I disagree with the current CEO of Mastodon about his stance on mid-sized instances. We don’t want to be run in isolation, we are part of the Fediverse. “Normal users just want the default”, he can repeat that as many times as he wants, it doesn’t make it true because of that.
Diversity is the DNA of the Fediverse and Mastodon is just one part of the whole. Thousands of people spend their time and money to make it successful. Anyone who dismisses that and single-handedly tries to market the Fediverse as a Mastodon brand and use “crowding out” techniques to prevent users from even being encouraged to choose an instance from a diversity will ultimately fail.
I am super disappointed with the direction Mastodon Corporation is taking. If there is not enough headwind here soon, then sooner or later it will lead to a schism.