Hey new people and those thinking of joining, you do NOT need to sign up on huge servers!
You can follow and interact with people on any server from any server, the servers are connected.
It would really, really help the network right now if you could sign up on medium or small size servers. You will still be able to follow and interact with whoever you want, and the network as a whole will work much better.
A good safe place for beginners to find servers to join is https://joinmastodon.org/servers
You also don't need to be on the same server as your friends.
You can find each other from different servers by exchanging account addresses, here's how it works:
https://fedi.tips/how-to-use-mastodon-and-the-fediverse-basic-tips/#WhatsMyAccountsAddress
It's a bit like exchanging phone numbers!
@feditips If there are countless ways of opening an account with one’s own name, how do you stop countless imitations? Surely someone could copy your name & just have a different suffix/group.
This kind of address system has been around since the beginning of the internet, so the problems and solutions are well understood.
It's important to pay attention to the server part of the address because this tells you where the account actually is.
For example, the European Union has lots of official accounts on here and we know they are official because they have "europa.eu" as their server. Only the EU has control of that site.
Email has the same issues and solutions.