Reading list
Shortform reading
This is an incomplete list of the shortform reading (and listening and watching) I’ve been doing lately.
Bridges & The Last Network Effect
The endgame is not Mastodon, Bluesky, or Threads. The endgame is finding communities on the web and following them all on the best platform for you.
We don't have to enclose ourselves in walls of our own making or force users to understand the nuances of every platform and protocol. It's time to give people tools that empower them to make decisions that fit their needs. That is how we truly make the social web open.
#better-web · #decentralization · #fediverse · #social-media
Decentralized Systems Will Be Necessary To Stop Google From Putting The Web Into Managed Decline
Is Google signaling the end of the open web? That's some of the concern raised by its new embrace of AI. While most of the fears about AI may be overblown, this one could be legit.
#artificial-intelligence · #decentralization · #fediverse · #social-media
Building Bluesky: a Distributed Social Network (Real-World Engineering Challenges)
Bluesky is built by around 10 engineers, and has amassed 5 million users since publicly launching in February this year. A deep dive into novel design decisions, moving off AWS, and more.
#bluesky · #decentralization · #infrastructure · #social-media
As TikTok ban threatens stability in social media ecosystem, some brands settle into the fediverse
As the TikTok ban threatens the social media ecosystem, agency execs debate investing in the fediverse.
A thought experiment! Let's reimagine the web with r-selected thinking.
Consequently, it is not enough to build systems that “can” federate: all four case studies above can federate but de facto stay centralised. Nor is it enough to “save ourselves”, self-hosting our own decentralised digital islands, while ignoring the reality of the masses. We cannot close our eyes and rest, content with freedom in our personal bubble, ignoring the reality of our non-technical friends and family who do not enjoy the same luxuries of privacy and free speech. We cannot ignore their struggles after resolving our own, justifying our behaviour to ourselves given that there is no technical obstacle to their digital freedom “if only” they abandoned their convenience and dedicated themselves to learning system administration and software debugging. With or without decentralised free software, within the technocracy our non-technical loved ones are barred from liberty over their own lives. Decentralisation is certainly better than dependence on centralised corporate conglomerates, but for whom? A society free for the few is a society in chains.
Taking Back the Web with Decentralization: 2023 in Review
When a system becomes too tightly-controlled and centralized, the people being squeezed tend to push back to reclaim their lost autonomy. The internet is no exception.
#decentralization · #social-media · #tech-industry · #technology
364: Thinking About Decentralization (Podcast)
We've got a another cross-post episode for you this week, on a subject near and dear to our hearts: protocols over platforms, and restoring decentralization online.