FediDB respecting robots.txt has resulted in appr. 2M Fediverse accounts no longer being counted.
FediDB respecting robots.txt has resulted in appr. 2M Fediverse accounts no longer being counted.
FediDB respecting robots.txt has resulted in appr. 2M Fediverse accounts no longer being counted.
Prior to this change, #FediDB counted 12,923,233 accounts. Now it counts 10,868,233 accounts.
Now let me be blunt: respecting robots.txt is a good thing. But now when we look at #Fediverse accounts, it must clearly be seen with the acknowledgement that these only count services that haven't opted out of tracking.
So when people compare user counts of #Bluesky vs. the Fediverse, remember that Bluesky has the luxury of a more complete count because they host all accounts there. In contrast, the Fediverse is actually decentralized, and a good many services simply do not want to be tracked -- and are therefore not counted.