“Mastodon did not, and does not, have a unique selling point for most users” is a bit like saying “This park bench did not, and does not, have a unique selling point for most visitors.” just because it has a 10th of the number of people that use it as the one right next to the parking lot, even though it’s got a nicer view and is quieter and has much less litter surrounding it.

The rebuttal is frankly “So what?”. These migrations come in waves. The wave comes in, and the wave goes out. Some of the wave seeps in and sticks around. That’s the nature of these things.

Comparing fediverse sites to reddit and twitter is a fallacy and instead should be taken for what they are. I like the vibes on Beehaw. I like the vibes on my mastodon instance. I get to see the kind of content that I like to see and I don’t have big corpa algorithms trying to change my opinion or actively hide the content I DO like in favour of content that upsets me in the name of engagement.

I would call that a unique selling point. So maybe that’s another rebuttal. Op-ed person just wanted the fediverse experience to be something it wasn’t. They had expectations of the “migration” that weren’t met. But those are 100% their own problem and not an issue with the fediverse.