If Meta is really working on a new ActivityPub-powered social network, I see it as a very positive signal overall--my personal feelings towards Meta notwithstanding. For one, it's validation for our entire ecosystem from the biggest player. It also tells me that they don't see themselves as strong enough to keep users locked inside their walled garden anymore. It means the tide is really turning for interoperable social media, and that's always been the goal.
@Gargron if there is anything positive coming out of the bird site burning down, it's this! Such a great win for ActivityPub and the philosophy behind it!
@Gargron Meta has been hemorrhaging users for a few years now. Like Twitter it has tried to wall people off then suggesting they pay to promote themselves... and like Twitter... they are learning you don't have content creators when you force such things.
IMO, if they don't adapt they will stop existing.
Bots make up a lot of their interactions there now. Much like we see with Twitter.
@Gargron I agree it’s a good thing with only a few minor reservations. On the plus side, all those folks who got on Mastodon but then didn’t find their friends and left will have more of a reason to stick around. Their friends may just show up via Meta.
@Gargron I suppose meta could create their own gigantic (and modified) Mastodon instance and brand it as Facebook. They may even try to contribute to Mastodon’s source code and ultimately try to steer its development in whatever direction they want.
@Gargron while I'm with both you & @gruber on rolling out welcome mat for #Zuckstick + #Meta in #Fediverse serious concerns remain re: establishing “Digital Self Defence” tools, strategies, policies & laws re: persistent #PersonalData harvesting by #BigTech everywhere Zeros & Ones exist. Where's the balance between Open Web & Privacy? We have TONS of great #digital stuff precisely because there’s NO law or BAD law (especially in #AI). Asking for citizens, individuals families & #democracy ?
"Decentralization" and "protection of diversity", which are upheld by ambitious, tolerant, and capable people like you, are the clear stream of the "winner takes all" era. Thanks.
@Gargron The one thing they may not be considering fully is that these things were created as a way to get away from them in the first place. I don't see their dynasty lasting so dynastically.
@Gargron yes!! that's the dream! I have plenty of family who will stay on facebook until it dies, no matter what I say to them... I would love to still be able to share with them and see their updates via ActivityPub
@Gargron I'm not 100% on board here; I see this as much an opportunistic move to siphon Twitter down, nip Blue Sky AND possibly attempt (however stupidly) to try the user capture they did when they supported then didn't XMPP.
Historically, the most ardent wall-garden builders (or siloists) evolve into open standards champions, once their monopolies implode—since there’s no other path to survival.
Open Standards always win out, eventually—and this reality is about to reshape the #SocialMedia too!
@Gargron Think of what the big corps did to other decentralized networks. Jabber/XMPP was adaopted, used to be interoperable, then locked back down again. Email? Try running your own infrastructure and not end up in some big corp spam filter blocklist.
I'm not saying it's a bad move per se. I'm just not sure if it's beneficial in the long run.
@Gargron My fear is that they just see that platform as another way to gather data like „who communicates with whom“. There‘s a good reason I avoid everything that‘ connected with Meta.
@Gargron It's clear that more and more users want to free their data from one single service provider and move to services where they can import and export their data. This news from Meta about using ActivityPub/Mastodon is a great sign for future interoperable services.
@Gargron All of Facebook's recent successes aren't a result of innovation. Any recent success they have is because they either acquired or copied the competition.
Meta can't acquire the Fediverse. Therefore they copy.
But now they're on our terrain, and the game has changed. They don't get to set the rules anymore ?
@Gargron From experience I can tell you the Facebook playbook:
1) Tightly embrace and clone the latest new thing
2) Reach out to the people who've been key in building/supporting that new thing with attractive partnerships to gain their support, trust and endorsement
3) Abruptly pull support from those same people when either a) the current new thing is under their control or b) the next new thing arrives
I've seen these movies too many times and the sequels keep getting worse.
@Gargron I agree that this is overall a good thing for ActivityPub and for the widespread adoption of the vision you have championed. Facebook is validating the work you and others in this community have done. As Oscar Wilde said: "Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery that mediocrity can pay to greatness."
That said, I can assure you that Facebook has zero intention of supporting interoperable anything, ever and will work from within to destroy anything like that from ever happening.
Eugen Rochko's creation, the Fediverse, is revolutionary not only for the social media landscape, but also serves as a model of decentralized, cooperative activities of many participants for other areas of society. It transforms capitalist economics and therefore cannot be combined or reconciled with approaches by monopolistic, profit-maximizing companies like Meta, Google, etc. Eugen, success forces caution!
@Gargron it won’t be ActivityPub-powered. It might speak ActivityPub — which is very different. Because it will speak it a little bit. With strange incompatibilities and glitches. And weird extensions. Sending you on wild bug chases and distracting you. Exporting only the boring stuff (e.g. to see videos you have to be logged into their app.) While they build features you can’t easily match because they have 100 people on the team.
I want to believe that, but so far, it sounds like EEE. When they will have enough of AP and federation quirks, they will just silently kill it, killing social connections as well.
Also Facebook is ultra censored, I don't think they just fit here.
@a1ba@Gargron IIRC what Google did is make people migrate en masse to Google Talk, for various reasons but a lot of them even made technical sense due to XMPP's pretty poor interoperability on almost all levels and the particular case of VoIP being an horrible pain to get working thanks to NAT.
Meanwhile in this particular case: - I don't believe people will move to Facebook's servers - Facebook has been leaking users for the past years, so I believe people *will* leave Facebook, specially if they can still contact some people after migrating to the other side - The fediverse bootstrapped itself / works standalone, it's not the extraneous network like it was in GnuSocial era where basically everyone had accounts on a bigger network
@lanodan@Gargron remember when Google supported XMPP? It did change the reputation of XMPP from positive to negative, when they were slowly killing XMPP support.
And it wasn't a technical problem that Google's support for it was incomplete, they just didn't care enough.
@Gargron Yeah, I do have a bit of worry in terms of culture and good old Embrace Extend Extinguish (not a strong one though, I don't think people would leave OG Fediverse to Meta, more like the other way around really).
At least I would very much welcome tearing the wall of Facebook down.
@Gargron I wouldn't be so sure. It's Meta. it's cancer. Even if they start using AP, they will eventualy turn it into closed proprietary shit to shove ads into their users brain.
Very similar to what happened with XMPP and FB Messenger, WhatsApp, Google Chat and what not
@brennansv Friendica has actually been around since 2010. Because it too uses ActivityPub, it’s largely cross compatible with Mastodon. This is why people on Mastodon can contribute to @fediversenews, which is a group hosted on a Friendica server.
Also, Friendica also uses Mastodon’s API. Mobile developers like @ivory should support it but they choose not to.
By the way, Android has better support for the rest of the Fediverse ?
@atomicpoet Perhaps. I just had a look and it does not seem to be as far along as Mastodon which now has many apps. I use @ivory and @IceCubesApp which are quite good in terms of usability and visual design. I may be an early adopter but it will be hard to convince others to get onboard.
@atomicpoet@Gargron The Fediverse can copy FB groups, events and shared photo albums. It would allow so many people to finally to get off the platform.
@Gargron Corporate greed is incessant. Meta has zero interest in ActivityPub except how it might help drive up their stock price.
My gut says to the degree that the nature of ActivityPub will not allow Meta (and other rich capitalist companies) to do what they want, they will then try to control it and change its very nature at some point and in some way we likely, today, think cannot be done and therefore will only learn about when it's too late.
@Gargron I have been here for a month now, had this page on Hatebook/Metahate for 8-9 years, my personal account for 16 years or so ... sick of FB/Meta by now. That is why I am here ?
@Gargron I've been using www.spoutible.com ? and am loving it. It's a much easier transition from Twitter, especially for those with #Mecfs and #LongCovid#BrainFog - it's been in beta since February 1st and is rolling! I hope people don't go to another VC FUNDED PLATFORM like Meta. I won't join a Zuckerberg alternative for twitter.