this post was submitted on 15 Feb 2024

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308

Bluesky and Mastodon users are having a fight that could shape the next generation of social media (techcrunch.com)

submitted 7 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 36 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Bluesky:

Protocol is maintained by the same people who make the app and is developed on GitHub.
Instance that was the only one for such amount of time is hosted on Amazon AWS, with domain bought on Google Domains. Does not support IPv6.
Mobile app is not distributed on any of the open app stores, just Google Play and Apple AppStore.
Weak non-copyleft license not protecting the software from turning closed source and not making users sure they actually use open source version.

Wow, such decentralization.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 7 months ago

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago (2 children)

I'm perfectly fine with the unwashed masses flocking to non-federated services, it means things will remain sane a while longer over here.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago

We did learn a lesson from Facebook. It was fine until the Boomers got involved. Once the masses get in, we're toast.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 7 months ago

People wouldn't have to flock anywhere if things were more connected ;_;

[–] [email protected] 90 points 7 months ago

The decision was made the moment Bluesky chose to deliberately be incompatible with ActivityPub. They want the AT protocol to exist in their own domain because they know the moment they put the screws to monetize, users will flock to an instance where they don't.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 7 months ago (1 children)

What if I tell you I don't give a fuck

[–] [email protected] 23 points 7 months ago (1 children)

I wouldn't believe you because people who don't give a fuck dont feel the need to go into the comments and tell everyone they don't give a fuck.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago (1 children)

About The subjects, I don't give a fuck. Letting know I give a fuck about this subject, yes.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 7 months ago (1 children)

I don't even give a fuck about not giving a fuck, so I do give a fuck... wait what?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 7 months ago

You're not fucking around my friend, well done.

[–] [email protected] 28 points 7 months ago (2 children)

And still we all know it's blue sky that will win, and we will be at it again in 5 years after its enshitification...

[–] [email protected] 4 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (1 children)

Maybe. Meta and Automattic (WordPress.com and Tumblr) are betting on ActivityPub over ATProtocol.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago

I would love to be wrong, we'll see in ~1 year.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago

Well, 5 years isn't too bad.

[–] [email protected] 75 points 7 months ago (5 children)

I just do not understand using a corpo solution over a better OSS solution. You know where it's going to go in your bones, yet you sign right up for another 10 year run before you change all over again. Like these people were just waiting for another terrible option to show up before they switched.

Fuck, just sign up with Mastodon and get it over with, you putzes. What is your issue with free software?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

It’s the capitalist system we’re born into. It’s time living in a cocoon where these magic products appear to guide you. Then one day you wake up realizing they’ve been drinking your blood all this time. Open source might not lead to your perfect product, but it will be close, and mandatory profit seeking won’t turn the ecosystem hostile against the users. We leave that to the mods and server operators.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Mastodon is a maze, or to put it differently, a mess. The one thing putting me off is needing to find an instance with the right collection of policies and rules, and I just can't be bothered.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago (2 children)

The entire point is you have a choice, though

[–] [email protected] 1 points 7 months ago

Choice is sometimes a bad thing.

Choice paralysis + the the fact that this random shitty instance that hosts maybe 300 people could go down at any moment + the admin could boot you for no seemingly no reason + the various issues with federation make it extremely unappealing for the average Joe. And if you want actual content and adoption you have to make concessions for them or else you'll forever be irrelevant.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 7 months ago (1 children)

That's fine until making that choice feels like sifting through a massive stack of paperwork.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

My experience is signing up to a Mastodon instance a while ago then switching instances about two months ago, and all of it was exemplarily straightforward

Admittedly those are both pretty big instances so it's not like I worried about either of them shutting down without notice or anything

[–] [email protected] 5 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (1 children)

Fuck, just sign up with Mastodon and get it over with, you putzes. What is your issue with free software?

What you are partially seeing here is the fact that there is friction to the very idea of Mastodon not being owned by a massive corporation. People have been trained so well to expect their social media to be run by a massive corporation that even if an alternative social network like Mastodon did onboarding perfectly people are still going to get tripped up and feel confused about Mastodon simply because a bunch of rich people don’t own it.

It is maddening and there isn't much we can do about it other than treat that friction as an opportunity to help radicalize people into being more open in a broader sense to taking back aspects of their life from the control of rich people/massive corps.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 7 months ago (1 children)

People don't care that it's not owned by a millionaire. What they care about is it being simple and easy to understand. One choice is as simple as it gets.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (1 children)

People most definitely do care about that, and every single day more and more people are realizing how much ownership over their digital community spaces matters.

That process happens slowly most of the time but occasionally it happens in huge bursts that in a short time change the longterm growth trajectory overnight of the Fediverse. We can’t foresee when events will trigger that but the potential is always there.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Yes people will not use a service because a billionaire owns it. But nobody is using a service simply because a billionaire owns it. People might choose bluesky over mastadon because the owner created twitter originally. But nobody is choosing it because Jack Dorsey has a fuck ton of money.

Elon's rabid fanbase not withstanding. That's more the exception though, not the rule.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 7 months ago

Yes people will not use a service because a billionaire owns it. But nobody is using a service simply because a billionaire owns it. People might choose bluesky over mastadon because the owner created twitter originally. But nobody is choosing it because Jack Dorsey has a fuck ton of money.

I get what you are saying but my point is I actually think subconsciously (and sometimes even consciously) this is how people think. The collective organism of (at least US) society desperately wants a businessman (especially a techy one) to tell us what the future of social media is. People aren't actually able to comprehend NOT needing a tech businessman to own their social media in a lot of ways. It is weird, but it is really just a natural consequence of how utterly obsessed US culture is with seeing all of society through capitalism and rugged individualism.

[–] [email protected] 46 points 7 months ago (3 children)

I mostly use Mastodon, but I 100% get it. The onboarding process is much easier with centralized services (no need for analogies to email), and more importantly, you're not at risk of losing half your follows/followers when server admins have a pissing match. As long as those friction points exist, there will be a market for centralized platforms.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago

The admin politics is exactly what turned me off to mastodon. It's like the worst people are in charge of everything

[–] [email protected] 11 points 7 months ago

There's also less complexity for a centralised system, since you don't have a big confusing mess having to learn which server you want to sign up with, how that impacts what you see, and how you connect with other servers.

It's one of the downsides of Lemmy, since people get completely boggled over their heads, and either jump to the biggest Instances that they can find (assuming that the servers are basically completely separate), or give up on it entirely because it's too confusing when you just want something simple and straightforward.

[–] [email protected] 28 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (2 children)

I was impacted by the closing of mastodon.lol and I never recovered either my follow count, or frankly my interest and engagement in the platform since. I'm not alone, either. The 'migration' behavior was half baked at best, giving me what equates to a 301, not much else. There's a lot of work to be done here.

I am the most active on Threads for my brand account, and my personal account on Mastodon is a distant second. I know the people here are gonna throw shoes at me, but my activity is on Threads because that's clearly where the numbers are for my field and the market outside of the total loss that is Xitter.

Mastodon is probably not going to be any bigger than it is now. But you can self host and dictate your fate. In a time of protocols, not products, existing is a great place to be in. Make your own fate.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 7 months ago

👟👟 Here, hope they fit!

[–] [email protected] 8 points 7 months ago (2 children)

If you are running a business account you really should be using your own mastodon server.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 7 months ago

Agreed, but it is a cost.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 7 months ago (1 children)

And poof! There goes the appeal.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 7 months ago

Yeah, sure, being the absolute authority on moderation for your content is real unappealing to businesses

[–] [email protected] 12 points 7 months ago (1 children)

It's astonishing! I get why dril or some celebrity would go with BlueSky, but journalists seem to be trying to make it a thing too! It's like did you learn nothing?

[–] [email protected] 8 points 7 months ago

dril and journos are just going where the numbers are. Simple as. Its not about what platform is best, they want exposure and reach. Mastodon's design makes it difficult to get both of those things, and that's why I prefer it. I want smaller, manageable groups. If I wanted to hear about "corncobbing from hte master" i'd use Bluesky.

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