5 ms·

I would like to decentralize, but projects like Masterdon are not the way forward. If you want to decentralize the servers then you MUST also decouple user acc

I would like to decentralize, but projects like Masterdon are not the way forward. If you want to decentralize the servers then you MUST also decouple user accounts from the server they signed up with. Today, if you switch to Masterdon (or perhaps someone you know is running a diaspora node), everything appears to go well until a year from now when the volunteer who was providing the server loses interest or moves on, and your account/photos/journal/social network vanishes. So you start over by creating a new account with another server... tick tick tick, gone. Rinse repeat. Centralized services don't have this problem - even myspace is still up today, meaning this killer problem isn't on our radar when we evaluate things like Masterdon, or promote it. We don't realize this is a temporary arrangement with a clock ticking down to complete account destruction. Hubzilla is the only decentralized social media project I've encountered that tackled this problem and sort of solved it (they call it "nomadic identity"). I hear that needing an architecture able to solve this problem was why when Friendica was gaining popularity, the guy behind it realized the whole concept was a lost cause and subsequently started again with what would later be called Hubzilla. Regardless of whether Hubzilla itself is your cup of tea, separating user accounts from volunteer run servers is necessary before centralized social networks can be challenged, otherwise you just inoculate people against ever leaving the central networks again. (not to suggest this is the only necessary thing, or only hard nut to crack)

black_puppydog 9y ago
Actually, what you're describing is a problem of federated services. True decentralization has no servers, and thus none of those problems. Take twister for example [1]: * Identity management via blockchain (one of the use cases where IMHO this is a good, or at least defensible choice). * Metadata storage in a DHT * Content storage in torrent swarms None of this depends on any single peer/server. [1] http://twister.net.co/ http://twister.net.co/
- CookieMon 9y ago
  > Take twister for example Y'all got any more of them "examples" I'm now aware of two social media alternatives that aren't dead accounts walking. Twister is in beta, but that looks interesting enough to play with and keep an eye on.
  - lifty 9y ago
    Scuttlebutt is a pure p2p social network. Active and lovely https://www.scuttlebutt.nz https://www.scuttlebutt.nz
    - gglitch 9y ago
      I got excited about Scuttlebutt but was troubled by my inability to remove old content. It created a chilling effect. I hope I just misunderstood that.
      - concerned_user 9y ago
        It is just the reality of the situation, when you publish something on the internet and then delete it, even if it is an entry in your private blog that runs on a Raspberry Pi on your desk if you had at least one visitor you can't guarantee they didn't save a copy and that hey won't distribute it again later.
      - black_puppydog 9y ago
        as cornered_user also stated, that's just a reflection of what "publish" means. You could also see it as the other side of "censorship resilience". On twister, you could regularly see people having their "oh shit" moment when they published a post with a typo or such for the first time. You get used to it.
  - black_puppydog 9y ago
    Yeah, I'm the first to acknowledge that most p2p social $things are doomed from the start and of the rest, only very few stand an actual chance. Twister has been in beta since it featured here on HN in december 2015 (?) but it has been usable the entire time, actually. I chose twister as an example because its decentralization contrasts nicely/clearly with the federation being discussed in the parent.
zaarn 9y ago
>If you want to decentralize the servers then you MUST also decouple user accounts from the server they signed up with. Mastodon is working on migrating accounts between servers so that in the exact case you describe people can take their data and move elsewhere.
- Avamander 9y ago
  I think it shouldn't be that only people can take their data, I think the main value in social media is keeping a history about the user's actions, where one has been and so on. I think using decentralized servers like that will cost us a lot of data that later would have become to have historical value. We can see this loss of data well with old image hosts and forums, so much has been lost...
  - zaarn 9y ago
    I see no problem in someone writing an archival activitypub implementation; a crawler that attempts to save and index the fediverse into a permanent record. Of course, you'll need permission (though sometimes asking for forgiveness can be good enough)
    - warkdarrior 9y ago
      > sometimes asking for forgiveness can be good enough You do not want to start there, Facebook's MO is exactly that.
      - zaarn 9y ago
        web.archive.org has been archiving webpages for decades and I don't see anybody making a fuss about it since they are primarly archival. If you are a website owner you can easily opt out or have your data deleted. Facebook's MO is "store all the shit and never delete it", an archival project should have an MO of "archive everything we can get and delete it when somebody complains". Otherwise you'll never be able to archive any significant portion of the internet or fediverse.
Tepix 9y ago
Btw, it's spelled "Mastodon". > If you want to decentralize the servers then you MUST also decouple user accounts from the server they signed up with. I somewhat disagree. Email is a decentralized service that works well and its accounts are coupled to the server you signed up with. It merely requires you to do some research when picking a node² or running your own. Ideally there would be some provision in the protocol that allows you to transfer your content and notify your friends whenever there is an address change. You could do this with a digital signature. You could also bolt on a decentralized identity that's on the blockchain, e.g. register a domain with namecoin (which is completely decentralized) and point it to your current social identity. Problem solved¹. -- ¹ to be fair, registering a domain with namecoin is not trivial at the moment. ² perhaps pick one that requires payment, that creates an obligation to provide the service
- daveFNbuck 9y ago
  I didn't do much research when picking a node and now I'm locked in to Gmail way more than I am to Facebook. If I stop using Facebook, I lose access to a few people I'm not actually talking to anyway. If I stop using Gmail, not only do people lose the ability to contact me, it also breaks my account on most other services I use online.
  - Tepix 9y ago
    Yes. It's convenient but it's bad for privacy and locks you in. I'm not using any SSO for that reason.
- Steltek 9y ago
  There's less friction in moving to a new email provider. You sign up, you blast your contacts "Hey folks, got a new email address", and you're off to the races. Social networks have circles, permissions, and all sorts of other clinginess. Additionally, there are features in email that you won't expect from these nodes like a useful (to muggles) data export. I can pull down my email with IMAP or POP, close that account, and still have access to all of my old email. Hell, I could _reply_ to one of those old conversations using my new account/provider and keep right on trucking.

black_puppydog 9y ago

Actually, what you're describing is a problem of federated services. True decentralization has no servers, and thus none of those problems. Take twister for example [1]: * Identity management via blockchain (one of the use cases where IMHO this is a good, or at least defensible choice). * Metadata storage in a DHT * Content storage in torrent swarms None of this depends on any single peer/server. [1] http://twister.net.co/ http://twister.net.co/

CookieMon 9y ago
> Take twister for example Y'all got any more of them "examples" I'm now aware of two social media alternatives that aren't dead accounts walking. Twister is in beta, but that looks interesting enough to play with and keep an eye on.
- lifty 9y ago
  Scuttlebutt is a pure p2p social network. Active and lovely https://www.scuttlebutt.nz https://www.scuttlebutt.nz
  - gglitch 9y ago
    I got excited about Scuttlebutt but was troubled by my inability to remove old content. It created a chilling effect. I hope I just misunderstood that.
    - concerned_user 9y ago
      It is just the reality of the situation, when you publish something on the internet and then delete it, even if it is an entry in your private blog that runs on a Raspberry Pi on your desk if you had at least one visitor you can't guarantee they didn't save a copy and that hey won't distribute it again later.
    - black_puppydog 9y ago
      as cornered_user also stated, that's just a reflection of what "publish" means. You could also see it as the other side of "censorship resilience". On twister, you could regularly see people having their "oh shit" moment when they published a post with a typo or such for the first time. You get used to it.
- black_puppydog 9y ago
  Yeah, I'm the first to acknowledge that most p2p social $things are doomed from the start and of the rest, only very few stand an actual chance. Twister has been in beta since it featured here on HN in december 2015 (?) but it has been usable the entire time, actually. I chose twister as an example because its decentralization contrasts nicely/clearly with the federation being discussed in the parent.

zaarn 9y ago

>If you want to decentralize the servers then you MUST also decouple user accounts from the server they signed up with. Mastodon is working on migrating accounts between servers so that in the exact case you describe people can take their data and move elsewhere.

Avamander 9y ago
I think it shouldn't be that only people can take their data, I think the main value in social media is keeping a history about the user's actions, where one has been and so on. I think using decentralized servers like that will cost us a lot of data that later would have become to have historical value. We can see this loss of data well with old image hosts and forums, so much has been lost...
- zaarn 9y ago
  I see no problem in someone writing an archival activitypub implementation; a crawler that attempts to save and index the fediverse into a permanent record. Of course, you'll need permission (though sometimes asking for forgiveness can be good enough)
  - warkdarrior 9y ago
    > sometimes asking for forgiveness can be good enough You do not want to start there, Facebook's MO is exactly that.
    - zaarn 9y ago
      web.archive.org has been archiving webpages for decades and I don't see anybody making a fuss about it since they are primarly archival. If you are a website owner you can easily opt out or have your data deleted. Facebook's MO is "store all the shit and never delete it", an archival project should have an MO of "archive everything we can get and delete it when somebody complains". Otherwise you'll never be able to archive any significant portion of the internet or fediverse.

Tepix 9y ago

Btw, it's spelled "Mastodon". > If you want to decentralize the servers then you MUST also decouple user accounts from the server they signed up with. I somewhat disagree. Email is a decentralized service that works well and its accounts are coupled to the server you signed up with. It merely requires you to do some research when picking a node² or running your own. Ideally there would be some provision in the protocol that allows you to transfer your content and notify your friends whenever there is an address change. You could do this with a digital signature. You could also bolt on a decentralized identity that's on the blockchain, e.g. register a domain with namecoin (which is completely decentralized) and point it to your current social identity. Problem solved¹. -- ¹ to be fair, registering a domain with namecoin is not trivial at the moment. ² perhaps pick one that requires payment, that creates an obligation to provide the service

daveFNbuck 9y ago
I didn't do much research when picking a node and now I'm locked in to Gmail way more than I am to Facebook. If I stop using Facebook, I lose access to a few people I'm not actually talking to anyway. If I stop using Gmail, not only do people lose the ability to contact me, it also breaks my account on most other services I use online.
- Tepix 9y ago
  Yes. It's convenient but it's bad for privacy and locks you in. I'm not using any SSO for that reason.
Steltek 9y ago
There's less friction in moving to a new email provider. You sign up, you blast your contacts "Hey folks, got a new email address", and you're off to the races. Social networks have circles, permissions, and all sorts of other clinginess. Additionally, there are features in email that you won't expect from these nodes like a useful (to muggles) data export. I can pull down my email with IMAP or POP, close that account, and still have access to all of my old email. Hell, I could _reply_ to one of those old conversations using my new account/provider and keep right on trucking.