Mastodon's Eugen Rochko and the Turtle in the Mud
Like many other users of Mastodon, I’m impressed with Mastodon’s announcement that the people should own the town square that is Mastodon. I agree with others who are tremendously impressed with founder Eugen Rochko’s willingness to give up the financial security of owning the growing platform. I thought of him and his decision just now as I came across this in Helen De Cruz’s book Wonderstruck:
The ancient Chinese philosopher Zhuangzi (ca. 369-286 BCE) was sitting fishing when two state officials from the kingdom of Chu came to offer him a prestigious position as chief administrator. Without turning around, he said,
“I have heard that in Chu there is a sacred tortoise which died three thousand years ago. The ruler keeps it covered with a cloth in a hamper in his ancestral temple. What would you say that the tortoise would have preferred: to die and leave its shell to be venerated, or to live and keep on dragging its tail in the mud?”
The officials agreed it would rather be alive, so Zhuangzi concluded, “Go your ways. I will keep on dragging my tail over the mud.” This is a startling response. For readers at the time, as now, turning down a cushy position like this, which comes with wealth and honor, would be virtually inconceivable. Zhuangzi evokes a sense of wonder and unfamiliarity by likening that position to being a desiccated tortoise stored away in a box (p. 20).
I’m not suggesting that Rochko is a turtle, or that his continued work on the development of Mastodon is akin to dragging a tail over the mud. I do think, however, that the image of “desiccated turtle” seems apt for at least one other player in the world of social media.