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1. Embed this notice
   Aral Balkan (aral@mastodon.ar.al)'s status on Wednesday, 15-Jan-2025 02:34:53 JST Aral Balkan

   This fucking Free Our Feeds bullshit is basically trying to do for Bluesky what Mozilla does for Google.

   And guess what, there’s Mozilla’s executive director and president on as custodians alongside two guys from AI companies and the executive director of Meta partner Social Web Foundation.

   I’m so bloody sick and tired of bloody Silicon Valley asshats sucking all the oxygen out of the room with their bullshit and I truly hope the folks roped into legitimising it realise this and distance themselves as quickly as possible (you know who you are).

   https://freeourfeeds.com

   #FreeOurFeeds #SiliconValley #SanFrancisco #BlueSky #SocialWebFoundation #bullshit

   • anban repeated this.
   • Embed this notice
     Mastodon Migration (mastodonmigration@mastodon.online)'s status on Wednesday, 15-Jan-2025 03:32:40 JST Mastodon Migration

     in reply to

     @aral

     Thank you Aral for putting it so clearly. This "communitywashing" BS is super destructive because it takes money, energy and focus away from legitimate public endeavors to rid us of the influence of billionaires. These guys are in effect a poison pill for truly open public social media. Hard to express how devious and horrible this initiative is. They should be ashamed, but shame is obviously not an emotion they are capable of.

   • Embed this notice
     Aral Balkan (aral@mastodon.ar.al)'s status on Wednesday, 15-Jan-2025 06:18:31 JST Aral Balkan

     in reply to

     • Johan Groenen

     @jpagroenen Yes. And look at the people behind it. It’s bullshit. That’s my position.

   • Embed this notice
     Johan Groenen (jpagroenen@mastodon.nl)'s status on Wednesday, 15-Jan-2025 06:18:32 JST Johan Groenen

     in reply to

     @aral hi Aral, I would like to understand your position better; Do you mean that this initiative is overshadowing the many good initiatives that are already there to decentralize social media and dethrone the broligarchs?

   • Embed this notice
     Aral Balkan (aral@mastodon.ar.al)'s status on Wednesday, 15-Jan-2025 16:25:44 JST Aral Balkan

     in reply to

     • Gera Mov

     @Gmov They exist thanks to roughly half a billion dollars a year from Google. They’re not what they say they are. As their head of public policy at the time once told me while asking me to go easy on them “I don’t understand why you’re holding us to such a higher standard, we’re just another Silicon Valley tech company.” Not what you tell everyone else, though, is it, Mozilla?

   • Embed this notice
     Gera Mov (gmov@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 15-Jan-2025 16:25:45 JST Gera Mov

     in reply to

     @aral I have zero knowledge of tech, just a layman trying to understand what tech is not involved with the endless data extraction and with fascist business oligarchs. I’d like to understand what is problematic with Mozilla, I’d appreciate any hint link or explanation 🙏

     anban repeated this.
   • Embed this notice
     joene 🏴🍉 (joenepraat@todon.nl)'s status on Wednesday, 15-Jan-2025 17:15:33 JST joene 🏴🍉

     in reply to

     • Cory Doctorow

     @aral Looking to all those names, one I don't understand and that is Cory Doctorow. But let's ask him. @pluralistic why did you after your clear support for the fediverse vs Bluesky choose to put your name on this list? Check Aral's post. It's thin air from Silicon Valley asking for donations without any believable coal. Don't believe the hype! All corporate nothingness.

   • Embed this notice
     Bob Mottram :debian: (bob@epicyon.libreserver.org)'s status on Wednesday, 15-Jan-2025 17:15:40 JST Bob Mottram :debian:

     in reply to

     @aral "Save Social Media From Billionaire Capture", followed by a lineup of what appears to be very rich silicon valley people.
     
     Can multi-millionaires save us from billionaires? The mind boggles.
     
     If BlueSky becomes a non-profit and ditches VCs and AI grifters, and makes the protocol genuinely federated, then maybe it has a future. But it's not looking like that's going to happen. Expect at some point BlueSky to get rug pulled and there be an exodus of the casualties into the ActivityPub fediverse. To these rich people the social web is just another hype machine to be pumped and then dumped.

   • Embed this notice
     Gera Mov (gmov@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 16-Jan-2025 03:35:38 JST Gera Mov

     in reply to

     @aral Many thanks for your response! But, does that relation regarding being google the default searcher involves more than that? Does it somehow compromise the privacy of users? (beyond the searcher one uses).

   • Embed this notice
     Aral Balkan (aral@mastodon.ar.al)'s status on Thursday, 16-Jan-2025 03:35:38 JST Aral Balkan

     in reply to

     • Gera Mov

     @Gmov Think of it this way: what would you think if Greenpeace needed half a billion dollars a year to exist and it got it from ExxonMobil?

   • Embed this notice
     Craig Lambie (craiglambie42@fosstodon.org)'s status on Friday, 18-Apr-2025 19:23:45 JST Craig Lambie

     in reply to

     @aral I don't understand why you need $£€30M to start a AT protocol (bluesky) server?
     Isn't it open source?
     Surely spinning up a small server, like the fediverse servers is therefore possible.
     Also I understood that fediverse (AP) and bluesky (AT) protocol can interact somehow?

   • Embed this notice
     Aral Balkan (aral@mastodon.ar.al)'s status on Friday, 18-Apr-2025 19:23:45 JST Aral Balkan

     in reply to

     • Craig Lambie

     @craiglambie42 Well spin one up and let us all know how it goes.

   • Embed this notice
     Craig Lambie (craiglambie42@fosstodon.org)'s status on Friday, 18-Apr-2025 19:56:12 JST Craig Lambie

     in reply to

     @aral I plan to in a bit. Maybe I should do it at home first... Bit busy atm...

   • Embed this notice
     Aral Balkan (aral@mastodon.ar.al)'s status on Friday, 18-Apr-2025 19:56:12 JST Aral Balkan

     in reply to

     • Craig Lambie

     @craiglambie42 I wasn’t being serious :) You can’t just spin up a relay node. Please read the link sent earlier and save yourself some time. https://social.tchncs.de/@werawelt/114356412748545871

   • Embed this notice
     Aral Balkan (aral@mastodon.ar.al)'s status on Monday, 21-Apr-2025 20:24:26 JST Aral Balkan

     in reply to

     • Craig Lambie

     @craiglambie42 They have a marketing budget and the sort of people who crave large audiences are pushing it as a Twitter/X replacement. Which it is. In every way.

   • Embed this notice
     Craig Lambie (craiglambie42@fosstodon.org)'s status on Monday, 21-Apr-2025 20:24:27 JST Craig Lambie

     in reply to

     @aral thanks, hugely useful article.
     Why is bluesky getting so much attention over the real fediverse then?