One stated purpose of the campaign is to show the size and influence of the fediverse so that politicians and governments will set up instances and/or accounts and maintain an official presence on it. $500k may or may not be enough to do that, but the organizer is meeting with Democratic Party officials this week to discuss the campaign and there could be meaningful outcomes for the whole fediverse.

At time of publication, the campaign had raised 485k on ActBlue. Yesterday it broke 500k and is still going strong, with smaller daily fundraising goals.

You can see the progress tracker here: https://secure.actblue.com/donate/mastodon-for-harris

I’m with you there. The only explanation that makes sense to me is if they’re really hurting for cash. And if they are, I honestly don’t have a solution that falls between “go bankrupt” and “sell out our users in the least noxious way we can come up with.”

Do we think anyone would actually opt in?

I’m not saying you’re wrong, just that making it opt-in is probably seen in this case as equivalent to throwing the entire feature in the trash.

“I’m not owned! I’m not owned!” I continue to insist as I slowly shrink and transform into a corn cob