this post was submitted on 11 May 2025
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A few months ago, I posted here about my excitement for Plebbit and the promise it held for decentralization. I was convinced that a p2p social platform with a unique UI could be the future, with different UI of all social media..including Lemmy, a true alternative to centralized services. I saw the potential, and I wanted to believe in it.

Plebbit promised a lot of an innovative interface, decentralization, community driven governance. But after months of delays, vague updates, and little to no progress, it’s clear they never delivered. They had the right ideas but lacked the follow through to make them a reality. What was once an exciting project quickly turned into an example of what can go wrong when the hype overshadows the substance.

I wanted Plebbit to succeed, but in the end, I’ve realized that I’m better off sticking with what actually works.

If Plebbit had actually followed through on its promises especially with its vision of being a decentralized Reddit alternative. it could have been the best. The idea of a selfhosted platform, where users had true control over their content and communities, was a dream for those of us who wanted more than just another centralized app. It had the potential to be the go-to solution for anyone seeking real decentralization and p2p freedom. But unfortunately, that potential was never realized. Instead of delivering on its ambitious promises, Plebbit became just another project that failed to meet expectations, and the opportunity for a truly revolutionary platform faded away.

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[–] [email protected] 120 points 2 days ago (4 children)

The blockchain components meant it was dead on arrival.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 day ago (1 children)

The reason why we picked Blockchain name systems is because they're the only way of having a full control over a name. There are lot of examples online with people getting their DNS revoked. What do you think the problem is with blockchain components?

Also, blockchain are only used for resolving names, which is a small part of Plebbit, the rest of stack is P2P.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 hours ago

Yeah, that's a super uninformed take. Blockchain is perhaps the best solution for authentication in a P2P system. I assume they're linking blockchain to cryptocurrency, but AFAIK, there's no cryptocurrency in Plebbit.

For authentication, you need a central authority of some form, and blockchain is about as decentralized as you can get while having that central source of truth. It's a good solution.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (2 children)

I'm a little confused on this point. I took a look at their whitepaper and it says that they're not using blockchain at all. It's some sort of proprietary peer to peer algorithm. Is this something that changed in implementation? I'm not really familiar with this project so I'm certainly not trying to defend anything, just unclear as to why people are calling it a blockchain project specifically.

Edit: OK, after some more digging I see what people are talking about. The project itself isn't blockchain based, but it's run by a DAO that operates using a governance token, which is not exactly great.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 day ago

I took a look at their whitepaper and it says that they’re not using blockchain at all

If community owners want to set a blockchain name like hello.eth or hello.sns it's possible, but it's optional.

It’s some sort of proprietary peer to peer algorithm. Is this something that changed in implementation?

Not true, it's free software released under GPL V2, check out plebbit-js

but it’s run by a DAO that operates using a governance token, which is not exactly great.

What is the problem with DAOs? I think they're a great way of facilitating coordination between anons on the internet

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 day ago (2 children)

It's some sort of proprietary peer to peer algorithm

I completely lost interest for the project at this point of the text

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 day ago

Not true, it’s free software released under GPL V2, check out plebbit-js

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Lmfao I actually made a huge frown upon reading that

[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 hours ago (1 children)

That's a reasonable reaction if it was true. But it's not, plebbit is FOSS.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago) (1 children)

I'm looking for a link to the protocol source (like the blockchain integration). I can't find it

I don't think it's in here https://github.com/orgs/plebbit/repositories

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 hour ago

I'm pretty sure it's just for community names. If you check out one of the clients, you'll see .eth. So I'd look at the code for creating a community to start.

[–] [email protected] 36 points 2 days ago

People constantly told OP that, but they just won't stop making posts about it

[–] [email protected] 22 points 2 days ago (2 children)

Not that the blockchain itself is a Bad idea, but after like a year or 2 of becoming popular it will be impossible for anyone to have a locally stored coin because they will be just multiple petabytes big

[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 hours ago

My understanding is the blockchain bit is optional and only used to establish ownership over a name. The posts and whatnot are not on a blockchain, that would be silly.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 day ago

Plebbit is not a blockchain, it's P2P and all content on the network is content addressable. There's nothing to "sync"