6 ms·

>If Twitter shuts down, you’ll lose your followers. If Facebook shuts down, you’ll lose your friends. For some platforms, it’s not a question of “if”, but “when

by xez 8y ago

>If Twitter shuts down, you’ll lose your followers. If Facebook shuts down, you’ll lose your friends. For some platforms, it’s not a question of “if”, but “when”. Wouldn't this happen as well if the instance my account was created in shuts down?

jordigh 8y ago
It would and it has. In Mastodon-speak, this is called an "extinction event", and I have seen a few of those. Mastodon, however, has already implemented take-out feature where you can download all of your data at any time, including your friend list. It's not perfect, because although you can keep your followee list, your followers don't have an automatic way of knowing where your new presence may have moved to. Also, the stuff that has already been tooted lives on in the fediverse in other servers, so it's not like the toots also disappear from other servers after an extinction event, just like an email server going down doesn't delete the email from everyone else's inbox.
- xez 8y ago
  right, there's that at least, and that's probably better than the alternatives. It just didn't sound like a good analogy. A bit deceiving even.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- s73v3r_ 8y ago
  Unfortunately, it's out there, but you can't associate those previous messages with your new account.
  - PKop 8y ago
    Keybase.io could be a part of solving this I think: https://keybase.io/docs/sigchain https://keybase.io/docs/sigchain
- PKop 8y ago
  I was thinking that federation still leaves unsolved the issue of knowing the single source of truth for identities, and when instances go down, you can't reference anything to know who/where people are. Couldn't Keybase.io solve this? It could track your identities on these servers, and it would exist outside of any instances or federation, but be the source of identity that would go along with any federated instances you are a part of
  - wmf 8y ago
    Or DNS.
  - skywhopper 8y ago
    What will we do when keybase goes away?
    - archgoon 8y ago
      Isn't keybase.io just a way of storing public keys? If they go down, and you still have the private key, you can just sign a message saying "No, really! It's me!" The issue with distributed systems that rely on public keys is the lack of options to turn to if the keys are lost or compromised. And yes, people will lose keys. Systems that rely on keys for identity need to figure out what options people have at that point to re-establish their identity.
- stcredzero 8y ago
  It would and it has. In Mastodon-speak, this is called an "extinction event", and I have seen a few of those. Mastodon, however, has already implemented take-out feature where you can download all of your data at any time, including your friend list. How about backing up accounts in other servers? These could be encrypted with a key which only the user controls. Or perhaps the backup could be done encrypted in cloud storage like S3 (this would involve a paid account, obviously) so the user's presence could be resurrected in a different server? It might also be dandy to have "failover" agreements, where one server can agree ahead of time to failover users for another server, in case of failure.
- alex_duf 8y ago
  Yes I think the next step to avoid that is to own your own domain name. If you own your domain name you can have a provider die, and you'll still be able to re import your data on a new provider, assuming you're able to set up a DNS And that's where you lose most non technical users I guess?
  - phyzome 8y ago
    Mastodon (and I suppose ActivityPub in general) conflates hosting location with username. If I have a username like @bob@mastodon.social, then my stuff has to be accessible at mastodon.social's IP address (the A record). Compare to email, where the MX record provides a layer of indirection. ActivityPub technically has a feature like this using a .well-known file, but it leaks into the user interface n unpleasant ways.
rainbowmverse 8y ago
It's always a risk. However, I'll take my chances on something that's already paying for itself (the instances I use) over something that's going to collapse the moment easy capital dries up in the next market crash. That said, it's wise to maintain a backup account on a different instance. Right now one of my instances is down for unknown reasons, but almost everyone who follows me there also follows my other account.
dredmorbius 8y ago
Yes, though: 1. You can readily extract your information. 2. And re-import it elsewhere. 3. You can run your own instance. (I've had a couple instances die and / or fade on me, which is why I maintain a few presences.)
daveid 8y ago
Then your account is gone, but your friends on other servers are still where they were. With backup/import tools you can reconnect with them from a new account easily.
- ALittleLight 8y ago
  What if a significant portion of your friends were on the same server? Wouldn't you not have an easy connection to them?
- s73v3r_ 8y ago
  Can you? You have to be able to message them to tell them where your new account is. And they have to actually go and re-follow.
wmf 8y ago
IMO the solution to this is one instance, one domain, and one IP per person with some kind of financial sustainability (i.e. you pay for it) but it's very difficult for people to swallow.
aqsalose 8y ago
>If Twitter shuts down, you’ll lose your followers. Maybe my way of using Twitter is particularly weird, but I'd be more disappointed if I'd lose the thematic lists of interesting Twitter accounts that I have collected over several years at this point than if I'd lose my followers. The above is also the main reason my pasts attempts to switch from Twitter to Mastodon have failed. There's quite much people and content in the Fediverse now, but still not enough that matches my particular combination of interests.
dreen 8y ago
Yes although Account Migration is a very active discussion topic https://github.com/tootsuite/mastodon/issues/177 https://github.com/tootsuite/mastodon/issues/177

by xez 8y ago

jordigh 8y ago

It would and it has. In Mastodon-speak, this is called an "extinction event", and I have seen a few of those. Mastodon, however, has already implemented take-out feature where you can download all of your data at any time, including your friend list. It's not perfect, because although you can keep your followee list, your followers don't have an automatic way of knowing where your new presence may have moved to. Also, the stuff that has already been tooted lives on in the fediverse in other servers, so it's not like the toots also disappear from other servers after an extinction event, just like an email server going down doesn't delete the email from everyone else's inbox.

xez 8y ago
right, there's that at least, and that's probably better than the alternatives. It just didn't sound like a good analogy. A bit deceiving even.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
s73v3r_ 8y ago
Unfortunately, it's out there, but you can't associate those previous messages with your new account.
- PKop 8y ago
  Keybase.io could be a part of solving this I think: https://keybase.io/docs/sigchain https://keybase.io/docs/sigchain
PKop 8y ago
I was thinking that federation still leaves unsolved the issue of knowing the single source of truth for identities, and when instances go down, you can't reference anything to know who/where people are. Couldn't Keybase.io solve this? It could track your identities on these servers, and it would exist outside of any instances or federation, but be the source of identity that would go along with any federated instances you are a part of
- wmf 8y ago
  Or DNS.
- skywhopper 8y ago
  What will we do when keybase goes away?
  - archgoon 8y ago
    Isn't keybase.io just a way of storing public keys? If they go down, and you still have the private key, you can just sign a message saying "No, really! It's me!" The issue with distributed systems that rely on public keys is the lack of options to turn to if the keys are lost or compromised. And yes, people will lose keys. Systems that rely on keys for identity need to figure out what options people have at that point to re-establish their identity.
stcredzero 8y ago
It would and it has. In Mastodon-speak, this is called an "extinction event", and I have seen a few of those. Mastodon, however, has already implemented take-out feature where you can download all of your data at any time, including your friend list. How about backing up accounts in other servers? These could be encrypted with a key which only the user controls. Or perhaps the backup could be done encrypted in cloud storage like S3 (this would involve a paid account, obviously) so the user's presence could be resurrected in a different server? It might also be dandy to have "failover" agreements, where one server can agree ahead of time to failover users for another server, in case of failure.
alex_duf 8y ago
Yes I think the next step to avoid that is to own your own domain name. If you own your domain name you can have a provider die, and you'll still be able to re import your data on a new provider, assuming you're able to set up a DNS And that's where you lose most non technical users I guess?
- phyzome 8y ago
  Mastodon (and I suppose ActivityPub in general) conflates hosting location with username. If I have a username like @bob@mastodon.social, then my stuff has to be accessible at mastodon.social's IP address (the A record). Compare to email, where the MX record provides a layer of indirection. ActivityPub technically has a feature like this using a .well-known file, but it leaks into the user interface n unpleasant ways.

rainbowmverse 8y ago

It's always a risk. However, I'll take my chances on something that's already paying for itself (the instances I use) over something that's going to collapse the moment easy capital dries up in the next market crash. That said, it's wise to maintain a backup account on a different instance. Right now one of my instances is down for unknown reasons, but almost everyone who follows me there also follows my other account.

dredmorbius 8y ago

Yes, though: 1. You can readily extract your information. 2. And re-import it elsewhere. 3. You can run your own instance. (I've had a couple instances die and / or fade on me, which is why I maintain a few presences.)

daveid 8y ago

Then your account is gone, but your friends on other servers are still where they were. With backup/import tools you can reconnect with them from a new account easily.

ALittleLight 8y ago
What if a significant portion of your friends were on the same server? Wouldn't you not have an easy connection to them?
s73v3r_ 8y ago
Can you? You have to be able to message them to tell them where your new account is. And they have to actually go and re-follow.

wmf 8y ago

IMO the solution to this is one instance, one domain, and one IP per person with some kind of financial sustainability (i.e. you pay for it) but it's very difficult for people to swallow.

aqsalose 8y ago

>If Twitter shuts down, you’ll lose your followers. Maybe my way of using Twitter is particularly weird, but I'd be more disappointed if I'd lose the thematic lists of interesting Twitter accounts that I have collected over several years at this point than if I'd lose my followers. The above is also the main reason my pasts attempts to switch from Twitter to Mastodon have failed. There's quite much people and content in the Fediverse now, but still not enough that matches my particular combination of interests.

dreen 8y ago

Yes although Account Migration is a very active discussion topic https://github.com/tootsuite/mastodon/issues/177 https://github.com/tootsuite/mastodon/issues/177