If you don’t want to hear criticisms, stop bringing up pseudo-decentralized corpo VC-backed Twitter 2.0 :3
Can we please stop arguing about whether Bluesky is decentralized?
Submitted 3 weeks ago by airportline@lemmy.zip to fediverse@lemmy.world
Comments
alsaaas@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
omniman@anarchist.nexus 3 weeks ago
what about matrix , they also do business
alsaaas@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
There is a difference between providing services to fund development and “We take VC capital now and try to make it profitable later”, which just invites enshittification.
Also Matrix is much better federated than BS + everything is open and was so for a long time
Ulrich@feddit.org 3 weeks ago
Matrix has a profitable business model that doesn’t involve exploiting users. BlueSky doesn’t.
queermunist@lemmy.ml 3 weeks ago
Is anyone arguing at this point?
It’s not decentralized. There’s no argument.
irelephant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
It is decentralised.
Check: blacksky.community, atproto.africa, altq.net, app.wafrn.net and zeppelin.social.
Kirk@startrek.website 2 weeks ago
paraphrand@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I’ve seen people arguing. On Mastodon, weirdly enough.
Flax_vert@feddit.uk 3 weeks ago
There is no argument. It’s centralised.
tidderuuf@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Author: points out how Bluesky is not decentralized.
Also Author: only points out how people are arguing about how Bluesky is decentralized.
Author: Mission Accomplished.
theacharnian@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
Centralization on its own is not a deal breaker. Wikipedia is centralized.
Corporate/business ownership on it’s own is not a deal breaker. There are many business mastodon instances: mastodonservers.net/servers/business
It’s the combination that is a deal breaker. Corporate AND centralized. We’ve seen this movie before. It’s a predictably boring story that ends with enshittification.
wuphysics87@lemmy.ml 3 weeks ago
Agreeish? (M)any one of us can download wikipedia. Does that still make it centralized when it is designed to be distributed that easily? That design choice is baked into the ethos. Centralized vs. Decentralized seems not to be binary.
theacharnian@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
But once you download It, any changes you make are only local. You cannot edit wikipedia using a non-wikipedia account (sure you can edit anonymously but then your IP functions as your account) and the articles are not systematically stored in different wikipedia instances. There is one Wikipedia.
irelephant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
You can download all of bluesky easily through the firehose, and it is federated.
irelephant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
Luckily, there’s non-corporate bluesky servers that I can use instead of the main one.
ozymandias@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 weeks ago
well bluesky is not owned by a normal corporation, but i’d say the problem is it’s supposed to be decentralized, that’s it’s entire point and purpose….
so if it’s not, then that’s problematic….
it’s still fairly new so maybe they want everything perfect before they start federating?
the split between Ruby version 1.8 and 1.9 was huge and seriously hindered it’s growth….
i have hope for Bluesky and the AT protocol… but not a ton of hope.Kirk@startrek.website 3 weeks ago
I agree with your overall point, but Wikipedia has a singular mission. Social settings can have wildy different missions from shitposting, to hobbies, study groups, to support groups, etc. There is no singular moderation ethos that can apply to all of them, that’s why decentralization is important in social media.
We want to algorithms to work for the people, not have people slaving for the algorithms.
theacharnian@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
Of course I agree that decentralization for social media is hugely important. I’m just pointing out that there can exist use cases where centralization makes sense and/or is not a problem.
Corgana@startrek.website 3 weeks ago
I haven’t seen much arguing, it is unquestionably centralized and for profit. There truly is nothing unique about it.
I’m not an expert with the AT protocol but it really seems like what Dorsey and co have made is a super complicated protocol that (under specific conditions that cannot exist in the real world), has the potential to be federated in a meaningful way. That way they can steal all the talking points of the fediverse and muddy the meaning of words.
There are also a lot of people on Fedi who will seek out threads like these to explain how line 2532 of the AT protocol handbook explains how having 100% of users on a single server is actually decentralized but I’m sure they’re all authentic accounts.
irelephant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
Hey, the at protocol is pretty simple really.
Essentially, the network has three main parts:
- PDSes: These are “dumb” data stores. The do not do anything except store data and handle authentication. Your account “lives” on them, but you can migrate between them seamlessly, and keep your data when you migrate.
- Relays: These connect to PDSes over websocket and store all the data from them. They provide a “firehose” of data through websockets. The advantage of relays is that there is far less missing information than on the fediverse.
- AppViews: These connect to relays and take the posts. They sort through the data and only keep what is relevant for them.
For example, bsky.app is an appview. It connects to the bolson.bsky.dev relay, and only takes objects that have anapp.bsky.*nsid/type. frontpage.fyi is another one, it connects to the relay1.us-west.bsky.network relay, it ignores all posts that except for ones withfyi.frontpage.*nsids, and that are too long.
This approach is way better than activitypub.
Relays aren’t necessary, nor expensive to run (anymore). For example, appviewlite can be run easily, and can be configured to crawl PDSes itself, rather than using a relay.
The cost in running relays has also dropped. It’s roughly $34 a month. Read this article by a bluesky dev: whtwnd.com/bnewbold.net/3kwzl7tye6u2y.
It has the potential to be federated in a meaningful way in the real world right now.
I’m not going to deny that most people using bluesky’s servers is a problem, because it is.Jack Dorsey wasn’t very involved in bluesky, and isn’t involved at all anymore. He left the board and deleted his account after they did moderation.
Bluesky, right now, is federated in a meaningful way. Whether or not it’s decentralised only depends on your definition of the word at this point.
Also: the people who work at bluesky, right now, have very good intentions. I don’t really think any are crypto-bros. The main problem is investors trying to claw back some value after they invested in it.
Ulrich@feddit.org 3 weeks ago
Yes, as soon as 99%+ of the users aren’t on the same server. That’s the bottom line. We can argue theory all day but it doesn’t change the implications of centralization.
irelephant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
Alternate ATP servers:
- altq.net: PDS
- app.wafrn.net: pds and appview
- atproto.africa: alt relay
- zeppelin.social: alt appview
- blacksky.app: alternate PDS
- blacksky.community: alternate appview
- witchcraft.systems: alt pds
- sprk.so: alt pds, plans on hosting an appview
- gander.social: canadian PDS, appview in plans
- arankwende.com: open-signup PDS
- atproto.hotwaru.com: open-signup PDS
- bsky.aenead.net: open-signup PDS
- casjay.social: open-signup PDs
- deer.social: alt-client
Honourable mention to AppViewLite which lets you easily and cheaply host an appview yourself. I can run it on my laptop easily. It doesn’t depend on relays, it can crawls PDSes directly.
Plus the many other instances here: github.com/mary-ext/atproto-scraping
Ulrich@feddit.org 3 weeks ago
Thanks!
LodeMike@lemmy.today 3 weeks ago
99% isn’t the threshold. I’d say like 25% or less
Die4Ever@retrolemmy.com 3 weeks ago
Well 25% is very strict, pretty sure mastodon.social is more than that for the Fediverse
But yea anything higher than 75% is kinda missing the point, ideally if anyone hit 50% they would close signups and suggest people signup on alternatives instead lol
join-lemmy.org actually hides any instance of 30% of Lemmy github.com/LemmyNet/…/instances.tsx#L451-L456
irelephant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
Doesn’t LW control ~30% of the lemmyverse?
unknown1234_5@kbin.earth 3 weeks ago
bluesky is technically decentralized, but the way it does it makes self-hosting all but impossible due to storage requirements. because of that, it really isnt. its like how a lot of ai models are 'open-source' even though the training data isnt available and the ai is still effectively a black box. it isnt decentralized unless anyone can make an instance, just like how it isnt open-source unless you have access to everything that makes it work (yes, by this definition chromium and android aren't truly open-source, and I stand by that).
irelephant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
The storage requirements aren’t an issue anymore.
You can self host everything for around ~$34 a month.@gabboman@app.wafrn.net runs an alternate bluesky instance (kinda) and he’s not bankrupt yet. Hell, it was on a free oracle server for a while.
unknown1234_5@kbin.earth 2 weeks ago
but can I use a random old computer I have in my house to run an instance as long as there are a managable number of users? renting a server isnt self hosting. making one yourself is self hosting.
jukmehrk@lemmy.org 3 weeks ago
[deleted]iopq@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
It’s a benefit corporation which means the board has to consider the benefit to society, employees, etc.
Das_Fossil@feddit.org 2 weeks ago
Capitalism is not bad
hendrik@palaver.p3x.de 3 weeks ago
Since we have Mississippi as an example... Why not just look how it turned out for the people there? Do or don't they have a communications platform now that connects them to a network of other people? I feels that's way more helpful than discussing what should be discussed, or talking about theoretical details.
irelephant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
If they use deer.social or zeppelin.social (alternate bluesky instances), they can evade the bans and blocks.
hendrik@palaver.p3x.de 3 weeks ago
Ah, thanks. And are those people then connected to the same network and can follow each other, or are those entirely seperate? Pardon my lack of knowledge aboit Bluesky and ATProto
_NetNomad@fedia.io 3 weeks ago
can anyone recommend a good read into the actual developments happening with ATproto as of late? i've seen a lot of insisting lately that things are changing/have changed but no one's saying what exactly is or has changed
airportline@lemmy.zip 3 weeks ago
Fediverse Reports regularly talks about updates with ATProto, and I found this blog post mentioned in another blog post from WeDistribute.
The most interesting development as of late is the progress of Blacksky. It is the first major attempt at creating an independent “Bluesky Instance”–where in that it’s functionally the same as Bluesky but doesn’t rely on any of Bluesky’s infrastructure.
There is also Wafrn, which is really hard to explain.
skribe@piefed.social 3 weeks ago
Not really that hard to explain, unless I'm missing your point. Wafrn is a federated Tumblr-like platform that allows two-way interaction with Bluesky users (without the need for bridging).
_NetNomad@fedia.io 3 weeks ago
thank you!
littleguy@lemmy.cif.su 3 weeks ago
No.
The distinction is important, and every useful idiot pivoting from one corporate platform to another should be educated on their mistake.
JandroDelSol@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
I didn’t even realize that decentralization was a selling point for Bluesky. I genuinely thought it was just Twitter but not run by Elon Musk
Kirk@startrek.website 2 weeks ago
You are correct. The term is called “openwashing”. Now and then bluesky
employeescultists will come on Lemmy and mastodon and try to LARP that their for-profit company has our best interests in mind.airportline@lemmy.zip 2 weeks ago
That is by design. From a user’s perspective, the only indication that Bluesky is
decentralizedfederated is the option to select a different “hosting provider” when logging in.
Sunshine@piefed.ca 3 weeks ago
I want all my greens on Mastodon instead of Bluesky.
SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
Who cares. It’s inherently a shit platform like Twitter. No one cares about your pithy half sentences.
ekZepp@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Cmo, what so bad with
furrysky… BLUE! I mean Bluesky 😰.Kolanaki@pawb.social 3 weeks ago
I kinda wonder… Is Bluesky’s creator(s) furry? 🤔
The furry community was pushing to switch to it from other platforms almost as soon as the site started up.
lavember@programming.dev 3 weeks ago
Thats the article? What? Its just a big nothing burger
Tracaine@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I have no idea what this means or what Bluesky is, so yes. I’m happy to continue not knowing or talking about it.
omniman@anarchist.nexus 3 weeks ago
there is blacksky and others which are making app for atprotocol soo its decentralized
chicken@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
What does that enable? Could people in states blocked by the main network use it through these?
airportline@lemmy.zip 3 weeks ago
Could people in states blocked by the main network use it through these?
Yes, and they wouldn’t even need to migrate their accounts to do so (although they probably should).
irelephant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
People with bsky.social accounts can evade the bans by using: deer.social, zeppelin.social and blacksky.community, without even having to migrate their accounts.
unexposedhazard@discuss.tchncs.de 3 weeks ago
I will continue to point it out as long as people keep recommending it. Its not a minor complaint of point of discussion, its a complete deal breaker that makes the platform worthless to invest any time in. No matter how much time passes it will always be a shit platform.
airportline@lemmy.zip 3 weeks ago
There are four other posts about Bluesky or ATProto on the front page of !fediverse@lemmy.world (when viewed from lemmy.zip), so I guessed otherwise.
alsaaas@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
I think the sidebar clarifies it pretty well