I forgot what prompted me to have this thought three and a half years ago, but it seems fitting for the moment.

One of the worst things you can do when replacing a tool is to try to make it work just like the old one. If the old and new tools were meant to be exactly the same, they wouldn’t be different tools.

Change is hard but necessary. You know what else is hard? Trying to contort your old workflow to work with the new tool. Replacing the tool is an opportunity to improve your processes. If nothing else, it prevents you from fighting the tool.

This holds true even if you’re writing the tool yourself. If you’re doing the work to write a new tool (or rewrite an old one), take the opportunity to re-think how you work. What assumptions have you carried forward that are no longer valid? What new ways of working have you learned since you first adopted the old tool?

I’m seeing this play out on Mastodon as people used to Twitter try to adjust. They expect certain things based on their use of Twitter. And while Mastodon has a lot in common with Twitter, they’re not the same. Some things may change as Mastodon grows. And some of the Mastodon experience probably should be more like Twitter, even if it isn’t. But if you make the switch, think about why you think it should work the way you want.