Yeah, I’m on The Site Formerly Known As Twitter for artists, not gossip. Fortunately, the artist who drew my avatar (and who is a dear friend, Arsbin) is also on Mastodon, but she’s about the only one. TwitterX exploded in popularity in Japan when Elon took over for some reason, so my other dear friend, Nami, probably won’t leave anytime soon.
I’m gonna play Devil’s Advocate here…
What’s to stop them from scraping the Fediverse without federating? If they really want the data, they could very well find a way. At least they’re spelling it out here and announced an attempt at proper federation.