Sure the town square has had value throughout history. But no one ever lived their entire life in it until now. They spent most of their time outside the town square with their friends and family.
It's a weird accident of information capitalism that we all signed up on platforms to talk with our friends and then those platforms gradually morphed into hyper-engaged outrage factories where you're getting sucked into political arguments with strangers.
What's striking to me about HN discussions of ActivityPub being the future is that the future is already here. The resistance already exists. Do you not know anyone who participates in a semi-private Telegram group or Discord instance?
Especially when you talk to younger folk they're acutely aware of how the behemoth, wide-open networks like Twitter and FB are dangerous places to be yourself. They don't participate heavily in these networks. They are already moving to loosely moderated, semi-closed communities on other platforms. These platforms have millions of users.
Now in light of that fact, Mastodon's role in the discussion seems to me to simply be "here is a similar solution which some techies are really into, it has federation which some of them think could be a killer feature, though it isn't yet."
If an individual is concerned about the effect of Twitter on society the best thing to do is quit using it, move to semi-open, semi-moderated platforms, and encourage everyone else to do the same.
I participate in Discord and Mastodon instances, I've cut back my FB usage and I wouldn't touch Twitter for a million bucks. This digital town square bullshit needs to do a lot better to earn my engagement. I'll just keep going to the local pub for that because at least I get to drink a beer when I'm there and people are usually more civil when they have to say things to my face.
It's a weird accident of information capitalism that we all signed up on platforms to talk with our friends and then those platforms gradually morphed into hyper-engaged outrage factories where you're getting sucked into political arguments with strangers.
What's striking to me about HN discussions of ActivityPub being the future is that the future is already here. The resistance already exists. Do you not know anyone who participates in a semi-private Telegram group or Discord instance?
Especially when you talk to younger folk they're acutely aware of how the behemoth, wide-open networks like Twitter and FB are dangerous places to be yourself. They don't participate heavily in these networks. They are already moving to loosely moderated, semi-closed communities on other platforms. These platforms have millions of users.
Now in light of that fact, Mastodon's role in the discussion seems to me to simply be "here is a similar solution which some techies are really into, it has federation which some of them think could be a killer feature, though it isn't yet."
If an individual is concerned about the effect of Twitter on society the best thing to do is quit using it, move to semi-open, semi-moderated platforms, and encourage everyone else to do the same.
I participate in Discord and Mastodon instances, I've cut back my FB usage and I wouldn't touch Twitter for a million bucks. This digital town square bullshit needs to do a lot better to earn my engagement. I'll just keep going to the local pub for that because at least I get to drink a beer when I'm there and people are usually more civil when they have to say things to my face.