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This is exactly what the internet needs less of. Sad to see the diaspora guys reduced to overlaying unfunny text captions over jpgs.

dmix 14y ago
Indeed, I tend to agree with 4chan (in their tirade against http://9gag.com http://9gag.com) that this type of stuff has become the "cancer" of internet culture. Even though they are responsible for spawning it.
- JamesLeonis 14y ago
  Oddly enough, 4chan's creator moot went on to make Canv.as, which this seemingly rips off.
runn1ng 14y ago
Hm, this is kind of sad. On one hand, I understand that the original concept wasn't as successful as everyone thought, so the best thing to do is try to do something else. On the other hand, "meme creation" is so overdone at this point that I am surprised that this is the "next big thing" that they try to build
- TylerE 14y ago
  Actually, the prevailing attitude when Diaspora was announced was that it had as much chance as a bumblebee's fart in a hurricane.
  - seagreen 14y ago
    But it didn't actually have to take over, right? It just had to build up a decent user base. Then it could be linked with identi.ca, and they would be linked to whatever came along next . . .
- unoti 14y ago
  Meme creation isn't fully overdone until someone creates meta-meme creation: Where you fill in a few blanks, and the meme meta-creator gives you a website where people can create new memes tailored to some specific parameters.
koji 14y ago
I recommend taking the time to use it, especially with friends. When you're not just passively sitting and staring, but contributing to the content, it turns it something else. You become part of a conversation that's surprisingly addictive, and not something you come across in 'post random pictures here' sites.
- kulkarnic 14y ago
  If you're one of the founders, all I can say is stop doing stupid shit. I don't mean to offend-- finding pictures and clever captioning them is surprisingly addictive, but this really is a step away from social-games' Skinnerian conditioning. In short, it's addictive, not fulfilling. Diaspora started out wanting to change the world-- creating something addictive may be profitable, but as other commenters say, underwhelming.
  - ddt 14y ago
    I would argue that it's fundamentally non-Skinnerian. There's no intermittent reward mechanism and it's fundamentally communal. It's fun and it's a little weird, and I don't think there's anything wrong with that.
  - mbs348 14y ago
    koji isn't a founder, but I am. I can understand why you think that way, but to some degree this is about a bigger problem that we lived through, first hand. That is, people don't know what they data is, so why would they use even the most perfect distributed system over something that provided basically the exact same functionality. Owning the bits is an important problem that will get solved with time, but unless people feel like they are actually creating and making something of value on social networks, then it will be hard for any system to pull it off, even if it gets all the tech right. Turns out the 'social' in social networks is actually the hard part. This is our stab at it. Sorry if its not for you :)
    - aangjie 14y ago
      I don't know why there are so many comments along the lines of "come on this is meme creation old and boring". But I do think this has value. What's created out of the whole activity(colloborative editing) may or may not be a big thing, but the participation works well and is missing in social networks. So +1. :-)

dmix 14y ago

Indeed, I tend to agree with 4chan (in their tirade against http://9gag.com http://9gag.com) that this type of stuff has become the "cancer" of internet culture. Even though they are responsible for spawning it.

JamesLeonis 14y ago
Oddly enough, 4chan's creator moot went on to make Canv.as, which this seemingly rips off.

runn1ng 14y ago

Hm, this is kind of sad. On one hand, I understand that the original concept wasn't as successful as everyone thought, so the best thing to do is try to do something else. On the other hand, "meme creation" is so overdone at this point that I am surprised that this is the "next big thing" that they try to build

TylerE 14y ago
Actually, the prevailing attitude when Diaspora was announced was that it had as much chance as a bumblebee's fart in a hurricane.
- seagreen 14y ago
  But it didn't actually have to take over, right? It just had to build up a decent user base. Then it could be linked with identi.ca, and they would be linked to whatever came along next . . .
unoti 14y ago
Meme creation isn't fully overdone until someone creates meta-meme creation: Where you fill in a few blanks, and the meme meta-creator gives you a website where people can create new memes tailored to some specific parameters.

koji 14y ago

I recommend taking the time to use it, especially with friends. When you're not just passively sitting and staring, but contributing to the content, it turns it something else. You become part of a conversation that's surprisingly addictive, and not something you come across in 'post random pictures here' sites.

kulkarnic 14y ago
If you're one of the founders, all I can say is stop doing stupid shit. I don't mean to offend-- finding pictures and clever captioning them is surprisingly addictive, but this really is a step away from social-games' Skinnerian conditioning. In short, it's addictive, not fulfilling. Diaspora started out wanting to change the world-- creating something addictive may be profitable, but as other commenters say, underwhelming.
- ddt 14y ago
  I would argue that it's fundamentally non-Skinnerian. There's no intermittent reward mechanism and it's fundamentally communal. It's fun and it's a little weird, and I don't think there's anything wrong with that.
- mbs348 14y ago
  koji isn't a founder, but I am. I can understand why you think that way, but to some degree this is about a bigger problem that we lived through, first hand. That is, people don't know what they data is, so why would they use even the most perfect distributed system over something that provided basically the exact same functionality. Owning the bits is an important problem that will get solved with time, but unless people feel like they are actually creating and making something of value on social networks, then it will be hard for any system to pull it off, even if it gets all the tech right. Turns out the 'social' in social networks is actually the hard part. This is our stab at it. Sorry if its not for you :)
  - aangjie 14y ago
    I don't know why there are so many comments along the lines of "come on this is meme creation old and boring". But I do think this has value. What's created out of the whole activity(colloborative editing) may or may not be a big thing, but the participation works well and is missing in social networks. So +1. :-)