From 6c936c5d0eaab82b75c4141ba5f376ed38f31654 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: =?UTF-8?q?No=C3=ABlle=20Anthony?= Date: Thu, 5 Mar 2020 09:30:05 -0500 Subject: [PATCH] Update README.md --- README.md | 13 +++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 13 insertions(+) diff --git a/README.md b/README.md index 36ecbee..b19d8a7 100644 --- a/README.md +++ b/README.md @@ -20,6 +20,7 @@ I've done my best to make this understandable, but you're welcome to suggest cha * [How do privacy settings work?](#how-do-privacy-settings-work) * [How private is "Private"?](#how-private-is-private) * [What happens when someone follows me?](#what-happens-when-someone-follows-me) +* [So if I lock my account, only approved people can see my posts?](#so-if-i-lock-my-account-only-approved-people-can-see-my-posts) * [What if I go over the character limit?](#what-if-i-go-over-the-character-limit) * [What are hashtags?](#what-are-hashtags) * [What does "CW" mean?](#what-does-cw-mean) @@ -164,6 +165,18 @@ Just kidding. If someone follows you, they will see your posts on their Home timeline and they will be able to see your followers-only posts. If you want, you can limit the people who can follow you by clicking on **Edit profile** and selecting **Lock account**, which will allow you to manually approve and reject people who want to follow you. +## So if I lock my account, only approved people can see my posts? + +Yes and no. + +With a locked account, you get to approve who can follow you *through the Mastodon interface*. This means that only the people you approve will be able to see your **followers-only** posts. Your **unlisted** posts will still show up on your profile, and your **public** posts will still show up on your profile and on the local and federated timelines. + +**However.** + +Every Mastodon account (on an unmodified server) also creates RSS and Atom feeds of their public and unlisted posts - i.e. the posts that appear on the account's profile. Your RSS feed appears at `https:///users/.rss`, and your Atom feed is at `https:///users/.atom` . **Anyone can subscribe to these feeds using an RSS reader to see your public and unlisted posts when you post them.** These feeds don't contain your followers-only or private posts, but you don't get to control who can see them. + +Remember, you can set the default privacy level for your posts under **Preferences > Other > Posting Privacy**. If you have a locked account, you might prefer to set that default to followers-only so you have to make an active effort to post an unlisted or public toot. + ## What if I go over the character limit? Don't worry. First, you can't; Mastodon won't let you post a toot over the instance's character limit. You won't get in trouble or anything.