And the language of "toot" is extremely hokey and will never be taken seriously. It implies farting for most Americans.
"Tweet" reminds people of birds. As in "a little bird told me". Which is appropriate for a gossip style network.
"Tweet" reminds people of birds. As in "a little bird told me". Which is appropriate for a gossip style network.
Breaking news. In a series of explosive toots...
The foreign minister was forced to resign after a number of offensive toots...
OMG, your toots are so funny!...
Everyone's talking about what J K Rowling tooted today...
I can't believe you tooted that!...
...and so on
If you think I'm joking then that shows how bad a name "toot" is. Because these are all phrases that people would say about tweets, and which need to sound non-ridiculous for any such system.
It's difficult to show evidence for the absence of something, though.
It'd be possible to show evidence of it, like that every time the word "tweet" was brought up the were people saying it sounded ridiculous and embarrassing.
But then with Toot, obviously that wasn't what they were going for. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Mastodon seriously needs a rebrand.
In addition, it's time to drop the notion that every platform has to serve every type of user. As demonstrated by the problems facing Twitter, it is probably better to have many different platforms serving different audiences. Mass media inevitably reaches for the lowest common denominator.
> Breaking news. In a series of explosive toots...
> The foreign minister was forced to resign after a number of offensive toots...
> Everyone's talking about what J K Rowling tooted today...
If the age of tweet-reporting ends because of "toots" then I am all for it. As for your other examples, you have a decent point.
> OMG, your toots are so funny!...
> I can't believe you tooted that!...
I can see how this might feel weird for some people, at least in the English-speaking world. But people thought "tweeting" was ridiculous, and they made fun of it relentlessly. In the end it doesn't matter all that much.
I don't think the terms "tweeting" and "tooting" are in the same ballpark in terms of how ridiculous they sound to people.
> In the end it doesn't matter all that much.
But naming does matter, which is why companies spend huge sums on it each year.
(Btw I removed those examples from my earlier comment as I felt they weren't relevant to the topic we were originally discussing, which was the name Madstodon)
I think it would be pretty darn easy to maintain a rebranded fork, though.
More seriously, the American Heritage Dictionary gives the following definition:
v.
To sound a horn or whistle in short blasts.
v.
To make the sound of a horn or whistle blown in short blasts or a sound resembling it.
v.
Slang To snort cocaine.