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ATprotocol seems technically superior, but socially set up for failure. Because there’s no social incentive for anyone to set up and maintain relays and modera

ATprotocol seems technically superior, but socially set up for failure. Because there’s no social incentive for anyone to set up and maintain relays and moderation service when divorced from actual communities, what’s left are purely financial incentives - paid service, advertisement insertion, data mining, information manipulation etc. Also the centralization of data distribution and moderation means they are huge undertaking now, both in terms of hosting cost and human cost, it’s almost forcing these services to be commercialized, or you can say discourage anyone not Bluesky from setting up their own relay or moderation service. For all the faults of ActivityPub, the extremely “gated community” like approach provides the social incentive for users to feel a sense of belonging to a server, and for the server owner and moderator to feel a sense of pride and ownership over providing service to their users. Being within a valued community also incentivizes people to donate to pay for server cost and moderation effort. ATprotocol will technically allow multiple relays and moderation services, but in reality how many will actually materialize? As such I feel judging social networking protocols from a purely technical and adversarial point of view (like ATprotocol does) is a mistake, sure you are now no longer beholden to a server, but at the same time you are divorced from a tight knit community and you no longer have skin in the game. When you have nothing to lose (data, identity and community wise), that’s a double-edged sword.

inhumantsar 3y ago
> For all the faults of ActivityPub, the extremely “gated community” like approach provides the social incentive for users to feel a sense of belonging to a server, and for the server owner and moderator to feel a sense of pride and ownership over providing service to their users. Being within a valued community also incentivizes people to donate to pay for server cost and moderation effort. are social incentives going to be enough long-term though? I keep looking at this and thinking of three things: trust, security, and Reddit. These are actual questions, not arguments, I'm genuinely curious. Can you trust an admin to host and police your social network? Moving servers isn't hugely difficult iirc, but it could be very disruptive and drama-ful. It would have to get pretty bad before people start to overcome the network effect inertia and actually move. What is there to hold hosts accountable for security? The threat of reputational damage doesn't seem like it is going to mean much to pseudonymous volunteers, so what can be done to ensure hosts are properly protecting the system from promise? Reddit moderators are, by and large, reasonable but there's a non-trivial minority who will do things like stage a coup against the other moderators, start arbitrarily banning or harassing people, or just straight up ghost the site and never follow up on the rules. same as above, what mechanisms exist to prevent or reverse or take over the actions of an rogue/absentee mod?
- miragecraft 3y ago
  > are social incentives going to be enough long-term though? I'd say all the long-running forum based communities proves that yes it is. Not counting Usenet, IRC and other "old internet communities" which have withstood the test of time. > Can you trust an admin to host and police your social network? That's where the federated part comes in, you choose a server and admin that you trust. Preventing people from moving server would be holding them hostage, breaking the fundamental trust of the platform and become public enemy numero uno overnight. I really doubt anyone would do it, but yes the chance isn't zero. Plenty of people host servers with their real identity and reputation on the line though. If you are still paranoid you can join a commercial server where by contractual obligation they have to provide service to you and allow you to move away. > What is there to hold hosts accountable for security? The threat of reputational damage doesn't seem like it is going to mean much to pseudonymous volunteers, so what can be done to ensure hosts are properly protecting the system from promise? Again, you choose your server based on your risk tolerance. You can go with the main mastodon.social server, or join a server owned by a real person you feel is reputable/trustworthy, or join a paid server. And I would disagree about pseudonymous volunteers not caring about reputation damage, the vast majority of people would feel a sense of ownership over their online identity, especially if it has a lot of clout. > Reddit moderators are, by and large, reasonable but there's a non-trivial minority who will do things like stage a coup against the other moderators, start arbitrarily banning or harassing people, or just straight up ghost the site and never follow up on the rules. same as above, what mechanisms exist to prevent or reverse or take over the actions of an rogue/absentee mod? Reddit mods are not server owners, at the end of the day they know they're just hosting someone else's party so there isn't a true sense of ownership. But if a moderator decided to go rogue? It's just like a forum isn't it? Either the owner gets rid of them or you're out of luck. You can limit damage by backing up your followers and follows on a regular basis so you can rebuild your network if you are forced to create a new account on a different server. With federated system come the freedom to chose your server and the consequences thereof, you're gonna have to take some personal responsibility by choosing a server that has a healthy community and a responsible moderation team. At the end of the day I don't think a perfect system exists, they are just different sets of compromises.
steveklabnik 3y ago
> For all the faults of ActivityPub, the extremely “gated community” like approach provides the social incentive for users to feel a sense of belonging to a server, and for the server owner and moderator to feel a sense of pride and ownership over providing service to their users. I really misunderstood what you were talking about until you got here. This mindset is extremely alien to me, so that's probably why it's so hard to make sense of this. I am glad that you have a system that works for you, and that I have one that works for me.
- miragecraft 3y ago
  I'm actually a fan of POSSE (https://indieweb.org/POSSE https://indieweb.org/POSSE) where all social networks are auxiliary to my own website/blog. After the Twitter debacle I'm done with the idea of being "married" to any network.
  - ttepasse 3y ago
    Since Bluesky published their protocol, I’m thinking about how one integrate a BS-compatible microblog into one’s own weblog software, e.g. POSSE. With ActivityPub I can see that: a form of headless ActivityPub server which provides an Inbox and Outbox, based on the DB. Such you can publish your own posts both on the web and into an outbox. And even better, you get reactions in your inbox, which you could possibly display on your own web pages with enough determination, similar how the Indieweb people do that with WebMentions. After all every Status in Mastodon/Fediverse has an url property. With AT Protocol I’m a little bit at a loss. You could possibly expose your Backend as a AT-compatible Personal Data Repository, although that would be a lot of work, exposing a Git-like interface. But I’m still wondering how one would aggregate reactions. It seems it would not be enough just to have a PDS, but also to run an Indexer/Relay, which indexes other peoples PDS. And not just the PDSs of the people you are following, but also the rest of the world – after all a Like or such can come from everyone. When running an Indexer you are pretty soon into Firehose territory. Too much for a single person website. It really seems there isn’t a way for reactions to swim upstream – the social graph of Bluesky in a way lives in the Indexer/App View world, not on your PDS. Maybe I’m wrong, but the AT Protocol docs are not very expansive on such points. Neither is Klabnik’s blog. Everyone talking about ATP seems to be excited about the Solid-inspired DIDs and PDS, but never talk about the transmission mechanisms. Whereas I’m sitting here and thinking that an ActivityPub Actor’s Outbox is already a form of PDS – and it has an Inbox. Addressable via the Web and findable via Webfinger.
danabramov 3y ago
I’m still fairly new to the team, and don’t claim to represent their point of view here, but my impression is that services (like moderation services) aren’t intended to be divorced from the communities they’re serving. It’s more that they’re decoupled from the physical data placement. The relationship between users and moderation services would be many-to-many. The incentives to self-organize and to provide a valuable service for your community are still there; it’s just that the notion of belonging to a community is more fluid in itself.
- miragecraft 3y ago
  Fluid community would disincentive tight-knit community wouldn't it? I feel that if you decouple the social reward and the grunt work of moderation and financial burden of hosting the relay, then the incentives just wouldn't be there to do the dirty work unless it becomes paid or monetized in some way.

inhumantsar 3y ago

> For all the faults of ActivityPub, the extremely “gated community” like approach provides the social incentive for users to feel a sense of belonging to a server, and for the server owner and moderator to feel a sense of pride and ownership over providing service to their users. Being within a valued community also incentivizes people to donate to pay for server cost and moderation effort. are social incentives going to be enough long-term though? I keep looking at this and thinking of three things: trust, security, and Reddit. These are actual questions, not arguments, I'm genuinely curious. Can you trust an admin to host and police your social network? Moving servers isn't hugely difficult iirc, but it could be very disruptive and drama-ful. It would have to get pretty bad before people start to overcome the network effect inertia and actually move. What is there to hold hosts accountable for security? The threat of reputational damage doesn't seem like it is going to mean much to pseudonymous volunteers, so what can be done to ensure hosts are properly protecting the system from promise? Reddit moderators are, by and large, reasonable but there's a non-trivial minority who will do things like stage a coup against the other moderators, start arbitrarily banning or harassing people, or just straight up ghost the site and never follow up on the rules. same as above, what mechanisms exist to prevent or reverse or take over the actions of an rogue/absentee mod?

miragecraft 3y ago
> are social incentives going to be enough long-term though? I'd say all the long-running forum based communities proves that yes it is. Not counting Usenet, IRC and other "old internet communities" which have withstood the test of time. > Can you trust an admin to host and police your social network? That's where the federated part comes in, you choose a server and admin that you trust. Preventing people from moving server would be holding them hostage, breaking the fundamental trust of the platform and become public enemy numero uno overnight. I really doubt anyone would do it, but yes the chance isn't zero. Plenty of people host servers with their real identity and reputation on the line though. If you are still paranoid you can join a commercial server where by contractual obligation they have to provide service to you and allow you to move away. > What is there to hold hosts accountable for security? The threat of reputational damage doesn't seem like it is going to mean much to pseudonymous volunteers, so what can be done to ensure hosts are properly protecting the system from promise? Again, you choose your server based on your risk tolerance. You can go with the main mastodon.social server, or join a server owned by a real person you feel is reputable/trustworthy, or join a paid server. And I would disagree about pseudonymous volunteers not caring about reputation damage, the vast majority of people would feel a sense of ownership over their online identity, especially if it has a lot of clout. > Reddit moderators are, by and large, reasonable but there's a non-trivial minority who will do things like stage a coup against the other moderators, start arbitrarily banning or harassing people, or just straight up ghost the site and never follow up on the rules. same as above, what mechanisms exist to prevent or reverse or take over the actions of an rogue/absentee mod? Reddit mods are not server owners, at the end of the day they know they're just hosting someone else's party so there isn't a true sense of ownership. But if a moderator decided to go rogue? It's just like a forum isn't it? Either the owner gets rid of them or you're out of luck. You can limit damage by backing up your followers and follows on a regular basis so you can rebuild your network if you are forced to create a new account on a different server. With federated system come the freedom to chose your server and the consequences thereof, you're gonna have to take some personal responsibility by choosing a server that has a healthy community and a responsible moderation team. At the end of the day I don't think a perfect system exists, they are just different sets of compromises.

steveklabnik 3y ago

miragecraft 3y ago
I'm actually a fan of POSSE (https://indieweb.org/POSSE https://indieweb.org/POSSE) where all social networks are auxiliary to my own website/blog. After the Twitter debacle I'm done with the idea of being "married" to any network.
- ttepasse 3y ago
  Since Bluesky published their protocol, I’m thinking about how one integrate a BS-compatible microblog into one’s own weblog software, e.g. POSSE. With ActivityPub I can see that: a form of headless ActivityPub server which provides an Inbox and Outbox, based on the DB. Such you can publish your own posts both on the web and into an outbox. And even better, you get reactions in your inbox, which you could possibly display on your own web pages with enough determination, similar how the Indieweb people do that with WebMentions. After all every Status in Mastodon/Fediverse has an url property. With AT Protocol I’m a little bit at a loss. You could possibly expose your Backend as a AT-compatible Personal Data Repository, although that would be a lot of work, exposing a Git-like interface. But I’m still wondering how one would aggregate reactions. It seems it would not be enough just to have a PDS, but also to run an Indexer/Relay, which indexes other peoples PDS. And not just the PDSs of the people you are following, but also the rest of the world – after all a Like or such can come from everyone. When running an Indexer you are pretty soon into Firehose territory. Too much for a single person website. It really seems there isn’t a way for reactions to swim upstream – the social graph of Bluesky in a way lives in the Indexer/App View world, not on your PDS. Maybe I’m wrong, but the AT Protocol docs are not very expansive on such points. Neither is Klabnik’s blog. Everyone talking about ATP seems to be excited about the Solid-inspired DIDs and PDS, but never talk about the transmission mechanisms. Whereas I’m sitting here and thinking that an ActivityPub Actor’s Outbox is already a form of PDS – and it has an Inbox. Addressable via the Web and findable via Webfinger.

danabramov 3y ago

I’m still fairly new to the team, and don’t claim to represent their point of view here, but my impression is that services (like moderation services) aren’t intended to be divorced from the communities they’re serving. It’s more that they’re decoupled from the physical data placement. The relationship between users and moderation services would be many-to-many. The incentives to self-organize and to provide a valuable service for your community are still there; it’s just that the notion of belonging to a community is more fluid in itself.

miragecraft 3y ago
Fluid community would disincentive tight-knit community wouldn't it? I feel that if you decouple the social reward and the grunt work of moderation and financial burden of hosting the relay, then the incentives just wouldn't be there to do the dirty work unless it becomes paid or monetized in some way.