Anecdote: I joined Mastodon about a year ago, bc I wanted to participate in the monsterdon watch party. After about a month of “analysis paralysis”, I joined a non-mastodon.social instance. And I participated in the watch party, i.e. commenting as we all started watching a movie at the same time. But all my posts showed up like 3-4 hours late! So I made an account on mastodon.social and have been there since.