Erik Uden 🥥🌴🍑

Hello there @taylorlorenz@mastodon.social,
I’m not too familiar with Substack, but a short look at “Substack Notes” makes it seem like it’s a microblogging feature similar to Mastodon. I think that could easily be part of the Fediverse. As a matter of fact, considering that the “default incoming maximum post character limit” for a Mastodon server is ~100,000, even regular Substack Blogs could be federated without any hurdles or display issues.

There is a plug-in for WordPress called “ActivityPub” which turns every WordPress blog into an ActivityPub enabled server. If you wish to compare it, it’s like turning the RSS feed feature on or off.

If your WordPress Blog has comments enabled, ActivityPub replies could be displayed as comments. A Substack Blog could do the same, Substack Notes could basically be a microblogging platform akin to Mastodon.

I believe it could be federated, it just takes more work. Next to the general implementation of ActivityPub, which has its hurdles, now that anyone from across the interweb could write a comment, would you need an additional spam filter? Should federated posts be displayed on their platform too? What advantages does Substack have for opening up their platform (next to being good for their publishers and users)? So maybe just publish Notes and Blogs to the Fediverse but don’t display any interaction? Some of these questions may be what hinders Substack from doing this. Technically, it would be doable, how easy it is I cannot judge as I don’t know Substack’s code. Taking Ghost or the aforementioned ActivityPub plug-in as an example, their implementation of making blog posts federated was quite simple and didn’t take longer than a few months (the ActivityPub plug-in is open source, its code doesn’t seem too complex, especially considering it’s merely a plug-in and nothing that changes WordPress fundamentally)…

TL;DR: Yes, Substack Notes could be federated, same for Substack Blogs.

@taylorlorenz@mastodon.social Yeah, I don’t get the Substack “hate” either beyond the general criticism of being a centralized (which has the benefit of actually paying independent writers, though). The only people I follow on Substack are you, Michael Moore, and a few other I’d call progressives. So, keep using the platform as long as it suits you ^ ^

@MrMakabar @XTL You put something in the words I always struggled to do. Thank you!

@PugJesus @nuke “No communist symbols” I wonder why that is. Like, what did I do? Why don’t you just leave me and my art alone? You complain that there isn’t any of this kind of art but then spend 6 hours dismantling it. Why?

@PugJesus Look, I don’t know how to communicate this, but making ~80 posts in the past 12 hours isn’t healthy. I get you’re roleplaying as some kind of soldier / keyboard warrior, but this isn’t good. You draw a picture of your favorite military alliance on a digital canvas and larp with your friends about it, but why make it such a global and war thing? The saying of “if your only tool is a hammer you start seeing everything as a nail” truly applies here.

You get so worked up and made ~40 comments about pixels being drawn and how that represents fascism and how you’ve defended democracy and NATO by… etc. Please. I don’t get why someone does this, I just think it’s best for your own sake to rethink what you’re doing. Understand that this is a game, not some ‘battlefield’.

I’m sorry I ‘defaced’ your religious flag, it’s completely normal for you to call me a fascist as a response. Get some rest.

@PugJesus this is just revisionist. I painted something, you then began drawing a Ukraine flag next to it. I don’t have anything against Ukraine, but the canvas is barely 50% used! Find some other space.

@PugJesus No more positions needed.

@PugJesus @nuke like what did I do. Why would you tell people to take my art and destroy it when there’s so much empty space

@nuke Brothers Against NATO: Guided by Allah