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+1. And you read it because you're visiting hackernews (also central, private, for-profit). It's a systemic problem. That's why we need new tools that let us op

+1. And you read it because you're visiting hackernews (also central, private, for-profit). It's a systemic problem. That's why we need new tools that let us operate outside that system.

striking 10y ago
But how would I discover content if I didn't use HN? Is there a way to aggregate and rank content without an authoritative server? Also, HN isn't for-profit (although YC is). Like, yeah, it's not a non-profit, but it's not designed to make any money either.
- reitanqild 10y ago
  > Is there a way to aggregate and rank content without an authoritative server? Something like RSS: Pick up all posts tagged such and such from these users. I've thought a bit about this and if we really wanted to we could get really far with just a few hundred lines of code as well as some html templates. Problem is, most people like facebook and instagram :-/
  - true_religion 10y ago
    RSS doesn't really have a method for 3rd parties to rank content, does it? The thing about HN is voting and comments, both of which require manual moderation to be effective.
    - quikoa 10y ago
      Couldn't the moderation be distributed as well? Pick the moderators you want and the posts are filtered with their moderation actions.
      - reitanqild 10y ago
        Agree, I could share (a subset of) my sources as could you. We could even automate it so if my post reader notices several of my sources following another source it will ask me if I want to look at or follow that source, etc.
  - eximius 10y ago
    Then 'most people' aren't your target audience. That doesn't mean there isn't a well sized target audience.
- hackuser 10y ago
  Usenet / NNTP
  - striking 10y ago
    That's federated, which is a different kind of decentralized than the one implied in the article. Federated systems are less centralized, but still require regular clients to trust the system they are federated with.
Typhon 10y ago
I'm not sure what kind of new tools we need ? All the tools to create personal websites existed more than 20 years ago. They haven't disappeared. If anything they're probably cheaper, easier to find and to configure now, and also, more diverse, slicker, have more features, etc... And as pointed out by others, distributed social networks have existed for probably about ten years now. And yes, the fact that the author chose to publish this pompous trite on medium is laughable.
- return0 10y ago
  The big shift to mobile, however, means that people can no longer use their computers to host a server. Napster would probably not achieve critical mass nowadays.

+1. And you read it because you're visiting hackernews (also central, private, for-profit). It's a systemic problem. That's why we need new tools that let us operate outside that system.

striking 10y ago

But how would I discover content if I didn't use HN? Is there a way to aggregate and rank content without an authoritative server? Also, HN isn't for-profit (although YC is). Like, yeah, it's not a non-profit, but it's not designed to make any money either.

reitanqild 10y ago
> Is there a way to aggregate and rank content without an authoritative server? Something like RSS: Pick up all posts tagged such and such from these users. I've thought a bit about this and if we really wanted to we could get really far with just a few hundred lines of code as well as some html templates. Problem is, most people like facebook and instagram :-/
- true_religion 10y ago
  RSS doesn't really have a method for 3rd parties to rank content, does it? The thing about HN is voting and comments, both of which require manual moderation to be effective.
  - quikoa 10y ago
    Couldn't the moderation be distributed as well? Pick the moderators you want and the posts are filtered with their moderation actions.
    - reitanqild 10y ago
      Agree, I could share (a subset of) my sources as could you. We could even automate it so if my post reader notices several of my sources following another source it will ask me if I want to look at or follow that source, etc.
- eximius 10y ago
  Then 'most people' aren't your target audience. That doesn't mean there isn't a well sized target audience.
hackuser 10y ago
Usenet / NNTP
- striking 10y ago
  That's federated, which is a different kind of decentralized than the one implied in the article. Federated systems are less centralized, but still require regular clients to trust the system they are federated with.

Typhon 10y ago

I'm not sure what kind of new tools we need ? All the tools to create personal websites existed more than 20 years ago. They haven't disappeared. If anything they're probably cheaper, easier to find and to configure now, and also, more diverse, slicker, have more features, etc... And as pointed out by others, distributed social networks have existed for probably about ten years now. And yes, the fact that the author chose to publish this pompous trite on medium is laughable.

return0 10y ago
The big shift to mobile, however, means that people can no longer use their computers to host a server. Napster would probably not achieve critical mass nowadays.