cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/1230183

Just gave my satyrical take on The Splinterverse. Grassroots movements adopt an implicit "Divided we will be conquered" approach, where big corporate newcomers can easily disrupt with Big Marketing™ followed by an Eternal September by their user influx to the Fediverse. The Muskening™ already gave a taste of that.

Currently new channels are abuzz with the Reddit shenanigans, and there's potential for another influx. People are inventing names like "threadiverse" for forum-like federated apps. There's a broader vibe where people come to the realization that enshittification on proprietary walled garden platforms is inevitable, and that the old web is re-emerging with blogs and webrings. And the heterogenous Social Web with countless alternative federated/decentralized apps where there isn't a single gatekeeper. That opportunity certainly exists (as Meta likely know all too wel also).

The common name that has stuck is "Fediverse", or affectionally spoken the "fedi". Many say it is a bad name, and maybe it is. It is a name you get used to, though, and it is not easy at all to introduce a new name in a grassroots movement.

But that is NOT what I find important at all ..

The Fediverse has slowly matured during many years. That slow growth has shaped an all-important aspect: A vibrant culture. This is what all growth-hacking enterpreneurial minds easily overlook. There have been a shit ton of social media launched.. and failed. The big ones we have have their solid position with FOMO and network effects. Those who say social media is easy have survivorship bias.

"It is the culture that matters, stupid!"

I love all the quirky aspects of the Fediverse. The diversity and inclusion. The weird angles. And also, weirdly enough.. the friction. Friction to get on the Fediverse has also served as a filter. We now have 'competitor' decentralized social networks with Nostr and Bluesky. "Nostr is developing way faster.. come to us!" --> This is a purely technical viewpoint. Wait till you see what culture that creates. Technical buzzwords like "encryption", "censorship-resistance", "micropayment", etc. that seem like features may see all the wrong types being attracted to those networks.

What I feel is the biggest thing that is missing on the Fediverse is a shared vision, a common notion of where we are headed, where the potential of the Fediverse is, what we might achieve collectively.

It is "App focus". App app app app app ... Apps are siloes!

Related to "marketing against Meta" it was asked "Where is the Mastodon branding agency?" --> They branded an app, not an ecosystem / online environment. And them being successful means we have this big confusion now, where people "Join the Mastodon". We should get rid of app focus.

The vision that appeals to me, and I am advocating for quite a while is that of a Peopleverse to emerge.

• Fediverse (technical) --> Peopleverse (social)

The Peopleverse is NOT a name.. it is an abstract idea, a vision of how things might be. The Peopleverse is where people find value online. Where they interact with others in a way that is enriching to their lives. It is where online and offline worlds are seamlessly intertwined.

Considered like that means that this Peopleverse will also have implications for the technical perspective, when looking at the Fediverse technology landscape and ecosystem. It highlights the amount of socio-technological support that is needed. It highlights a technology vision that encompasses the Fediverse's full potential.

"Hey, are you on Mastodon?"

"I joined The Mastadon network if that's what ya mean."

"Wait an instance. You are both using the Fediverse protocol."

"Ha. Well.. I joined the Threadiverse and like that way better."

"Is Lemmyverse connected to that?"

"Dunno. Let's ask at ActivityPub."

"Yay, beer 🍻 It is Friday."

"ActivityPub isn't a real pub, it is a community of sorts."

"Hi there.. dialing in from the #Pixieverse 👋 Can you see me?"

#Fediverse #ActivityPub #Threadiverse #Mastadon #TheMastodon #Lemmyverse #Pixieverse #Vidiverse #Web69

As Reddit's enshittification reaches new heights their attempts to suppress attention for alternatives, like federated Lemmy, has the opposite effect as this Hacker News discussion shows.

Copying some of my thoughts from forge federation chatroom:

Hmm, I have bumped into repl.it in the past, marked it as "interesting" for myself, and moved on. Yesterday https://replit.com became the hot thing on HN (though on AI topics). Just again navigating the site now.. and here we see another platform operating on a breadth of services, that may just give Github folks a cold sweat. It is not all smooth.. there are quirks in the site. But they are highly innovative, it shows. And apparently raking in investment money. Here we have another one-stop-shop integrated experience offering "Help with Software Development". I wonder what this disruptive trend will mean for FOSS code forges in the future.

We are moving towards this:

• Most devs: "We develop in Github / Replit / JetBrains / Gitlab.. it great. Highly productive."
• FOSS folks: "Use our tools. We have a huge patchwork of them, and you must configure them all, copy/paste between, have manual processes, and who needs that slick UX, right?"

(Actually this is already the current situation)

The tagline on Replit is interesting (highlight mine): "Build software collaboratively with the power of AI, on any device, without spending a second on setup"

We are so used to the way we develop software now, that we think that setting all the infra, CI, docker/k8s, what-have-you, and then configuring/tweaking, documenting it in README and Docs comes with the job. Well, it does not. It is a huge time-waster and the low-hanging fruit of increasing productivity. Any platform that removes all that from the picture, turned into some point-and-click UI, selecting from a marketplace of dev environments, etc. will give any manager 🤩 eyes.. and competitive advantage. And that's only the start. There's so many other common chores to be taken out of the equation on one-stop-shop automated online platforms.

In this trend I also expect Git to die eventually. It is very powerful tool, and lovely to do common things. But devs hate it when more advanced Git things need to be done. In the one-stop-shop future, git is implementation detail abstracted away deep in the platform. You don't need to be aware of it, even when developing locally offline. Because you will do that based on a full-blown "dev environment" package that you obtain from the platform.

• "I want to develop offline" --> sync local all-in dev package --> start package, code in package's IDE offline --> syncs back automatically when online again.

• "I want to contribute to this other project with other infra/techstack" --> click & code --> done.

I might also highlight the "collaboratively" in the same tagline. Replit already offers collaborative coding where - similar to Google Docs - you see the other people's cursor and activities. But this collaboration will of course be scaled to include the needs of any type of stakeholder involved in the Software Development process. That this will happen is a no-brainer. Most software projects fail because of all the handovers between stakeholders with poor collab and communication barriers. The idea behind Social Coding and the Free Software Development Lifecycle (FSDL), is that we in the Free Software movement should spend time to fill the gaps in this regard, where the FOSS movement is even weaker than corporate IT world with our tech-mostly focus.

With Fediverse going mainstream and corporate interests aplenty, it is very important to promote SocialHub and the FEP process, so that there's higher chance of keeping the fedi open and accessible to anyone. Anyone can help in this regard.

https://codeberg.org/fediverse/fep

https://socialhub.activitypub.rocks

In reaction to the surprise announcement of the creation of Gitea Ltd and the transfer of domains and trademark to this company, worried members of the Community have written an Open Letter to the elected Owners of the project.

The request is to return the assets and manage them by a community-led non-profit organization and furthermore improve the community organization, so that the Trust and Health of the project is restored.

The Open Letter can be signed by sending a PR to the Codeberg repository.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/476057

The activity of the SocialHub community, like all other 'fediverse-substrate' bodies, has waned. From an active community to just a forum. Now a decision has to be made for the future of SocialHub. The options are stopping, be just a forum, or revitalize a vibrant community. The last option needs people willing and committed to do so. To step up for the sake of Fediverse Futures.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/364580

The EU via their Horizons Europe program, the Next Generation Internet (where e.g. NLnet are associated) (NGI Initiative) are the biggest funders of the free software projects that comprise the fedi. Without their support fedi wouldn't be what it is now.

The European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) recently launched a pilot to have both a Peertube and Mastodon instance on the Fediverse, hashtagged #EUVideo and #EUVoice respectively. On these servers official European Commission related institutions as well as individuals working at the EC can have their accounts.

This recognition of the Fediverse and the interest that exists in entering our decentralized social networking environment is an important development. With success of the pilot there will undoubtedly be a follow-up and more initiatives to come. First results until now is that the parties that 'test the waters' are very happy on the kinds of interactions and quality of discussions they encounter on the Fediverse.

That is no wonder, of course. Fediverse offers social networking that is more personal and friendly, than corporate social media which is about 'broadcasting' and influencing.

Current pilot can be a ramp up to something much bigger:

Fediverse: United in Diversity

A social networking technology where everyone can find their place and participate, that is not controlled by Big Tech and commercial corporate interests. For the European Commission there is the opportunity to passionately put their support behind fostering "The European Take On Social Networking". Fediverse aligns to the NGI Initiative who envision an Internet for Humans.

How you can help

To progress towards this vision it is important for the EU/EC pilot to be a success. As fedizen you can help with this. Here are a couple of ways to offer your support:

→ Follow, boost, favourite the EUVoice accounts on Mastodon and EUVideo Peertube videos.

• These early adopter accounts are still learning how the Fediverse works, what the culture is and e.g. how we value accessibility and image captions. You can help them discover.
• Many accounts are still Twitter bridges and broadcast only. Some others respond and interact with fedizens, notably @EC_OSPO, @EDPS and @EC_NGI. The operators of the Twitter bridges don't know what the value of Fediverse is to them, and if they should spend time with us. All reactions by us are monitored, so we can help them here.
• There are people giving highly toxic reactions to almost any EC-related toot. There are many things to be critical about. Politics is about the discussion of these issues, and good arguments help more than toxicity. Here we have opportunity to show we are different than the cesspit that Twitter is.
• Do not expect too much, too soon. There is a complex organization structure at the EC, and given the politically sensitive nature all communications are weighed carefully and undergo multiple levels of approval. Plans move slowly, but they are in motion.

→ Let's give the fedi accounts more followers than they have on Twitter, if possible.

• For instance the Director General of Informatics at DG DIGIT, Veronica Gaffey, has 191 fedi followers in short time, while on Twitter she has 279 followers.

→ If you are on Twitter, then help encourage EC institutions to also have an account on EUVoice.

• A notable example is the European Parliament. Respond to their tweets and name-drop the fedi as THE place to be.

→ We are gathering a group of volunteers on SocialHub that can help train EC representatives in how to use the Fediverse effectively and understand its culture.

• The activities we do here, starting later this year, stand to benefit any administration or institution interested to join the Fediverse, not just EU representatives.

This post is also cross-posted to the Social Coding Movement that is dedicated among others to establish a Peopleverse on top of the fedi. Social Coding is not yet officially launched.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/346124

Innovation requires resources

Innovation happens wherever we put our efforts towards. The space race and the technologies it gave us is an example. Finding ways of reducing the cost of production of commodities is another. The green transition is another example.

These are the bounds that determine how innovation happens in federated social networks. They will only innovate when there is enough effort put towards them. Beyond technical innovation (perhaps in a TOR kind-of-network way, or in a Git kind-of-version-control way), a full-fledged piece of software that is effective and attractive enough for people to use, takes resources.

These resources largely refer to labor power. Remember, we're not talking about maintenance costs, but development costs. Programmers require money to survive.

FLOSS is no exception

Yes, FLOSS software can survive with volunteers, but even those volunteers have to pay their bills. Yes, the internet plus (as Bruce Schneier defines it), copyleft licenses, and already-existing technical know-how reduce the cost of production, but the costs are there nonetheless. Someone needs to do the work.

I think about open source projects I admire. Diaspora received exceptional funding, relative to its goals. Signal was heavily funded by donations. Element has a business model that lets them work towards improving Matrix. Linux has many companies that depend on it and are able to finance innovation on it.

This argument, applied to Lemmy, makes me wonder. How do Nutomic and Dessalines handle it? Are they precious exceptions that drive Lemmy forward because of their personal values and their willingness to use their technical know-how for the development of this platform? Will Lemmy thrive without them?

This brings me to another point: FLOSS and federated software has the advantage that many people are willing to spend their time working towards laudable goals. They are not motivated by profit as much as improving humanity.

FLOSS has a problem that others systematically address: making things attractive

The issue with FLOSS projects is that they mainly respond to thought-out worldviews. That is, people are willing to engage with this kind of software because of logical reasons (logos, as Aristotle and those guys would call it). It is rarer to have people engage with FLOSS and federated software because of emotions (pathos).

Unfortunately for humans, we are emotional creatures. I get put off by how unattractive the Free Software Foundation's website is, despite loving the values that the foundation stands for. I get put off by using terminals, despite the fact that plenty of FLOSS software does not have GUIs. I hate Thunderbird's calendar, despite using it daily.

Companies with investors and FLOSS projects with enough funding know this and therefore pay graphical designers, user experience experts, and sometimes market researchers to make products attractive. This takes money.

Conclusion

And that brings us back to my point: for free software to be chosen by most people, it has to have enough labor behind it to make it both effective and attractive. This is the hurdle it needs to be overcome.

Notes on my sources

These are reflections that arose after a series of conversations with a friend who works at an 'innovation office'. His job is explicitly to design an 'innovation ecosystem', which attempts to create innovation with minimal investment. Everyone at that office knows this is bullshit. Innovation rarely comes without money. Therefore, they basically look for investors for projects that don't have enough money. That's it.

This view, that innovation requires investment, is shared by Anwar Shaikh and classical economics.

However, it's more complicated with the research behind innovation.

Let's take 'platforms of innovation'. For example, cosmopolitan cities, the internet, and universities are hubs of innovation. However, it's a mistake to think that these are 'neutral' in terms of costs. All of them require operational costs. All of them imply costs of technical training. Even here, there are costs that cannot be ignored.

If we look at mission-oriented innovation, the situation becomes clearer. Universities doing cancer-related research, States doing green energy-related research, or companies doing market-related research all clearly align with the argument I made above.

Finally, it's perfectly possible that the argument I made above is not at all original. In fact, I doubt it is. If anything, it could be similar to a high-school student discovering their own proof of the pythagorean theorem: it's not new for the community of knowers who already know it, but it's new from the point of view of the student. At least I get to share this with you and hear your thoughts about it.

Oh, and given that Lemmy doesn't have terms of service yet, I wanted to make sure I could share this in the future. I licensed it under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Weird. I know. Oh well. At least you get to share it without fear!