#Fediverse, while we shaped a great place to be, we are sitting ducks for disruption by corporates where Metaverses are now the talk of the day.
We need broad vision to move forward, to ensure our relevance into the future, to inspire and become more united in our quest.
We do a lot of talking and we could do with more walking. Coordinated action.
I might be dreamy or crazy, but am afraid we squander the huge potential we have.
Let's build worlds, my fellow fedizens.
https://fediverse.town/t/sci-fi-labs-federated-worldbuilding/275
@humanetech The metaverse is a bad idea invented by companies desperate for a next big thing to sell to investors.
https://www.pcgamer.com/the-metaverse-is-bullshit/
There can be reasons to have an immersive 3d environment but it's unlikely to become the dominant means for computer interaction.
If you're interested there's a project inspired by second life that allows different hosters to interact http://opensimulator.org/wiki/Main_Page
It may be a bad idea but that won't stop it's owners pushing it in an aggressive way.
Ah. that is a more interesting question.
There's a big problem where companies use laws to achieve vendor lock in.
As an example California has higher gas prices partially because California refiners are highly regulated in ways that make it hard for anyone else to enter the market.
Yes, indeed. Here I think there's an under-appreciated strength of fedi, and a weakness in corporate social media. Each corporate platform has to defend their turf like a castle. They must be a full-service provider and lock people in.
On fedi OTOH we collaborate. Everything that happens here strengthens overall experience. It is not fedi apps that compete with social media platforms. It is the fedi itself in its entirety that competes. We create full-fedi network effects.
I just tried selling an advantage of the fediverse is that "One nice thing about the fediverese is people on instances optimized for different things can follow each other so users on text focused mastodon can follow people on image focused pixelfeed"
Instead of needing separate twitter and instagram accounts.
Yes, it is one such example. It is also where in articles, blog posts etc. we can put more focus. Instead of reviewing app by app, review on the amount of integration, and the why and how.
@humanetech @alienghic @zleap So what exactly does that competition look like? Advertising? Discounts? Lawsuits?
"Compete", as in being a viable alternative that appeals to people in general and to an extent that they are more likely to consider a switch.
Here each federated app can try to do it alone, or the fedi in its entirety becomes just a 'very attractive place to be'.
The latter is the way to go, imho, and should be in our vision as it plays to the strength of interoperable open standards-based software development.
By 'app' do you mean instance or software application used to connect to tge fediverse vai a specific instannce?
The latter also allows for different instances to develop their own values or reflect the culture / values they represent.
not everyone likes soccer so a soccer focussed instance will appeal to those who are interested,, they will follow/
Bu the latter will then allow people from other instances to interact.
I meant primarily the software projects. If there are many instances the contribute to attractiveness of 'ecosystem'.
But instances, i.e. server bounderies, are a very poor abstraction to model online community with. Better ways to model the social fabric of the fedi also work best on the level of interoperability betweeen applications.
@humanetech @alienghic @zleap I think it is very difficult indeed to undo the state of lock in that all corporate volunteers find themselves in. Don't get me wrong, I feel sorry for those people and their numbers are staggering. But to expect that the fediverse serves a purpose against that network effect is futile. I know this is sad, but there is no point in wishful thinking, let's just focus on our own creativity as a more healthy perspective..
Yes, I am fully with you on that sentiment. The arguments were more in reaction to those always comparing to FB.
I think fedi growing from their own strength and in its own right, independent of any perceived 'competitor' is the only good approach. Wounldn't even want to see the influx of the big masses, as we can't deal with that.
The top post is about an independent vision. The decentralised interop - a technical aspect - opens up unique non-technical opportunities.
It's hard to tell what's really going on with facebook because they've been caught lying about their activity numbers.
Facebook is certainly worried that they're losing younger people to Tiktok.
For most people Facebook is boring and is documented to be bad for peoples mental health.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/10/facebook-metaverse-mark-zuckerberg/620538/
Given the treatment of teachers in the UK on TikTok it seems social media in general is bad for mental health.
All these platforms are designed to draw you in , keep you fed with content so you stay.
Fedi does not have the AI for that, so we are able to respond to a single comment or have a conversation without some AI deciding we need more of x and less of y.
Losing to TikTok and snapchat.
So question is what can fedi learn from this ?
Well. We're not trying to trick you.
So maybe reminding people we're not trying to hack your attention and you can curate your experience might be appreciated.
But it also means people need ways to find something interesting.
And yeah it's also unclear if social media was really all that great of idea in first place. It's going to be a while longer before we understand it's downsides.
It seems to me that social media behaviour is only as good or bad as the users on there.
If I was the school bully, at osme time I would comment on your appearance to your face.
Social media simply lets that person do the same thing hiding behind a screen and a fake name in some cases.
It makes no difference how those comments are made they are equally as hurtful and long lasting.
I did a course on the effects of this, one suggestion to understand the effects is to take a sheet of paper, screw it up tight in a ball then unfold.
the paper is creased, those creases you can't get rid if, just as you can't undo the damage caused by those nasty comments.
That should say "at one time" in the 2nd paragraph.
A couple of things to add to this discussion. I consciously talk about "social networking" rather than social media. The latter is that limited thing that tries to draw you in. The former is any kind of abstraction of real life activity that plays out online. And we strive for it to support and enrich our lives.
Another *potential* strength of fedi is if we forget about social media altogether and stop copycatting. A social network goes *WAY* beyond microblogging.
I say 'potential strength' because most our thinking and development is not focused on the broader meaning of social networking.
#SocialNetworkingReimagined will bring many different domains and app types closer together online, via its integrations.
Take @forgefriends for instance. This project potentially allows us to shape something new: #SocialCoding. A new paradigm of inclusive software development that revolves around people of all kinds and backgrounds.
@zleap @alienghic @gert @forgefriends
And the beauty is that all these different domains where social fabric is being focused on, will be able to evolve independently with a large movement of people behind.
As long as there's sufficient focus on the open standards that will ensure these different initiatives are able to be integrated over time, that is.
@humanetech
Would you be interested in a chatroom where we discuss getting progressive NGOs presence in the fediverse? Try and convince them that decentralization is the way forward if they want to stay relevant?
We might be able to keep track of who is joining?
@gert yes, I would be interested to explore this further. I saw some other thread on the subject, and will continue there. Thank you!
@zleap Tiktok has elements of liberated culture. I think if we fully embrace creative commons and design our platforms to exploit liberated culture, we can create similarily engaging platforms.
@zleap @alienghic
I want to highlight that the described idea on the forum has nothing to do with metaverses and 3d worlds. It's just that with the metaverse now an accepted concept in the corporate world and governments thinking about regulating and dictating interoperability, that the fediverse will gain more attention from corporates. And we don't have a compelling story and vision for our own future yet. Fedi doesn't stand on its own feet fully. Our strength is simultaneously our weakness.