49 points

Mastodon

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12 points
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Bsky federates. I follow several people from my Mastodon profile.

Edit: I should add a caveat here. Federation doesn’t work as smoothly as Threads yet. You have to use a bridge service: https://fed.brid.gy/

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3 points

Oh, well that’s good anyway. Is it true that they only have like one major server? Because I’ve heard that, but I haven’t looked much into them, so I’m not sure if it’s still the case or not. To my understanding, they are meant to be a federated network, but really only have the one server.

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-1 points

AFAIK that’s still the case, yes. I don’t have a Bluesky (or Threads) account so I can’t confirm.

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3 points

Yeah this is still true as far as I know. Honestly this is probably what allowed BS to gain a foothold; I like mastodon too but asking new users to pick a server was always going to be a source of adoption friction.

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4 points

Of course it is, why would people throw millions at investing in a product and then decentralize it to the point that there weren’t any bottlenecks to apply pressure and extract a profit back out of it? It makes no sense and would be a ridiculous business strategy.

What is a good business strategy is associating your product with visions of decentralization while never truly intending to get there in practice.

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34 points

For now. They’re still in their growth phase. If they ever become dominant and they need to make money, they’ll turn into a walled garden like every other. Everyone seems to forget that Twitter, Reddit and Facebook were also all about openness at the start

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11 points

Absolutely, I don’t trust them at all. There’s a reason I’m on Mastodon and not either of the corporate platforms. It is nice to at least be able to follow people there though, and interact with them.

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3 points

The key is how healthy atproto is outside of bluesky by then

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1 point
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Not only federates but can also be partially self-hosted and is also open-source - by the way, I don’t mean it’s perfect but a lot better to reach people from there than Twitter, but be wary of this), anyone knowledgeable of US politics will know the names mentioned and how shady it looks. I still think Mastodon isn’t ready for this kins of exodus. People who waited this long to leave either wants convenience or is waiting for some of the people they follow go elsewhere, or both. Mastodon has too many mobile apps options, BlueSky official app is so much closer to how Twitter looks like and people are used to and don’t need to choosee instance as it already comes pre-selected by default (although people can change). Then comes the issue of scability if there was an instance to be the “default” for these people who just want quick and convenient alternative, will it be able to handle this much people at once? I have no idea but I doubt it. Most of us who go find alternative in the Fediverse is aware privacy-focused alternatives usually more than often comes at the price of convenience, not really the mindset those people are in, hopefully some of them get into it by learning what decentralization is from BlueSky?

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1 point

Reddit was the same, you know. It didn’t matter

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1 point
Deleted by creator
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8 points

The bridge is necessary because BlueSky and Mastodon cannot federate, and they never will be able to. ActivityPub and ATProto are different protocols.

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6 points

“Never” is a strong word. API translation is a technical hurdle, but rarely an insurmountable one. If Blue Sky wanted to add an ActivityPub interface to their platform, they probably could.

This issue isn’t technical per se; it’s a matter of priorities. Blue Sky doesn’t want to federate with Mastodon/Threads, because they want users to switch to their platform.

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1 point
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At a fundamental level the intended meaning of “federate” is that disparate communities and softwares can “connect” seamlessly, a bridge by definition is a tool used to connect things that are not connected or seamless.

A federated landscape of interconnected trails is the structural antithesis to a landscape of bridges each laboriously muscled out of the headache inducing process of connecting two disparate systems with a third system specific to that bridge and that bridge only that must be endlessly revised and rebuilt to keep everything from collapsing in a heap.

A bridge, by definition, is a composite of parts that are existentially vital to the sucessful conveyance of what passes over them, it only takes one section failing to break the entire bridge and it only takes one troll to block everything. A bridge, again by its very definition, is the most brittle architecture as every bridge is ultimately only a temporarily open door that must be continously be maintained and eventually rebuilt at the expense of great effort.

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27 points
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8 points

Has an aggressively unpleasant user base and nowhere near the blocking functionality that Bluesky has, which is essentially mandatory now for minorities on the internet. Not to mention an onboarding process that can confuse the tech literate, much less the average person.

This comment is not an invitation to talk about how actually it’s very simple and intuitive if you follow a 20 step process that relies on detailed knowledge of how federation works.

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0 points

Those people will either learn one day or they will end up in the same vicious cycle over and over again for the rest of their lives until they do learn the lesson or die. The only reason the blue sky process is better is because, at least currently, they only have the one server. If it ever actually federates, like it’s supposed to, then that point is completely moot. Because then they won’t know how to sign up for blue sky either.

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11 points

Oh no, not the same thing I’ve been doing since the mid 90s! I might die if I migrate sites again! Or something.

Making a social network only usable by around 5% of the population and then complaining when only 5% of the population shows up is a pretty indicative attitude of why so many FOSS projects struggle to get widespread adoption. You don’t get to choose how tech literate the population is. You either make it more useable or you accept a limited audience.

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5 points

Clown take. “People should just get smart!”

95% of all American adults cannot use search functions in email.

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5 points

I think it’s easy to understand Mastodon, or any federated service, using a metaphor for a country or large place, where you can say “I want to move to X country” but then you have to actually pick a place IN that country to live, like a specific city or rural district. Once you decide on your instance, it’s really not that hard

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0 points

As a progressive worldly usa person which instance should I choose?

Can or should it be tied to my lemmy.world instance somehow?

Thx

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2 points

You dont need to explain email so federation does not seem to be the issue here IMO. The problem is money which FLOSS projects usually don’t have. The successful ones have perhaps enough so that the devs can put food on their table, but not much else. Most of the apps are after Dayjob hobby projects. It’s hard to compete with those who have teams of paid staff.

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1 point

Don’t forget the disproportionate control individual mods have over the network due to the shared defederation lists. I was on a general purpose instance which found itself defederated from a large part of the network because a mastodon.art admin had disagreement with a mod on the one I was on.

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3 points

Putting aside control and anecdotes, neither of which would be fair to comment on without more context and a lengthier discussion, this breaks the email metaphor a bit, doesn’t it?

The Fediverse is just like email, where we all talk to each other, except Outlook blocked Gmail because MS and Google had a fight during a meeting so you’re gonna have to migrate to Yahoo or learn to self-host.

That’s not necessarily a criticism, I just find it funny.

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1 point

Twitter disappears when racism ends. Twitter will stay the cesspool it is.

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4 points

Twitter dies when advertisers realize there’s no money in paying to advertise there. The moment it becomes more advantageous to pay for the ads somewhere else, it collapses.

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0 points

Not when Elon can sue companies into continuing to advertise on Twitter.

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7 points

No. I thought so too, but it’s not the case anymore. Elon is so rich now, that he can run Twitter just as his personal propaganda media. same as bezos bought that newspaper.

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12 points
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1 point

What is TPOT

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2 points

The author explains in the thread and has links to further info.

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1 point
5 points

Sigh, that was an eye-opening depresing read… thanks for sharing!

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145 points

I just hope federal services (like applying for a passport) don’t become Twitter-only after Trump appoints Elon as Secretary of Enshittification.

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46 points

Oof. Poor Americans. The 4 year shit show you’re going to have to put up with.

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17 points

Cute that you think it’ll only last for 4 years.

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-35 points

Nah, most people are going to live their lives and see absolutely no effect from anything done. No single administration has the ability to totally fuck up the country in the amount of time they have. That’s why you get the big swings back and forth between the two parties. Also, the news is very good at sensationalizing absolutely everything and making you think that, oh my god, it’s the end of the fucking world. What are we going to do? Run around like chickens screaming with our heads cut off and shit.

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33 points

We know that Ukraine will be betrayed by the Trump government. A Russian victory will embolden Russia to further threaten Europe. This will also embolden China and other authoritarian states.

We also know a Trump government will stop climate action. Unfortunately, this will also signal to many other governments that they can do the same.

We also know that immense cruelties will be perpetrated such as the family separation policy of the 1st Trump presidency

But yes, if you are white, straight and middle class or rich, you’ll be able to think all is OK until such time as the authoritarian ascendancy led by China and Russia affects your own life, which might be a decade or more away.

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-15 points
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[Deleted]

I’ve made a huge mistake breaking my personal rule to avoid all political content and I’ve regretted that immediately

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25 points

No single administration has the ability to totally fuck up the country in the amount of time they have.

Women in need of reproductive health services in red states would like a word.

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14 points

No single administration has the ability to totally fuck up the country in the amount of time they have.

Trump: “Hold my Diet Coke”.

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13 points

Rotflmao, you didn’t read project 2025 🤣

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3 points

Reagan.

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64 points

Thing is, mate…fascists rarely stay inside their boarders. This is going to be the whole world’s problem in about 3 months.

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29 points

Maybe for the rest of our lives, however long that is…

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-4 points
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Trump wants adulation, not conquest. Push come to shove you can get him out of the oval office by making him figurehead Emperor, as long as it comes with immunity he’ll accept.

On a scale of Mussolini to Hitler, he’s like 250% towards Mussolini.

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3 points
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international us policy is very similar between republicans and democrats. you guys are already the whole worlds problem. 🌍🧑‍🚀🔫🧑‍🚀

im sorry but trump will be your problem. until the empire decides to turn up the violence dial again that is, which is something both parties do sometimes.

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30 points

4 years if laws and constitution stay the same and are followed… first term he had people alienated into him who were at least slightly appropriated for their positions, this time people who has nothing to do with their positions are being appointed simply for being loyal to him… Let’s see if any of them won’t let him do anything drastic within 4 YEARS

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7 points
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It’s more than 4 years. We just crawled out of Trump inflation and now are going right back in.

Dismantling and breaking is easy. They can do a lot of that in 4 yrs. Building takes decades.

There’s also a global effect. Would Putin have ever attacked Ukraine without a Trump term? How about Israel’s taking self defense into genocide territory?

America leads by example and the last example was an impulsive 3 yo with a giant military force and a dead diplomacy department in the executive branch. There’s permissiveness in that.

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24 points

You mean head of DOGE? Because we live in the timeline where a terminally online edgelord with the brain of a 14yo and the body of a 54yo makes meme government agencies.

Anyway, get your passport now. They’re good for ten years, enough to last at least through the tentative end of Trump’s circus.

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14 points

The new online passport process is unbelievably good

They better not ruin it

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5 points

oh yah i just renewed using the new process, got my passport back in less than 2 weeks.

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5 points

Narrator: they ruined it

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1 point

Just tell all your friends to do a passport. It will be ready if shit hits the fan and they must leave the country.

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2 points

Ooh, thanks for the reminder! Mine expires next year. Best renew it now before they fuck that up, too.

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3 points

The fact that this is an actual possibility is absolutely hilarious.

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13 points

These kind of articles always remind me whenever a new MMORPG launched, and then people claimed it would be the World of Warcraft killer.

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6 points
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On the other hand, the track record of old social networks is not great.

And it’s reasonable to posit Twitter is deep into the enshitifiication cycle.

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-1 points

Depends what “side” you’re on and what content you choose to engage with I guess.

Because features wise it’s better than ever I’d say, I’m not even sure what stuff they added or removed that would’ve made the platform worse.

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2 points

I’d posit the algorithm has turned it into a monster.

Attention should be dictated more by chronological order and what others retweet, not what some black box thinks will keep you glued to the screen, and it felt like more of the former in the old days. This is a subtle, but also very significant change.

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0 points

I mean, plenty of other games have had way more concurrent players.

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0 points

Maybe, but they’re not MMO games.

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2 points

Is WoW still that popular though?..

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1 point

Most definitely.

It’s seen better days and current expansion is kinda meh, but it’s still leading the amount of active players by a lot over all other MMO games.

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2 points
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It’s really hard to know for sure, because Blizzard don’t release statistics, but according to ActivePlayer.io, Final Fantasy XIV has more active players than World of Warcraft.

But there are other websites which put World of Warcraft in the lead. It’s also worth mentioning that World of Warcraft has much higher twitch statistics than FFXIV.

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2 points

In truth, every subsequent mimic platform is smaller and more diluted.

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