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From the Wayback Machine: https://web.archive.org/web/20190324154559/http://alwaysownyourplatform.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20190324154559/http://always

by jawns 7y ago

From the Wayback Machine: https://web.archive.org/web/20190324154559/http://alwaysownyourplatform.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20190324154559/http://alwaysowny... > You know, it wasn't that long ago. There was RSS. There were blogs. There were sub-groups and communities. The weirdos found each other. The non-weirdos found each other. It wasn't perfect. But it was distributed. It was ours. > It was yours. > Now? The original dream of the web is dying. Facebook, Google, Twitter, Medium, and YouTube entice us to give them our creative work. They control what gets amplified and what gets monetized. A few conference rooms in Silicon Valley dictate our online culture. > It's time to take it back. Stop giving away your work to people who don't care about it. Host it yourself. Distribute it via methods you control. Build your audience deliberately and on your own terms. Be in charge of the relationship with your audience. Deliver value and then ask for money. Avoid unnecessary middlemen. > Always. Own. Your platform. The pages says it was created by Sean Blanda. On his personal site http://seanblanda.com/ http://seanblanda.com/, it says he's the Director of Editorial for InVision and founder of Pilcrow House. He's got an active Twitter account -- last post was within a day -- so I guess he's comfortable not owning his platform.

BoiledCabbage 7y ago
I don't own HN, should I not post here? Seriously, is the recommendation that everyone who posts content own the platform? That's impossible to have a shared location for content.
- jsgo 7y ago
  Not the author, so no idea, but it seems to be directed more at people who put their content directly on other platforms to be doing wrong. Creating content on yourblog.tld and linking to it from Twitter/Facebook/etc. is fine, but creating content on Twitter/Facebook/etc. prevents you from really owning it. Same audiences, but now you have control over the content (for the most part. People can copy your content or there is caching).
- maehwasu 7y ago
  If you were relying on HN as a place to build your own brand, and maybe a business, in a way that was not robust to the future whims of HN's operators...then no, you should not post here. If you're like me and just want to fuck around during the day and post a few things, then it's totally fine. Searching for trivial proofs by contradiction in fields with lots of fuzzy variables is one of the worst habits of math/CS people.
MickerNews 7y ago
Are you seriously trying to say that he can't make this point unless he builds his own twitter? https://i.imgur.com/iBAIRqF.png https://i.imgur.com/iBAIRqF.png
- jawns 7y ago
  I'm both a programmer and a pedant, so my opinion is that he's allowed to make this point and be an active Twitter user if his domain is OwnYourPlatform.com, but not if his domain is AlwaysOwnYourPlatform.com. :)
  - 3stripe 7y ago
    Or maybe 'AlwaysOwnYourMainPlatform(s).com'?
  - MickerNews 7y ago
    He can always own his own platform and still use others'. Just the keep the pedantry going...
- Grue3 7y ago
  The original comic implies that abstaining from owning an iPhone is equivalent to not participating in society. Basically if your principles are so weak that you can't abstain from owning a luxury phone brand, which should take a literal bare minimum effort, then you don't really have these principles. A Twitter account is not a requirement to participate in society either. You don't even have to build your own Twitter, there are a few open-source clones that can be self-hosted.
  - Silhouette 7y ago
    As a long-time holdout when it came to smartphones, and a big believer in things like personal privacy and having control of your own devices, I can't agree with that argument any more. Smartphones are ubiquitous, to the point where everyday public services do assume that almost everyone has one and there are significant or even prohibitive barriers for those who do not. Sadly, the best you can hope to do now is to turn everything off that you don't want (which will probably mean fighting the defaults for at least an hour when you get a new device and still hoping you didn't miss something important) and stick to the essentials. It shouldn't be this way. We have failed on this one. But you really can't avoid some of these modern technologies entirely now, unless you're willing to become some sort of modern-day hermit and not participate in a lot of normal parts of society.
jdauriemma 7y ago
"Always own your platform" doesn't necessarily mean "never use someone else's platform."

by jawns 7y ago

BoiledCabbage 7y ago

I don't own HN, should I not post here? Seriously, is the recommendation that everyone who posts content own the platform? That's impossible to have a shared location for content.

jsgo 7y ago
Not the author, so no idea, but it seems to be directed more at people who put their content directly on other platforms to be doing wrong. Creating content on yourblog.tld and linking to it from Twitter/Facebook/etc. is fine, but creating content on Twitter/Facebook/etc. prevents you from really owning it. Same audiences, but now you have control over the content (for the most part. People can copy your content or there is caching).
maehwasu 7y ago
If you were relying on HN as a place to build your own brand, and maybe a business, in a way that was not robust to the future whims of HN's operators...then no, you should not post here. If you're like me and just want to fuck around during the day and post a few things, then it's totally fine. Searching for trivial proofs by contradiction in fields with lots of fuzzy variables is one of the worst habits of math/CS people.

MickerNews 7y ago

Are you seriously trying to say that he can't make this point unless he builds his own twitter? https://i.imgur.com/iBAIRqF.png https://i.imgur.com/iBAIRqF.png

jawns 7y ago
I'm both a programmer and a pedant, so my opinion is that he's allowed to make this point and be an active Twitter user if his domain is OwnYourPlatform.com, but not if his domain is AlwaysOwnYourPlatform.com. :)
- 3stripe 7y ago
  Or maybe 'AlwaysOwnYourMainPlatform(s).com'?
- MickerNews 7y ago
  He can always own his own platform and still use others'. Just the keep the pedantry going...
Grue3 7y ago
The original comic implies that abstaining from owning an iPhone is equivalent to not participating in society. Basically if your principles are so weak that you can't abstain from owning a luxury phone brand, which should take a literal bare minimum effort, then you don't really have these principles. A Twitter account is not a requirement to participate in society either. You don't even have to build your own Twitter, there are a few open-source clones that can be self-hosted.
- Silhouette 7y ago
  As a long-time holdout when it came to smartphones, and a big believer in things like personal privacy and having control of your own devices, I can't agree with that argument any more. Smartphones are ubiquitous, to the point where everyday public services do assume that almost everyone has one and there are significant or even prohibitive barriers for those who do not. Sadly, the best you can hope to do now is to turn everything off that you don't want (which will probably mean fighting the defaults for at least an hour when you get a new device and still hoping you didn't miss something important) and stick to the essentials. It shouldn't be this way. We have failed on this one. But you really can't avoid some of these modern technologies entirely now, unless you're willing to become some sort of modern-day hermit and not participate in a lot of normal parts of society.

jdauriemma 7y ago

"Always own your platform" doesn't necessarily mean "never use someone else's platform."