(This post is the first in a new series of guides aimed at newcomers to our community)
Joining a new community can be daunting. There’s all these conversations happening, all these strange new people, and all in this shiny new setting. Getting started can be a big hurdle, but doing it right can make it much easier to break the ice and get stuck in. Which is why, whether you’re completely new to the Fediverse or just new to Gamepad.Club, we encourage you to post an intro!
An introduction post usually has #introduction somewhere near the top, and helps to describe a little about who you are (in-game character names are fine!) and what you’re interested in. It can be as structured or chaotic as you like and contain whatever you choose. You can share as much or as little as you like, but remember that your comfort is paramount. Please do not feel obliged or pressured to put any real-life information in your introduction, or anything that may make you feel unsafe online. And above all, if you don’t feel comfortable posting an introduction then that’s absolutely OK too!
There’s no bad time to write and share your introduction. By default it’ll appear in every other community member’s Local timeline, as well as the federated feed of over 15 thousand other Fediverse servers worldwide! But here’s the real magic: by adding a few relevant hashtags to your own introduction, your post will land in the home feed of anyone else following that hashtag, making it a brilliant way of finding others with similar interests to you.
Here’s an example to give you an idea, but don’t feel obliged to follow the same format. Your introduction can be as unique as you are.
To make it a little more long-lasting, you can pin the introduction to your profile, meaning that it’s one of the first things someone else sees when they look at your posts. And, because you can edit your own posts on Gamepad.Club, you can update your introduction whenever you feel like it to keep pace with your interests.
Finding the right hashtags for your introduction might be a little unclear, especially if you’ve not seen others post about a topic you want to include. A good starting guide is that if you’ve seen a hashtag being used on other social media sites then it’s probably being used here too. But if you’re not sure (or you just want to check), sling that hashtag including the hash into the search box. If you get a ton of results from across the Fediverse, you’ve struck gold!
(Yes, that’s right: hashtags are how you can search for content from millions of people across the fediverse, which is why’re they’re so important. We’ll cover searching in more detail in a future Guide.)
Once you’ve composed your introduction however you like just post, pin, and relax. The hard work’s done!
Header Image: Hello by Natalie Kiennar