Absolutely yes, better than the others.
this post was submitted on 09 Jun 2023
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Fediverse
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For most of the users currently online it's extremely difficult to understand the concept of federation and how everything works, so I doubt it'll ever be as prevalent as "the big social media platforms", but for technically-inclined users, it'll definitely have at least moderate success.
Unlikely. When users left Digg for Reddit the internet was smaller and the users more technically minded. And even then it was essentially just creating a new account. You need an one stop solution for users to migrate and federation by definition isn't that. As a result discovery (and growth) is still hard even for Mastodon that's been around for a while and it's a relatively mature platform.
Fediverse will go through what Linux went through. Be seen by businesses as an existential threat. Then face FUD and EEE campaign.
One day, likely earlier than Linux witnessed the rise of RedHat, Google, Facebook as prominent businesses that became poster children for Linux, new or existing businesses could be built around and/or on fediverse. They may as well come together to form an ActivityPub foundation similar to the Linux Foundation for all we know.
Email went through similar trajectory too. SMTP, IMAP, pop are are open protocols. Yet we have a sort of oligopoly on email.
Similar to how Windows did not die away because Linux came along, existing social networks may remain in existence. The availability of fediverse as an alternative would keep them busy
Probably, since it's decentralised people can just move to another instance if the mods on theirs abuse their power.
If you move you lose your history and relationships behind. There is no migration, same as Mastodon. On purpose so as not to disempower instance owners
It works be nice if there was a way to verify that a user is the same one across Lemmy instances.
That is one of the main function of public key cryptography
You can append your digital signature to your messages and it becomes possible to confirm the same person made all the messages
It looks like they're going to merge
https://www.theverge.com/2023/6/8/23754304/instagram-meta-twitter-competitor-threads-activitypub
To me it seems like a power move to funnel and consolidate people who are interested in the "Fediverse" but don't understand how it works, onto Meta's platform. The cycle of enshittification will likely continue as usual over there on Threads/Project 92.
I wouldn't be surprised if they did things like restricting federation of replies made on Threads/P92, so if you're on an alternative like Mastodon you just see a P92 bot posting a "View full thread on P92" link, similar to how most social networks now force you into a sign-up page if you lurk incognito for too long
@itchy_lizard @Bicyclejohn Is #Meta joining the #Fediverse proof that they couldn't beat us?
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The issue is that without marketing or any big scale advertising, the fediverse is never going to take off. Because it is not backed by a big corporation with enough capital like Reddit, it won't ever reach the masses, even with all the advertising the recent Reddit API changes have brought to lemmy and the fediverse, even if Fedi were to be 10x better than anything else.
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Long term, the Fediverse is the way forward, but social media has staying power even if it dimishes from what it was. It will ages before the Fediverse replaces centralized social media, but I think it will slowly happen.
I saw a comparison here between the Fediverse and other federated services like emails and POTS. I think there are a lot of similarities, but if that's true, the Fediverse still has a long way to go before it matures like traditional federated services like email. Things like spamlists and increased interoperability will be needed eventually.
At least in the short-term, I think Lemmy has a good base here to take over from Reddit, and the increased focus will help the Fediverse mature further. Lemmy won't be another Voat.
Oh yeah, definitely not. FOSS combined with federation means that even if the main instance and dev team are toast, someone else could pick up where they left off and run with it. Lemmy doesn't necessarily need Lemmy.ml to function, which you couldn't say about voat (or Reddit, for that matter.)
I think the fediverse should replace popular socmedia, but it will never be able to compete financially.
We've already got Bluesky, which is the same thing but controlled (and sponsored) by the usual suspects, poised to snap up any users that bail from twitter. And popular opinion favours Bluesky thanks to the positive coverage it gets compared to fediverse projects.
The fediverse in the form it's in now will never replace twitter while the free market controls the distribution of users. They'll always go to the places controlled by big money.
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@Bicyclejohn I don’t know about "replace", but popular social media could JOIN the fediverse.
I don’t blame new users to be late on news. But to make a quick recap, the people interested in implementing ActivityPub include:
- Meta (insta/twt replacement)
- Tumblr
- Wordpress.com
- Medium (currently only running mastodon)
- Discourse
- Flarum
Last time I check those were a few popular social media.
Discourse and Flarum in particular are relevant to Lemmy
We are still missing basic tools, like the ability to import full history from one instance to another. To import posts and comments, not just followers and those we follow, or lists (which often isn't functional as on my current instance). Frankly we should be able to import history from non-fediverse social media too, if one has output files from them. Nobody I'm aware of has built a single tool to help them navigate those histories, let alone import them.
This kind of import is something that I would absolutely love to see, but some backend stuff has to be figured out. Unfortunately, importing and creating thousands and thousands of posts can absolutely hammer a server, and it gets amplified if everybody's doing it at the same time.
I had some ideas for a tool a while back that could import your posts first, help you sift through what your "Greatest Hits" were in terms of big life events or lots of conversation, and help you import those into another platform. The downside is, though, that you still wouldn't be able to reconstruct the threads for people who haven't moved over to the fediverse yet.
I think you're on to something. I'm all in on the Fediverse. I still have some legacy stuff on traditional social, but I spend most of my time here. Though I have to admit I love me some LinkedIn.
Wait. What? LinkedIn? What's the draw over there?
As a past follower of r/LinkedInLunatics I'm thinking the same, lol
since there isn't any strong way to collect data or advertise it will always be an underdog compared to big business.
that being said, the fediverse could outlast a few mainstream networks and build lasting strength with that. I'm an ideal setting it could become a defacto network over time.
can we get young people coming here though? that's how we get the tides to turn
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@knighthawk0811
> since there isn't any strong way to collect data or advertise it will always be an underdog compared to big business
... unless and until democratic governments ban corporations from spying on the people using their platforms, as they bloody well ought to, if they have any respect for the human rights of the citizens. Or pass laws that force the Walled Gardens to federate with similar platforms, like the Digital Markets Act.
@knighthawk0811
> can we get young people coming here though
That's a very good question to ask a young person. OTTOMH though...
... anything they have to use at school, they're unlikely to use by choice at home or elsewhere. What would have got me to join the fediverse if it existed when I was a young person? Hearing that someone I respected had joined like Upper Hutt Posse, or Michael Franti, or RATM, or even David Bowie. Pop poets are the vanguard party of the young.
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You have to remember that the vast majority of people are, for lack of a better word, pretty dumb. You say the word “fediverse” and their eyes cross.
that's putting it lightly. But remember Twitter wasn't mainstream for a while. And tbh it still isn't.
I mean, tweets are pretty regularly cited on the news. Not sure how much more mainstream Twitter could become.
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