Post Aq1NAZHXlPkYTDHxOS by NocturnalNessa@infosec.exchange
(DIR) More posts by NocturnalNessa@infosec.exchange
(DIR) Post #Aq1KK5BWDfNy9uJds8 by futurebird@sauropods.win
2025-01-12T22:54:23Z
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Hank Green is the absolute KING of *almost* getting it. He has a new very frustrating video where he gushes a bit about how "Blue Sky is a Protocol!" I mean, yes, you are technically correct. But it is not functioning like a protocol at all, come on.
(DIR) Post #Aq1KXBs8fPxCfEV92O by EverydayMoggie@sfba.social
2025-01-12T22:56:43Z
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If we're going to be pedantic about it (and why not!?) he isn't even correct about that. ATProto is the protocol.@futurebird
(DIR) Post #Aq1KYaTKgsnzFUZ3x2 by futurebird@sauropods.win
2025-01-12T22:57:02Z
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It's clear SOMEONE tried to explain things to him and about 1/3 of it got through. And ... really he's not person who I'd call averse to complex ideas about media ... but boy oh boy what a reality check about just how HARD this is going to be. It also shows that the BlueSky line about "oh we're a protocol too" is doing just what we'd suspected.
(DIR) Post #Aq1KhQcqfY1rJhEOrg by futurebird@sauropods.win
2025-01-12T22:58:36Z
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@goaty Unless he has a vested interest in obscuring what the real deal is (not impossible) I'd think he could understand the difference if explained with some patience.
(DIR) Post #Aq1KwnrgY39XjgVCng by NocturnalNessa@infosec.exchange
2025-01-12T23:01:21Z
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@futurebird he kinda recycles analogies to explain why fedi is good, but imo misses the mark just enough to poison rather than reinforce them.
(DIR) Post #Aq1NAZHXlPkYTDHxOS by NocturnalNessa@infosec.exchange
2025-01-12T23:26:15Z
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@futurebird this is so evergreen, sadly
(DIR) Post #Aq1RZ86WLZ1TEh6Gsi by graymiller@me.dm
2025-01-13T00:15:30Z
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@futurebird I have to give a presentation next month on “the new Alternative, social media platforms“ and they are asking me to talk about blue sky and mastodon. Unfortunately, they seem to think they both belong in the same category.Along with threads…I’m not sure how to break it to them
(DIR) Post #Aq1SKTxUuUKCcvSWR6 by futurebird@sauropods.win
2025-01-13T00:24:03Z
1 likes, 1 repeats
@graymiller I'm really glad that you are doing this. Please take note that Mr. Green is confused and he's a terminally online nerd. You cannot possibly make this TOO simple. Maybe run it by someone who isn't online much at all.
(DIR) Post #Aq1TuqYCUV0b4dWwG8 by futurebird@sauropods.win
2025-01-13T00:41:51Z
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@tshirtman OMG it's a month old. IDK why I thought it was newhttps://youtu.be/rpOkrxxpTcE
(DIR) Post #Aq1ZCyHyxS5I3cPFR2 by mattmcirvin@mathstodon.xyz
2025-01-13T00:45:47Z
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@inthehands @futurebird @graymiller Except that Bluesky right now is exploding on a scale that Mastodon isn't, which is the opposite of the situation with solar and fuel cells.Unfortunately Mastodon is something like the Linux of social-media networks. It's special in a way that may make it more robust than the commercial systems over the long term, and it makes it adaptable to all sorts of special purposes; but from a user perspective, it's a distinction on the basis of an ideology of technology that we probably can't make most people care about.I suspect we're going to end up in the position of the people who keep wondering why Linux never took off on the desktop--it's so much better! Other operating systems make you dumb! If you can't jump through the simple hoops to use it, you shouldn't be allowed to use a computer! etc. etc.(and we even have the equivalent of the people arguing "why aren't you calling it GNU/Linux" and arguing about the distinction of "open source" vs. "free software" etc. etc.)
(DIR) Post #Aq1Zqrfuy3dz7zcma8 by davep@infosec.exchange
2025-01-13T01:45:44Z
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@mattmcirvin @inthehands @futurebird @graymiller ActivityPub/Mastodon, if you please.🤪
(DIR) Post #Aq1ZqspAh8dkgyxge0 by futurebird@sauropods.win
2025-01-13T01:48:21Z
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@davep @mattmcirvin @inthehands @graymiller I can't even explain what it is with one word. I always have to say mastodon/fediverse because if they search for "fediverse" they will just get lost and never find their way on here. Mastodon is the only place where one could "get started" without someone helping you OR being a HUGE NERD. But you know I don't want to JUST say mastodon nooo no good either.But people learned to use email. It's not hopeless. The other systems will keep failing.
(DIR) Post #Aq1a1jX1aL0d3aeCIK by mattmcirvin@mathstodon.xyz
2025-01-13T01:50:18Z
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@futurebird @davep @inthehands @graymiller And that's *before* you even get to the problem of picking a distro, uh, I mean, an instance.
(DIR) Post #Aq1avYVbkrLF5RbR5s by DaveMWilburn@infosec.exchange
2025-01-13T02:00:22Z
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@futurebird I dunno, I use both and like both. They both use open protocols and (mostly) open source, and both support federation but in very different ways. The analogy I've generally heard is that Fediverse's ActivityPub is more like email, and Bluesky's atproto is more like the web.They both have plusses and minuses. ActivityPub scales up or down pretty well, so that a reasonably determined individual with moderate technical skills could run their own instance. Bluesky's design is biased towards much larger scales while sacrificing the ability to reasonably scale down, so the concept of standing up your own instance doesn't really work. Yeah, you can run your own PDS if you'd like, but in practice that doesn't really buy you much.If we continue with the "Bluesky is like the web" analogy, then the biggest minus with Bluesky is that it essentially has only one de facto search engine, which is the Bluesky corporate relay. It's possible someone else could stand up their own relay, but given the costs involved I don't know if anyone is going to try to compete with Bluesky corporation to stand up their own. Until/unless that happens, Bluesky's federation and independence is a bit more theoretical than practical. We'll see. I'm hopeful for both.
(DIR) Post #Aq1b0QViv2sRjFynCa by mattmcirvin@mathstodon.xyz
2025-01-13T02:01:16Z
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@futurebird @davep @inthehands @graymiller Anyway, these dark musings of mine were partly inspired by Katharine Hayhoe mentioning that of all the platforms where she talked about climate science, she got a positive reception on Bluesky, hostile denialist troll attacks on Twitter and Threads, dead air on Facebook because the algorithm was soft-shadowbanning her posts...but Mastodon was, instead, the #1 place for "friendly fire" attention where people were concerned about climate, believed the science but attacked her for advocating it the wrong way. Which is just too perfect. Of course Mastodon would be the home of that.
(DIR) Post #Aq1fyxNIGBFcqY9fKi by sen@gnulinux.social
2025-01-13T02:57:02Z
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@futurebird bluesky is bread you buy at the store, fedi is a community kitchen. The consumer/producer relationship is so deeply etched into our society that people vote by buying the other brand. Of course the problem isn't really the bread, it's the store that enforces characteristics of profitability over any other attribute. Bluesky is a product, so it will be discontinued when it is no longer profitable. The fediverse is an idea, so it will live as long as we believe in it.
(DIR) Post #Aq1g8fi0nPWOx8TiCm by futurebird@sauropods.win
2025-01-13T02:58:50Z
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@sen I hope so. But I still say we should fix the damn @ in the sharing links. You know... TRY to be friendly and easier to use in ways that don't compromise anything core.
(DIR) Post #Aq1m0NKzobvVNr8k3U by jes5199@mastodon.social
2025-01-13T04:04:29Z
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@futurebird we need a word for explaining “technically ‘open’ but prohibitively expensive to peer with”
(DIR) Post #Aq1oVKGvSlywlG7dzs by mcc@mastodon.social
2025-01-13T04:32:29Z
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@futurebird There's this classic problem in tech where people think only about the technical aspects of a thing and not thinking about the social dimensions. The bluesky protocol thing is such an unusually pure example! There's social/economics dimensions baked *directly into the protocol* that turn it into something other than a protocol, but if they're focused entirely on the bits they just don't see it.
(DIR) Post #Aq1rfUtP89D0SVf6Tw by JamesWidman@mastodon.social
2025-01-13T05:08:00Z
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@futurebird +1i too am a confused and terminally online nerd, and would very much appreciate any accurate explanations of what bluesky is and how it's worse.@graymiller will your talk be posted online anywhere?
(DIR) Post #Aq236WjRUzVFTh5s8G by clacke@libranet.de
2025-01-13T07:13:00Z
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> Except that Bluesky right now is exploding on a scale@mattmcirvin So, BlueSky is nuclear.(I kid, I kid, I believe solar, wind and nuclear are all required for us to leave carbon behind, and having nuclear is safer for us than not having it, as shown by France and Germany)@inthehands @graymiller @futurebird
(DIR) Post #Aq27PkdGRQybuLcsiW by iinavpov@mastodon.online
2025-01-13T08:04:26Z
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@futurebird on this one, I think it's a bit of a "none so blind..." thing. Many *really* want twitter back, with the revenue, large clout, and the algorithm making things viral. It's just better business. And it doesn't matter your business is charitable. Mastodon is just mediocre business.
(DIR) Post #Aq28FIOYfiDjOFKGVk by clacke@libranet.de
2025-01-13T08:13:30Z
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@jes5199 @futurebird I think "fauxpen" is a good term, but I've also seen that some people seem allergic to neologisms, some to this one specifically. 😅"Open in name only" is as good as I can do with existing words, unless you are looking for something more precise.
(DIR) Post #Aq2WgIbkO2Kglhu6oy by llewelly@sauropods.win
2025-01-13T12:47:34Z
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@futurebird there's a huge difference between a protocol thoroughly vetted and approved by an independent standards body and a protocol invented to please some soul-sucking venture capitalists. I don't know how to explain that to the likes of Hank Green, but it's true.
(DIR) Post #Aq2rBlIFmZjxnO49QG by foolishowl@social.coop
2025-01-13T16:28:35Z
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@futurebird @davep @mattmcirvin @inthehands @graymiller I don't want to abandon caution prematurely, but if turning Mastodon into a non-profit organization means it escapes the trap of the BDFL model, then the main reason I avoided referring to this network as Mastodon will no longer apply.
(DIR) Post #Aq3Ibrv6StDWdguWzw by DaveMWilburn@infosec.exchange
2025-01-13T21:30:21Z
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@futurebird FWIW, a new foundation called Free Our Feeds is being stood up to sponsor further development of atproto and expand tech based off of it. One of their goals apparently includes standing up of an independent relay. If that happens, then that would move atproto/Bluesky from "federated in theory" to "federated in practice." That's a big "if" because of the relatively high expense to stand up and maintain a relay, but there are some fairly prominent folks backing it. There's also some discussion of investments into integration work between atproto and ActivityPub like bridges. I remain cautiously optimistic.https://freeourfeeds.com/
(DIR) Post #Aq3IbsaE006uhE9N5s by futurebird@sauropods.win
2025-01-13T21:44:36Z
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@DaveMWilburn I'm very happy for them but still confused why they need 4m dollars?
(DIR) Post #Aq3PtvYsMdBUpC4Xc8 by DaveMWilburn@infosec.exchange
2025-01-13T23:06:17Z
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@futurebird I dunno, but it depends on their ambitions. You could easily burn through that with a moderately-sized team of devs. Or by standing up and running infrastructure for a fully independent atproto relay. It's not like the Fediverse where the cost is kind of distributed across a bunch of individual instance owners. Running an atproto relay is essentially an all-or-nothing affair. So the question isn't so much "what would it cost to run a Mastodon instance?" but instead more like "what would it cost to run ALL of the Mastodon instances?" At least that's my limited understanding of it.
(DIR) Post #Aq3Q1l4XFNggbpcAnQ by futurebird@sauropods.win
2025-01-13T23:07:44Z
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@DaveMWilburn OK but now they want 30M?
(DIR) Post #Aq3R4n76DJTxlNp9Zg by DaveMWilburn@infosec.exchange
2025-01-13T23:19:28Z
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@futurebird Yeah, I think it depends on what they're doing, but it still seems plausible to me.Are they essentially replicating the entire Bluesky enterprise, including infrastructure costs for relays and app view, labor costs to run the IT, labor costs for bare minimum trust and safety (e.g., DMCA, CSAM, spam, dealing with legal process, etc.)?Are they funding R&D for new atproto-based apps beyond Bluesky's current microblogging?What are their labor costs? Surely it can't all be volunteer-based. Are they paying San Fran / NYC labor rates, or going for cheaper salaries from lower cost of living areas? Even with lower cost of living, you could go through that pretty quickly.I don't think Bluesky has posted their financials for comparison. I believe they're privately owned and therefore not yet required to post financials, and currently living exclusively off of investor funding rather than any revenue from monetization. But $30M for standing up and operating a social media service with tens of millions of users strikes me as pretty reasonable, actually.