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So you're saying its impossible to have decentralized software that non-tech-savvy people can use? That seems a little backwards from a cause and effect perspec

• iamcurious 11y ago
  So you're saying its impossible to have decentralized software that non-tech-savvy people can use? Decentralized services aren't somehow fundamentally incompatible with usability—its just a challenge we haven't tackled yet. I don't say it is impossible. Just a lot harder due, for example, to the CAP theorem and friends. But that isn't that important because... Making software centralized makes it easier for non-tech-savvy people to use, as there are incentives to people to make their websites more accessible (larger profits). Yes! It isn't a matter of usability but of incentives. By having more tech savvy people you change the incentives, there is less to win by centralization (because they can do it alone) and more to lose (for instance they can't fiddle with it any longer). Also it is less attractive to make a centralization because a larger percent of the users will work around the attempts to control them.
• derefr 11y ago
  I think it's more like, non-tech-savvy people don't care about centralization. And decentralized things are harder to build. So, the natural tendency is to do the easier thing (build a centralized service) if-and-when the people you want to target will put up with it.