contrapunctus ✊🏳️🌈🏳️⚧️
The #Fediverse may end up suffering from what #XMPP is going through.
Better-funded (but enshittification-prone) platforms (like #WhatsApp, #Telegram, #Discord, #Matrix, and #Bluesky) can swoop in, provide better marketing and more features. A critical mass of people moves there.
Suddenly, you're socially pressured into using them. They become a necessity to find work, to organize communities, to buy and sell stuff, to apply for government programs...hell, to even book Metro tickets.
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contrapunctus ✊🏳️🌈🏳️⚧️
The solution is the same as ever -
1. Onboard people to free platforms like #XMPP and the #Fediverse
2. Increase the value you create (e.g. posts, replies, interactions, etc) on free platforms, and decrease it on abusive platforms.
3. Get others to do the same.
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contrapunctus ✊🏳️🌈🏳️⚧️
Communities can choose freedom-respecting platforms, thereby forcing a significant number of people to use it.
But most communities are too cowardly to do that. Just try getting free software projects off GitHub, or try moving Telegram/Discord communities to XMPP. See how much pushback you get.
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contrapunctus ✊🏳️🌈🏳️⚧️
You try onboarding people to a better platform. But nobody has space on their phone for a freedom-respecting platform, because all the space is taken up by "necessary" abusive platforms.
The same goes for _mind_ space. They may install your app. But they never post, never read, never interact - because all their time and mental capacity has been taken up by the other platforms. And then, one day, they uninstall it.
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contrapunctus ✊🏳️🌈🏳️⚧️
@realcaseyrollins And even back then, people tried to warn others about centralized and proprietary platforms, and pushed for alternatives. The takeover of Twitter is merely one example - Facebook is no better at controlling disinformation and hateful content. People die IRL on a regular basis as a consequence.
The heart of the matter is that centralized platforms are harmful and should not be the world's dominant mode of communication.
casey is remote
> If we allow it to become as dominant as Twitter used to be, we will get a new centralized and corporate-controlled social media, which we can all very much do without.
I just don't see how that changes anything. It's not like there wasn't a centralized and corporate-controlled left wing social media platform before #ElonMusk bought #Twitter.
casey is remote
@contrapunctus I'm not sure how #Bluesky fits into this equation. It's not on the #Fediverse, and neither is #X. There's a net zero change there.
contrapunctus ✊🏳️🌈🏳️⚧️
@realcaseyrollins Twitter was centralized, which allowed a change in ownership to affect the whole platform, to spread misinformation and hate across the world, and to engage in election interference.
Bluesky seems to be "centralized with extra steps". If we allow it to become as dominant as Twitter used to be, we will get a new centralized and corporate-controlled social media, which we can all very much do without.
I highly recommend reading -
https://pluralistic.net/2024/11/02/ulysses-pact/
contrapunctus ✊🏳️🌈🏳️⚧️
It's critical to prevent #Bluesky from becoming the next #Twitter, and the time to prevent it is right-freaking-now.
It's important to not let it get as bad as #Telegram / #Matrix / #Discord / #SignalApp vs #XMPP. Or #GitHub vs #Forgejo. Trying to fix things at that stage is far more difficult.
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