Is this sort of thing inevitable? The fact we feel compelled to bring algorithmic content sorting into the fediverse says something about the way we use social media. The author mentions that reverse-chronological timelines make you feel like you need to spend hours scrolling through much of the same thing to make sure you’re not falling behind on the internet. The other side of that is, why is it that we’re all spending so much time dumping the same thing into each other’s timelines? (I’m at least a little aware that I’m probably the nth person you’ve seen posting about this or a similar problem in the last week)
My solution to the timeline getting too fast has always been to unfollow/mute people, but maybe that’s getting impractical.
I think that, as humans always choose the path of least resistance, implementing any sort of algorithm is the fastest way to a ‘dopamine kick’, and as such the attention that new or lengthy information provides suffers. One thing I love about the current Fediverse (and I’ve heard this term used before, too), is that it is very reminiscent of the early internet - when everything was random and interesting, different view-points, things you’d never heard of, etc., If people had the option between algorithm or no algorithm, if it were a simple toggle, I’d have to imagine most people would choose the algorithm, which would be a real shame.