of and even more so. The problem is more to find what one wants what what what one wants to curate because well you have to find your way I think it's a great place because you have such a such an incredible it's such an incredible choice and and and rich and creative club a crowd out there.
Mia:
How many hours a day do you spend on
Sabine:
so well I'm normally I'm at the moment I'm staying in France in a small apartment so I'm I'm in front of my computer nearly all day long. And I have always a window open to just with one I follow what's happening on Mastodon and my federated timeline and my my hashtags I follow so there's always incoming stuff and with one I decide oh yes no, yes no to post or to boost things and with the other I'm I'm doing my stuff. So it's difficult to say how much the percentage of time I'm really concentrated on that. But unfortunately and this is really this is not really a disadvantage 24 hours a day there are interesting things coming up and it's it's a little bit well it's sad that I can't be online 24 hours and I have to admit that sometimes when I'm not able to sleep at night, I take a look and I come across things I never would have seen because with a lot of people I'm following there is a lot of movement there's a lot of things coming in I missed I missed a lot so with the people in Japan just not waiting for me getting up they have made their day and are going to sleep when I'm when I'm opening up my computer
Mia:
Well, before we go, every I end every interview with like, what I call it a speed round of live curation, where you tell me what are some books, movies, podcasts, games, music that that you love so much that you recommend everyone else should check out?
Sabine:
Well, this is maybe the hardest question. But I'm looking back on 52 years about 52 years of consuming culture that well to some extent consciously and I've read and seen and heard so many great things I would feel it in in an insult to those I forget now. And to just make a nanoscopic selection and also our that's another point I always find answers to this kind of questions to be sort of name dropping, you know, like putting yourself in the bright light of other artists hoping it shines a little bit on you. So I'm really reluctant about a part of apart from that there are many phases in the life of a person Yeah, so at the age of 12, it was completely different. I adored films of Kudla expressionist painting and but also lute music and then with 18 It was a clause no misinterpretation of personal It's called Song and in my late 30s It was filmed by Charlie Kaufman and Stephen Fry and today i i love Viola Huisman and was writing in French and I'm a part of a part of that I'm completely omnivores when it comes to visual art so I'm Yeah, it's a bit of everything is completely eclectic. Eclectic if you Well, yes.
Mia:
Who are some of your favorite artists today?
Sabine:
I really like Louise Bourgeois. Her complete her econ a classic way to get a grasp on things. So she's, she has no risk. But it's an interpretation. That's very personal. I think she's disrespectful to everything. And I like that because it's not that I understand. Or I would dare to say that I understood what she was thinking about when doing her things, but I I love the photos when she was really had already a certain age and she was mature and I love like, for example. But I also Yes, oh, there are so many different. Well, when I in my enumeration was no photograph photographer, because I'm I I'm really, no, I'm not closing the eyes. But I try not to get being inspired by other photographers. This is like, polluting my ideas. I don't want to be a copy of something or someone.