this post was submitted on 17 Jul 2023
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When Meta launched their new Twitter competitor Threads on July 5, they said that it would be compatible with the ActivityPub protocol, Mastodon, and all the other decentralized social networks in the fediverse "soon".

But on July 14, @alexeheath of the Verge reported that Meta's saying ActivityPub integration's "a long way out". Hey wait a second. Make up your mind already!

From the perspective of the "free fediverse" that's not welcoming Meta, the new positioning that ActivityPub integration is "a long way out" is encouraging. OK, it's not as good as "when hell freezes over," but it's a heckuva lot better than "soon." In fact, I'd go so far as to say "a long way out" is a clear victory for the free fediverse's cause.

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[–] loaf@sh.itjust.works 183 points 1 year ago (2 children)

It’s almost as if the entire point of Threads was to use the Twitter hate to harvest more personal data with zero interest in creating an actual longstanding platform. 🤔

[–] rm_dash_r_star@lemm.ee 9 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Threads is pretty blatant about censorship and sharing of user data. They use terms like "a friendly space" and "convenient" to sell it to users. So you're actually losing something by jumping ship from Twitter. The one positive for Musk era Twitter was an attempt to reduce censorship, but the crazy things the company did otherwise far outweigh it.

One of the shitty things profit driven social media sites do is curate content to create a more advertiser friendly space. It even extends to special interests and government interests. I mean what do you call that when public information is curated by the government. I sure as hell don't want my US government telling me what I can and can not discuss in a public venue.

In the USA there's a little thing called the first amendment. Granted these are companies and don't necessarily have to adhere to civil rights in the same way government agencies do, but in effect they're doing the same thing. The US government should absolutely not be coercing these US companies into censoring content, which they are.

[–] SilentStorms@lemmy.fmhy.ml 57 points 1 year ago (8 children)

🙄 "Saying slurs on a private forum is mah god-given right!"

There's plenty to criticize about Twitter and Threads, but the unmoderated parts of the internet are cancer.

Also pretending that Elon doesn't remove things he doesn't like is a joke.

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[–] ren@lemmy.world 94 points 1 year ago (3 children)

I think they were ever only going to do it if Threads failed.

[–] Kichae@kbin.social 43 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I think it makes entry into the EU easier, but they're receiving headwinds on two fronts there. There's no need for them to implement federation if they can't overcome the other regulatory hurdles first.

[–] jdp23@lemmy.blahaj.zone 11 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Yep. Federation could conceivably respond to the EU's requirement for interoperability -- and they could do it in a way that puts a lot of barriers to people actually moving, so works well for them. Of course the EU would say that didn't meet the requirement, which would lead to a multi-year legal battle and eventually Meta would probably pay a billion dollar fine (as they routinely do -- it's just a cost of doing business) and promise to remove the barriers (which they wouldn't, and then there would be another multi-year legal battle).

But none of that works if the EU won't allow Threads for some other reason!

Still, my guess is that they'll figure out a way around the EU's objections to Threads ... we shall see ...

[–] Hexadecimalkink@lemmy.ml 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Imagine of the EU mandated all social networks to be interoperable..

[–] Suoko@feddit.it 9 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Like "standard phone calls have always been interoperable" ?

Like "batteries should be replaceable" ?

Or "documents file formats should be open" ?

ActivityPub should probably become a login standard, somehow as standard as SAML. Any social network should propose to login with AP, just like any social let you use email or phone number to register.

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[–] photonic_sorcerer@lemmy.dbzer0.com 16 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Nah, what would be the point of keeping Threads around then? They'd shut it down as soon as user numbers got too low. Same as what happened with G+

[–] JayPalm@lemmy.world 8 points 1 year ago

Agree, if Threads majorly flops they’d just pull the plug, add they’ve done before.

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[–] jocanib@lemmy.world 13 points 1 year ago

I think they may have realised that federating whilst they're still not allowed to operate in the EU would hand hundreds of millions of EU users to independent instances.

[–] nekat_emanresu@lemmy.ml 62 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I'll stop fighting when Meta no longer exists.

[–] outdated_belated@lemmy.sdf.org 14 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

I’ll stop when capitalism and governments no longer exist.

(By government, I mean the institution of a group of rulers and attendant enforcement, used to compel others to do what they would otherwise not).

[–] WarmSoda@lemm.ee 30 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Governments will always exist. Sorry to burst that bubble. They always have and they always will.

[–] featured@lemmy.ml 13 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (6 children)

Lmao you think there were governments when early humans were wandering around the plains of Africa in tiny little tribes?

E: Downvote all you want but by the definitions being proposed here then all species have governments because they snatch food from one another, which is an immensely asinine description of 'government' since it describes and means effectively NOTHING

[–] Hexadecimalkink@lemmy.ml 20 points 1 year ago

Tribalism is a form of government hate to break it to you...

[–] Kalkaline@lemmy.one 15 points 1 year ago (1 children)

As long as there is a limited supply of resources there will be some form of economic distribution and a government to settle disputes about that distribution.

[–] nekat_emanresu@lemmy.ml 11 points 1 year ago

If you argue that any attempt to resolve an economic dispute(that apple is mine!) is through government, then yes, they will exist as long as we do.

[–] outdated_belated@lemmy.sdf.org 12 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Yeah, the fatalism is sad.

People lack both the knowledge to realize that different forms of society already existed (and do, currently), and imagination to realize that it’s possible to move towards a different and better form.

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[–] inexplicablehaddock@lemmy.loungerat.io 41 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Called it. I'd be prepared to bet that in a few more weeks, Meta's just gonna quietly drop the idea of ActivityPub integration all together. To me at least, it always seemed like the whole "planned Fediverse integration" for Threads was just them trying to jump on what they saw as the latest buzzword bandwagon.

Had Threads been released a few months earlier, you can bet they'd have been talking about "Metaverse integration" instead.

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[–] nave@lemmy.fmhy.ml 36 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Honestly this is why the whole “Meta will kill the fediverse” thing people were saying never really convinced me. They just don’t seem to care, I mean it’s been a month and they still have no real plans to actually federate.

[–] barryamelton@lemmy.ml 26 points 1 year ago (6 children)
[–] reclipse@lemdro.id 13 points 1 year ago (1 children)

This is the 1004th time I am seeing people mentioning this article.

[–] barryamelton@lemmy.ml 14 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I mentioned it 3 times in this last day since I read it! Maybe it is spreading.

I do it because I think it is the most important point on the fediverse. The fediverse is a tool of freedom, morals, ethics, for those that want to be connected, something that no commercial entity will offer. And it's ok for it to not grow at all costs, or be the widespread available platform. It just needs to be present and faithful to itself.

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[–] theneverfox@pawb.social 25 points 1 year ago (1 children)

A month isn't very long, they haven't even figured out their basic features - this was more a "maybe later this year" timeframe. It could be done quickly if they decided to start by reproducing mastodon and going from there, but building something that federates but is highly monetizable takes time - honestly they were probably pleased by the numbers and decided to go for monetization first

Making it clear they are unwelcome was the point though.

It seems they've put the idea on the back burner after we largely made our position clear, but it's not unlikely that they try to quietly federate down the road... Every time they think about it, we have to make them believe this would be more trouble than it's worth

[–] nave@lemmy.fmhy.ml 9 points 1 year ago (3 children)

I personally believe that Meta never intended Threads to be support Activitypub and just chose it so they could do the bare minimum to comply with the EU digital markets act.

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[–] hoodlem@hoodlem.me 33 points 1 year ago

When a company says “a long way out” it often ends up meaning “never”. Fingers crossed.

[–] great_meh@discuss.tchncs.de 32 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I don't trust them. So this means nothing.

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[–] WhoRoger@lemmy.world 29 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It's ironic, considering how much we've been fighting over whether to let Meta in or not.

Fuck me, that's exactly how society works, some bully doing something, the normal people fighting over it, then the bully going "never mind lol".

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[–] BeardedPip@kbin.social 25 points 1 year ago

If I don”t want something to happen, I”d much rather a corporation say “a long way out” than “never going to happen”. Something on the back burner of a corporation is as good as dead. Something an exec said no to just needs a change in leadership to make happen.

[–] MyOpinion@lemm.ee 13 points 1 year ago (3 children)

You mean all of the ridiculous bullshit complaining and bragading that has been going on here for weeks was pointless?

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[–] Feyter@programming.dev 11 points 1 year ago (7 children)

Actually I still think meta doing activity pub would be overall a good thing and a win for all of us. Users should decide what will be the best platform for them to use, free from any content locking reasons.

Meta being able to create completely new social network overnight and still getting more users then entire Fendiverse without the need to open up anything... That feels more like a loose for me.

But this is a very unpopular opinion here.

[–] salarua@sopuli.xyz 28 points 1 year ago (4 children)

hi, anti-Meta person here: it's not about how many users we have. it's about Meta's long track record of insufficient moderation and harvesting of personal data. thanks to their almost nonexistent moderation, they've facilitated genocides, let deadly disinformation spread unchecked, and contributed to the rise of fascism. and they harvest enough data from their platforms to create digital duplicates of us, and if they join the Fediverse, of course they're going to harvest data from anyone federating with them too.

would you trust them to play nice in the Fediverse after all they've done?

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[–] CautiousBrowser@lemmy.world 11 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

Euuuuh... Is it me or is some parts of the article setting up/opposing LGBTQ+ against non-lgbtq?

"One of the interesting dynamics of the discussion so far is so much of the resistance to Meta has come from queer and trans people, and that most of the loudest supporters of Meta in the fediverse are cis guys." This sentence may be technicaly right, but it's ~~sooooo stupid~~ mostly interpretation. Edit: wrong and uncalled for

Starting from there, the article seems to be as much about "us va them" than threads and meta...

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[–] yaniv@lemmy.ml 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)
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[–] iuseit@iusearchlinux.fyi 10 points 1 year ago

Good, fuckem

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