Evan Prodromou
A lot of people worry that commercial networks joining the fediverse will inevitably take over the network, "like Gmail took over email."
Except, y'know, Gmail hasn't taken over email.
There are 4.5B active email users (Radicati), 1.5B Gmail users (CNBC). About 1/3.
Email is growing faster than Gmail.
Maybe all the people you know use Gmail.
Maybe that says more about the people you know than about the state of the email network.
Email remains robust, decentralized and diverse in 2023.
Evan Prodromou
@mav To that anecdote with a sample size of one?
I'd say that Open Source email servers are some of the most miserable pieces of software to work with on the planet.
I have a personal email server and keeping it running suuuuuuucks.
We need better email client and server software!
mav :happy_blob:
@evan how would you respond to this? https://cfenollosa.com/blog/after-self-hosting-my-email-for-twenty-three-years-i-have-thrown-in-the-towel-the-oligopoly-has-won.html
Evan Prodromou
@g right. Let's try this:
A, B and C are people with email addresses.
B has Gmail, A and C do not.
There are nine possible email messages: A to B, A to C, B to A, B to C, C to A, C to B, A to B and C, B to A and C, C to A and B.
Only 2/9 or about 22% don't go through Gmail.
"I see a lot of stuff come through Gmail" is reasonable, but it doesn't mean everybody uses Gmail.
Guillaume Ross
@evan I feel like a significant portion of my own email (personal, which isn’t on gmail) ends up being written or received at gmail though. I wonder what the actual number is but I feel like it’s probably around 50%.
Evan Prodromou
I am not scared of anyone joining this network. *They* are coming to *us*, not the other way around.
We are a robust and resilient network. We are gaining more and more people, implementations, and communications content every single day.
We have the power in this situation. Let's start acting like it.
Karen Simpson
Embrace. Extend. Extinguish.
And there goes ActivityPub....
M$ excels at that, see ActiveDirectory vs LDAP.
Google's more clever, they push DKIM and alike "in the name of security" ('cos "think of the children" won't stick,.it's not encryption) and then block your email 'cos it's spam.
The net result will be that those who are now using the fediverse will keep on doing so, and the newcomer "normies" will use a fediverse based on an incompatible doctored ActivityPub .
Then there's datascraping but they can do that with a simple client.
Evan Prodromou
@datn @mav My numbers come from the Radicati email statistics report.
Could you put forward the meat of the argument?
I think "we're worried" is fine, but "Gmail took over email" is factually untrue.
Dan Shick
@evan @mav further: 1/3 of all email is a LOT of email, and i don’t see any evidence to support your claim that email is growing faster than Gmail. that seems wrong on its face.
i suppose you can argue the reversal of cause and effect here too, but i think some of us in the discussion will still perceive you as failing to respond to the meat of the argument put before you.
Dan Shick
@evan @mav sample size is much larger than one. this article has made many rounds through my networks; each time all the old heads like me pour one out for the days when one could run one’s own server.
the reason is spam, and the response of the dominant email providers to that spam. i believe if we had fewer monolithic email providers, we’d have better email client and server software that could handle that spam. as it stands, the few big sites call all the shots.
Evan Prodromou
@datn @mav the previous years' versions are available free of charge.
Dan Shick
@evan @mav I don’t have $2500 lying around for access to the Radicati report. i’d say the meat of the argument is somewhere between your two extremes, but closer to “Gmail took over email”.
how about “don’t you think giant for-profit companies will continue to screw over the open internet, specifically the fediverse?” but perhaps you’ve already answered that to your own satisfaction. sorry to bother!
Evan Prodromou
Dan Shick
@evan @mav if that’s so, i can’t find it. thanks –
Evan Prodromou
@datn @mav also, I took "Email is growing faster than Gmail" out of the original post, because it's not central to the argument. Let me know what you find!
Evan Prodromou
@datn @mav ah, OK. I don't have access to the full report. You're right, the data in the full report might not support the conclusions in the summary.
AFAIK, it's the gold standard for email network statistics. I'd love to hear better stats from an open publication!
Dan Shick
@evan @mav well, you linked me to the executive summary, so i’m still no wiser. it’s not important, though; i believe we will just have to agree to disagree. thank you for being civil!
Evan Prodromou
@goatsarah there are some tricks to that!
goatsarah
Evan Prodromou
@craigmaloney OK, but this post isn't about RSS or XMPP. It's about email.
GNU Too
GNU Too
Evan Prodromou
@vesperto yes, you're cynical.
We all benefit when big companies support open standards.
Karen Simpson
That's the spirit, @evan, but I think you missed the point:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguish
"Our" network is not imune to that.
Others on this thread also highlighted how Google EEE'd XMPP. The list goes on, ActivityPub is not free from risk.
And I'm cynical.
Evan Prodromou
@mav I think getting messages delivered is hard, yes.
mav :happy_blob:
@evan The meat of that anecdote didn't really have anything to do with *server software*, and everything to do with actually *getting your mail delivered*.
I take it that since you have an email server you disagree with the author's difficulties in actually getting messages delivered.
GNU Too
Evan Prodromou
Mark Connolly 🍻 🚴🏼♀️ (he, him, his)
@evan @josephby Do you know if the number of Gmail users includes accounts that have a custom domain? That is, not a gmail.com email address, but using gmail as underlying service? Not sure how big a difference it would make anyway.
Evan Prodromou
GNU Too
GNU Too
Evan Prodromou
@gnu2 It is. They haven't confirmed that they'll be using ActivityPub. It's absolutely possible they'll use some snowflake protocol like Blue Sky did.
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