We're coming to the point where decentralized social media contains the only structures we're going to have left that aren't completely controlled by hard-right interests
The one centralized holdout is Bluesky, which means either that's going to need to be decentralized, or it's going to be the next right-wing target over this year probably
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@cwebber I was literally thinking the same thing today re: Bluesky. Especially in light of US states getting into regulating algorithms (mostly to protect freeze peach)
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@rwg @cwebber
algorithms are already decentralized in bluesky
it would be no biggie to build a client that is not in the US and that can use arbitrary algorithmic feeds
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@m @rwg @cwebber isn't the cost of running a bluesky relay prohibitively expensive? :shiba_confused:
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@OctaviaConAmore @rwg @cwebber
The algorithmic feeds are a separate thing from the "relay".
There are ways to bring the cost of a "relay" down dramatically and it also would be possible to distribute such a thing in a system with centralized trust... maybe even decentralized trust.
In fact you could build a BlueSky entirely without this "relay" since all data is available over the PDSs and all data is public.
meaning you could build a client that scrapes PDSs and has nothing in between.
And then again, if the US fucks up that badly i am okay with paying 10EUR a year to a German company to host a "relay".
(there is a problem with PLC servers but i think one could overcome them)
In the end the entity that controls the PDSs controls what data is available.
As more ppl host their own PDSs the potential influence of BlueSky company shrinks.
Think of it in terms of a lot of git repos with all posts, likes, blocks etc. of a user on it; and a relay is just a big indexer, search engine and quick database to look all this data up. (there are a few nuances but they can be overcome IMHO like the PLC)
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@m @OctaviaConAmore @rwg @cwebber I was just reading some discussion on this https://lobste.rs/s/gsj2e2/how_self_host_all_bluesky_except_appview
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@m @rwg @cwebber I'm trying to wrap my brain around how this would work :frog_think:
would said client be asking for data from every private data server you want posts from every time you refresh your timeline in the client :shiba_confused: and to see a reply from PDS B to a post on PDS A, you need to know they both exist and ping each for their posts in that thread?
so if clients default to seeing the whole network (or most of it) so that they can see all or most posts and replies to those posts, the load on each PDS increases linearly with the number of clients in use? :cinna_confused:
(also, is relay in quotes different from relay not in quotes in your post? I'm trying to figure out whether I used the term relay incorrectly here or not :blobfox_laugh_sweat: )
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@OctaviaConAmore @rwg @cwebber
Like mastodon this would not provide a global discoverability.
More like a RSS reader.
But as mastodon shows it is not necessary to have data from outside of one’s own bubble and what the algorithm feeds show you.
You would need an index though for mapping. - but this is much much cheaper then a full global mirror “relay”.
But I mean all of this is not worth a discussion because BlueSky has the same problem that mastodon has. The landing page funnels all user to one entity and therefore the power as well.
So as long as we can not solve this problem the other technical ones are not that important at all.
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@OctaviaConAmore @rwg @cwebber
And we can fix all of this if we make a minor change of AT and add the DNS along the DID.
Then you cannot change handles but what ever. Having DIDs that do not resolve to the PDS is a bad design choice.
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@m @OctaviaConAmore @rwg @cwebber
There are ways to bring the cost of a "relay" down dramatically and it also would be possible to distribute such a thing in a system with centralized trust... maybe even decentralized trust.
I am not convinced that this is true. Fortunately, anyone can easily prove me wrong by building what you describe and showing that it provides useful service at scale.
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@timbray @OctaviaConAmore @rwg @cwebber
Sure. My rates are 180€ per hour.
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@cwebber I mean, Bluesky persecutes queer and feminist stuff as "mature" or "adult" and doesn't ban nazis, only limits their reach, was partially bought out by a crypto company and is headed by a crpyto grifter.
"holdout"? not sure.
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@amberage @cwebber it's certainly got a lot of indicators that are bad already and show the ways it's likely to get worse when the time comes for the investors to set it on fire. The value I see in it is mostly in the users there - a lot of good people now, not just the OG navel gazing shitposters and Resistance grifters that are the stereotype - and the fact they're slowly getting exposed to decentralization and other Fediverse concepts. It'll make it easier to bring them here eventually imo
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@mrcompletely @amberage @cwebber we need to get activitypub developers serious about account portability (per this discussion https://shadowfacts.net/2023/activitypub-portable-identity/) before you can seriously expect to migrate users from platforms like Bluesky. Interoperability is also important, but in many ways account portability comes first.
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@mrcompletely @amberage@eldritch.cafe @cwebber
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@cwebber Bluesky is owned by the same techbro who started Twit and sold it to The Bad Musk. What do you think is going to happen to it?
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@The_Icarian Afaik Dorsey no longer has any governance role in Bluesky, though he did arrange the initial funding
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@cwebber @The_Icarian Correct, Dorsey is gone, specifically because Bluesky wanted more moderation than he was comfortable with. So that's a good sign, even though I'm still wary of the platform.
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@Teskariel@eldritch.cafe @cwebber@social.coop @The_Icarian@federated.press I don't think I will be able to trust a for profit platform ever again. There was a point in web history in which online spaces schould have stopped being commercial spaces and we have passed it loooong time ago, I guess it's time to set some boundaries
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@cwebber @The_Icarian Indeed.. it's now owned by crypto bro VC investors, primarily. Who are going to want a big return on investment.
(Big improvement, I'm sure...)
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@cwebber @The_Icarian
The 'story' is that Dorsey is gone, and indeed they have said that he holds no personal equity interest. There are other ways to retain obligations, like convertable debt, warrants or ownership through shells, that may be a way of disguising a continuing interest. It would be good to approach everything with such corporate entities with a healthy skepticism.
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@mastodonmigration
@cwebber @The_Icarian
My take after reading Lemmer-Webber is that there's no real path to technically decentralizing BlueSky, and a better alternative is figuring out how to decentralize ownership.
Figure out the current cap table, figure out how to buy the current investors out, turn to a membership co-op model with community governance, and use regulation crowdfunding (selling bonds or non-voting shares) when a capital raise is needed. Can do up to $5m a year.
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@ryansingel @cwebber @The_Icarian
Or, just build the Fediverse and other PUBLIC SOCIAL MEDIA.
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@mastodonmigration
@cwebber @The_Icarian
I think foundations should be pouring money into the Fediverse, Spritely and, if they can figure out how to get BlueSky out of VC control, into that too
There's a little window to hijack a rocketship
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@cwebber @The_Icarian it's true, but they still have very sketchy people among the investors and the recent valuation round raised more concerns in this area. As I said elsewhere, I'm glad BS exists in this moment, but the investors are still a valid source of concern medium term
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@cwebber This is Lando.
The Empire is here. Time to GTFO of Cloud City, before more stormtroopers arrive.
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@KraftTea @cwebber Well Han said you're no friend of the empire, so we should totally trust you ;)
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@johnmark @cwebber
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@cwebber I don’t guess I trust Bluesky enough to not fall.
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@chad_j why though? @cwebber
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@elduvelle @cwebber Because Bluesky is at the end of the day a corporation headquartered in and run by capitalists in Seattle. By a weird coincidence, I am also a capitalist in Seattle. Do not let Seattle fool you, we will sell absolutely everything and anything, and nothing is too sacred to not make a buck from.
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@chad_j Oh do you mean that for you Twitter hasn't fallen it has instead succeeded somehow?
If so, yes, I do understand your point about Bluesky.. yes it is likely to "succeed" just like twitter 😬
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@elduvelle no, I think either I have misstated my opinion or you have misread it. Twitter is a failure. I expect Bluesky to follow. It may be easy to look at my admission that I am a capitalist and think I mean it the other way, but that’s a trap in absolutist thinking: not everything needs to be exploited, and this trap is the one American capitalism has itself fallen into. And ultimately this is why we cannot have nice things - unless you can afford them.
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@chad_j oh I read your post saying
"I don’t guess I trust Bluesky enough to not fall."
as meaning that you trust that Bluesky will not fall, as in, it will not turn out like twitter, but I must have misinterpreted then!
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@elduvelle I freely admit that I frequently only make sense to myself. But I sound so SMART in my own head…
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@elduvelle let me just say this: I hope I am wrong and that they uphold the lofty ideals they say they do, forever. But the problem is I only need to be right in my pessimism once to then have been right, forever. Do I trust capitalism when it tells me it’s not going to behave like it has been? I’d like to, but I just don’t.
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@cwebber
I have been procrastinating about signing up on Bluesky...
I have an odd feeling about it and I don't know why. It's probably PTSD from Twitter, I worked really hard on building my Twitter account and then had to walk away which bothered me for about 3 weeks until I found Mastodon. I am afraid Bluesky will do the same thing.
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@cwebber Absolutely. People flocked behind BlueSky because it was created by Twitter's ex-founder. But how long will it take before it becomes commercialized and user data starts being sold for advertising again?
1/2
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2/2 @cwebber I'm also thinking about creating a non profit organization in Canada for hosting and managing some of these federated social networks. I'd love to get mstdn.ca, lemmy.ca and other *.ca networks under one banner and have a central hub for these services to help Canadians find these services. And also have a plan for getting government subsidies to financially support them. Just so we can have sovereignty over our social media, information and data.
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@cwebber
Someone beat me to it!
https://fedecan.ca/
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@cwebber It is confusing, but is BS not already decentralized by using the AT protocol? The probleem seems that everyone uses the same server owned by another tech giant.
https://techcrunch.com/2025/01/16/what-is-bluesky-everything-to-know-about-the-x-competitor/
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@bassjobsen https://dustycloud.org/blog/how-decentralized-is-bluesky/ https://dustycloud.org/blog/re-re-bluesky-decentralization/
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@cwebber @bassjobsen
Required reading for anyone before opinining on #Bluesky, #AT Protocol, or #FreeOurFeeds. ☝️
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@bassjobsen @cwebber It's a fundamental flaw of federalized protocols that users won't all have the knowledge or resources to host their own server. Therefore centralization is only slowed down in best case.
That is exactly why it even needs more decentralization than Mastodon is currently offering.
So BS is definitely no solution to this issue.
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@cwebber BlueSky is decentralized, and is a public benefit corporation https://techcrunch.com/2025/01/16/what-is-bluesky-everything-to-know-about-the-x-competitor/
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@punkjedi oh thanks, could you please tell me more about the "bluesky network" being decentralized? is it different than the "mastodon network"?
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@punkjedi @cwebber
🤦♂️ Because they say so?
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@cwebber I'll give it a few weeks, tops.
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@cwebber
My bet is BlueSky is going to follow in-step with the other centralized social media platforms because it is controlled by a for-profit corporate entity.
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@eosfpodcast
Abso diddley fucking utely.
@cwebber
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@cwebber I fully expect BS to be a target in the near future. It may be a little longer than a year, because it will have more value to asset-strip if they let its user growth continue for a year or two, plus it could end up being a big honeypot for lefty users. All that said, right now it's a useful transitional platform for many coming off Twitter and Meta, and hopefully provides a bridge to either a decentralized version of itself, or a Fediverse that has used the time wisely for improvements
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@cwebber big investors have gotten into Bluesky, I will stay there, but they will turn it into corporatized shit eventually.
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@cwebber Agree 100% Now that Zuck (which rhymes with suck) has bent over for #45 creating a Zuck/Bezos/Musk trifecta, decentralized social is the last "safe space" left.
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@cwebber But they're going to implement decentralisation real soon now, for sure!
(A dump truck full of money arrives)
Uh... so uh, we've all had an incredible journey...
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@cwebber Depends on how much you trust the founder of Bluesky.
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@drwho @cwebber I put a lot of trust in the founder and other developers. I don't trust their board.
edit: by founder I mean Jay, not the Twitter guy
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@blake @cwebber ...gotcha.
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@blake @drwho @cwebber
This is the key point. Jay Graber seems very sincere, but her ability to control things is limited by her relative equity position. It is not known what percentage ownership she has, but in typical VC backed enterprises it would be far short of control. Also, the fact is that should someone with a whole lot of money want to buy Bluesky, she stands to become a very very wealthy person. Such prospects are a severe test of one's principles.
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@cwebber
the #fediverse has its own charm, maybe bluesky will be a gateway, once they visit and see options in that space.
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@cwebber Bluesky is already owned by bad people. It doesn't even need to be a target. It's going to go hard right willingly and a lot of people are going to be very very surprised for some reason.
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text/gemini
