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2026-02-28 02:09:36

ljwrites@writeout.ink

Curious whether the number of tags in a post affects people's willingness to boost. Is there a point where you think a tag has too many posts for you to comfortably boost it?

#accessibility

No, I don't consider tag numbers when I boost.

33 Stimmen | 31%

5+ tags makes me reluctant to boost

33 Stimmen | 31%

10+ tags makes me reluctant to boost

30 Stimmen | 28%

Other/depends

11 Stimmen | 10%

107 Stimmen insgesamt
Umfrage ist beendet

2026-02-28 02:18:35

afreytes, 👨🏾‍✈️ of my ⚛️⚛️⚛️

afreytes@mastodon.gamedev.place

@ljwrites More than 5 tags make me reluctant to even read a post.

I think tags CAN be useful, and sometimes even necessary. But too many tags, to me, means it's a spammy post and no one can convince me otherwise.

2026-02-28 19:14:18

Jupiter Rowland

jupiter_rowland@hub.netzgemeinde.eu

@afreytes, 👁️‍🗨️of🇵🇷 @Author-ized L.J. I always use a lot of hashtags. I have to. But many of my hashtags are not to increase discoverability. They're to trigger filtering, including filters that hide my content behind CW buttons. Such filters have been available on Mastodon since October, 2022 and here on Hubzilla (https://hubzilla.org, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hubzilla, https://joinfediverse.wiki/Hubzilla) since its inception before Mastodon was even made.

This, by the way, is why some of my hashtags start with "CW": They're only there as content warning triggers/content warning substitutes, also because I have no means to add Mastodon-style content warnings to replies. Otherwise this comment would show the following CW on Mastodon:

CW: long (over 4,700 characters), Fediverse meta, Fediverse-beyond-Mastodon meta, hashtag meta, content warning meta, character limit meta

However, unless I explicitly talk about certain hashtags, they all always go into the last line. And I think that even 20 hashtags in the last line of one of my posts or comments make people less uncomfortable than the post or comment exceeding 500 characters or myself talking about the Fediverse, especially talking about the Fediverse not only being Mastodon.

This comment, for example, would get the following hashtags (normally in the last line, but this time I'm talking about them):

Hashtags for content over 500 characters:
- #Long (= this message is over 500 characters long which makes some people uncomfortable)
- #LongPost (= this message is over 500 characters long which makes some people uncomfortable; two hashtags because I can't know who filters what)
- #CWLong (= this message is over 500 characters long which makes some people uncomfortable; hashtag version of "CW: long")
- #CWLongPost (= this message is over 500 characters long which makes some people uncomfortable; hashtag version of "CW: long"; two hashtags because I can't know who filters what)
Hashtags for when I talk about the Fediverse:
- #FediMeta (= I'm talking about the Fediverse which makes some people uncomfortable)
- #FediverseMeta (= I'm talking about the Fediverse which makes some people uncomfortable; two hashtags because I can't know who filters what)
- #CWFediMeta (= I'm talking about the Fediverse which makes some people uncomfortable; hashtag version of "CW: Fediverse meta")
- #CWFediverseMeta (= I'm talking about the Fediverse which makes some people uncomfortable; hashtag version of "CW: Fediverse meta"; two hashtags because I can't know who filters what)
Hashtags for when I talk about hashtags:
- #Hashtag (= I'm talking about hashtags; also for discovery)
- #Hashtags (= I'm talking about hashtags; also for discovery; two hashtags because I can't know who follows/searches for the singular and who follows/searches for the plural)
- #HashtagMeta (= I'm talking about hashtags and what I think about them which makes some people uncomfortable)
- #CWHashtagMeta (= I'm talking about hashtags and what I think about them which makes some people uncomfortable; hashtag version of "CW: hashtag meta")
Hashtags for when I talk about content warnings:
- #CW (= I'm talking about content warnings; also for discovery)
- #CWs (= I'm talking about content warnings; also for discovery; two hashtags because I can't know who follows/searches for/filters the singular and who follows/searches for/filters the plural)
- #ContentWarning (= I'm talking about content warnings; also for discovery; multiple hashtags because I can't know who follows/searches for/filters what)
- #ContentWarnings (= I'm talking about content warnings; also for discovery; multiple hashtags because I can't know who follows/searches for/filters what)
- #CWMeta (= I'm talking about content warnings and what I think about them which makes some people uncomfortable)
- #ContentWarningMeta (= I'm talking about content warnings and what I think about them which makes some people uncomfortable; also for discovery; multiple hashtags because I can't know who filters what)
Hashtags for when I talk about character limits:
- #CharacterLimit (= I'm talking about character limits; also for discovery)
- #CharacterLimits (= I'm talking about character limits; also for discovery; two hashtags because I can't know who follows/searches for the singular and who follows/searches for the plural)
- #CharacterLimitMeta (= I'm talking about character limits and what I, as someone with over 16.7 million characters, think about them which makes some people uncomfortable)
- #CWCharacterLimitMeta (= I'm talking about character limits and what I, as someone with over 16.7 million characters, think about them which makes some people uncomfortable; hashtag version of "CW: character limit meta")

2026-02-28 02:19:23

Author-ized L.J.

ljwrites@writeout.ink

Don't get me wrong, I think a great thing about Mastodon and fedi is that you can have as many tags as you like and no bs algorithm will hide it. Nevertheless, I personally find it annoying and become hesitant to put it on people's timelines if every other word is a tag or there's a huge block of them. As a rough rule of thumb 10 tags for me is around the point where there had better be really good reasons to boost--urgent mutual aid is still high priority (generally on my other account, since this is my writing one), but I'm highly unlikely to boost book promotions and art with giant walls of tags. I'm wondering if anyone else is similar.

2026-02-28 02:20:53

Naga (he/they good for now)

naga@toot.cat

@ljwrites Depends somewhat. Mostly on whether a post with a lot of hashtags has them gathered at the end or interspersed.

I've heard from enough people who use screen readers that say having every fifth word (or whatever) be a hashtag makes following the post difficult.

I don't use a screen reader, but visual clutter also matters.

2026-02-28 03:08:32

Kelly, (who Cannot, Today)

i_cannot_today@beige.party

@ljwrites I don't care as long as they're collected at the foot of the post and not inlined.

Inlined tags are a whole different story, I have a very low tolerance for them.

2026-02-28 04:26:32

Ahimsa

ahimsa_pdx@disabled.social

@ljwrites I prefer when hashtags are listed at the end. I don't care much about the number as long as they're relevant (not spamming).

When hashtags are at the end the first few are listed and the rest are hidden behind an "and more" link. That reduces clutter. Maybe some folks (crossposting?) don't know about this feature?

The only time I remember using hashtags in the main text nowadays is when it's part of a group's name, eg, #MEAction = an advocacy group for ME/CFS patients.

2026-02-28 07:26:30

ChasMusic (he/him)

ChasMusic@ohai.social

@ljwrites Thinking I might not boost if the tags were scattered through the post or weren't camel-cased or were spammy.

2026-02-28 09:37:40

Alexa Devreux-Swift

alexadeswift@lgbtqia.space

@ljwrites

Hastags splashed all through the body text is a definite no go for me. In fact, such posts ate illegible and unreadable to me, so I either scroll on by, or even outright block users who routinely post like this!

2026-02-28 09:38:13

Kibrika

kibrika@toot.lv

@ljwrites I was ready to say "I don't consider the tag numbers" but reading the 5 and 10 numbers made me realize I just don't see that many tags. So I don't know how it would affect me, I suspect I wouldn't mind if they were relevant, but not sure, probably a wall of them would start to look like spam and would impact.

2026-02-28 10:02:39

Rowyn

rowyn@mastodon.art

@ljwrites I use the web interface that compresses end of post tags, so those i don't notice. But tags sprinkled throughout the text can put me off.

2026-02-28 13:00:54

Svenja

svenja@mstdn.games

@ljwrites with more than three I already don't boost anymore.

2026-02-28 13:05:30

Kay :heart_bi: :tinoflag:

Kay@mastodon.nz

@ljwrites I mute accounts that use ten or more tags in a post. It's rude.