Mastodon Account Migration

You can move your account to a new instance, but only if your current instance is cooperative. There's no app lockin, I can switch from the official webui to pinafore.social to tusky and back and it doesn't change anything, they're just different UIs for the Mastodon API.

There is an account migration feature. If you create a new account on a different instance, you can migrate the old account to the new one.This basically sends messages to your followers instructing them to follow your new account instead. This is all transparent to both you and your followers.

You can move between Mastodon instances, but you will lose all your posts https://docs.joinmastodon.org/user/moving/

Mastodon allows you move instances with minimal effort. You can redirect your old profile to the new one in another instance, or permanently move it keeping your follows and followers.No one there wants to hold your information hostage, you can always export it, and while it doesn't support importing, you can repost it through their API if you really want to.https://docs.joinmastodon

How do things stand on account portability? If I sign up at a mastodon server, build an audience and network there, but later if the server admin changes its policies in unfavorable directions, can I migrate to a new server with all my contacts and reputation intact - even without the old admin's cooperation?

My main issue with Mastodon is that your identity is tied to whatever instance you signed up with. So if I sign up at example.social I will be [email protected]. If the moderators ban me or the instance stops working I am losing all my tweets and followers.Ideally you would sign up with your own domain ([email protected]) and point some dns records to whichever instance you want, this way you stay flexible and you own your identity.There is a github issue for this that is open for 5 years

>just go to anotherDoes Mastadon have a way to migrate your posts/followers/etc from one instance to another?

Can one move their account to a new instance if, for example, they start on Mastdon, like what they see, and then decide to set up their own instance?

Nothing is stopping you from making a new account but there is no account migration. Assuming you and your instance admin arent bad people (as in, your old account isnt deleted or banned) you can make a new account and put a link to your old one in your about me section of your profile.Everyone you see on the public timeline is on a server that contains at least one person someone om your server follows. Thats how servers get to know each other. If you go seek out and follow someone on madeup

You might be interested in the "fediverse" then. One instance can ban you but you can make an account in others and still interact with people from your old instance.