1. Reddit sells its api for high and is about to go for an IPO, its economy bases entirely on the data made by the users/communities. It is the work of the public, get robbed by a small group of individuals. A living example of capitalism.

2. Fediverse isn't enough to secure the publicity and usage of public data. What if the host of Lemmy instance also releases the snapshots of all the posts and modlogs, everyday, in the form of bittorrent? Only by doing so, we are safe from the host erasing public knowledge and data brokers.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/1109122

Today, we are taking the first step in building out an initiative to create opportunities for people to help build the Fediverse and create an organizational structure which can allow developers to coordinate their efforts where most needed.

We call upon anyone with both the skills and motivation to join us and the Guild we are starting, Guild Alpha. Read the announcement linked to learn more and find out how you can participate!

If anything discussed here has your interest or you want to help grow free-software and the Fediverse, fill out this form to let us know!

Copying some of my thoughts from forge federation chatroom:

Hmm, I have bumped into repl.it in the past, marked it as "interesting" for myself, and moved on. Yesterday https://replit.com became the hot thing on HN (though on AI topics). Just again navigating the site now.. and here we see another platform operating on a breadth of services, that may just give Github folks a cold sweat. It is not all smooth.. there are quirks in the site. But they are highly innovative, it shows. And apparently raking in investment money. Here we have another one-stop-shop integrated experience offering "Help with Software Development". I wonder what this disruptive trend will mean for FOSS code forges in the future.

We are moving towards this:

• Most devs: "We develop in Github / Replit / JetBrains / Gitlab.. it great. Highly productive."
• FOSS folks: "Use our tools. We have a huge patchwork of them, and you must configure them all, copy/paste between, have manual processes, and who needs that slick UX, right?"

(Actually this is already the current situation)

The tagline on Replit is interesting (highlight mine): "Build software collaboratively with the power of AI, on any device, without spending a second on setup"

We are so used to the way we develop software now, that we think that setting all the infra, CI, docker/k8s, what-have-you, and then configuring/tweaking, documenting it in README and Docs comes with the job. Well, it does not. It is a huge time-waster and the low-hanging fruit of increasing productivity. Any platform that removes all that from the picture, turned into some point-and-click UI, selecting from a marketplace of dev environments, etc. will give any manager 🤩 eyes.. and competitive advantage. And that's only the start. There's so many other common chores to be taken out of the equation on one-stop-shop automated online platforms.

In this trend I also expect Git to die eventually. It is very powerful tool, and lovely to do common things. But devs hate it when more advanced Git things need to be done. In the one-stop-shop future, git is implementation detail abstracted away deep in the platform. You don't need to be aware of it, even when developing locally offline. Because you will do that based on a full-blown "dev environment" package that you obtain from the platform.

• "I want to develop offline" --> sync local all-in dev package --> start package, code in package's IDE offline --> syncs back automatically when online again.

• "I want to contribute to this other project with other infra/techstack" --> click & code --> done.

I might also highlight the "collaboratively" in the same tagline. Replit already offers collaborative coding where - similar to Google Docs - you see the other people's cursor and activities. But this collaboration will of course be scaled to include the needs of any type of stakeholder involved in the Software Development process. That this will happen is a no-brainer. Most software projects fail because of all the handovers between stakeholders with poor collab and communication barriers. The idea behind Social Coding and the Free Software Development Lifecycle (FSDL), is that we in the Free Software movement should spend time to fill the gaps in this regard, where the FOSS movement is even weaker than corporate IT world with our tech-mostly focus.

With Fediverse going mainstream and corporate interests aplenty, it is very important to promote SocialHub and the FEP process, so that there's higher chance of keeping the fedi open and accessible to anyone. Anyone can help in this regard.

https://codeberg.org/fediverse/fep

https://socialhub.activitypub.rocks

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/364580

The EU via their Horizons Europe program, the Next Generation Internet (where e.g. NLnet are associated) (NGI Initiative) are the biggest funders of the free software projects that comprise the fedi. Without their support fedi wouldn't be what it is now.

The European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) recently launched a pilot to have both a Peertube and Mastodon instance on the Fediverse, hashtagged #EUVideo and #EUVoice respectively. On these servers official European Commission related institutions as well as individuals working at the EC can have their accounts.

This recognition of the Fediverse and the interest that exists in entering our decentralized social networking environment is an important development. With success of the pilot there will undoubtedly be a follow-up and more initiatives to come. First results until now is that the parties that 'test the waters' are very happy on the kinds of interactions and quality of discussions they encounter on the Fediverse.

That is no wonder, of course. Fediverse offers social networking that is more personal and friendly, than corporate social media which is about 'broadcasting' and influencing.

Current pilot can be a ramp up to something much bigger:

Fediverse: United in Diversity

A social networking technology where everyone can find their place and participate, that is not controlled by Big Tech and commercial corporate interests. For the European Commission there is the opportunity to passionately put their support behind fostering "The European Take On Social Networking". Fediverse aligns to the NGI Initiative who envision an Internet for Humans.

How you can help

To progress towards this vision it is important for the EU/EC pilot to be a success. As fedizen you can help with this. Here are a couple of ways to offer your support:

→ Follow, boost, favourite the EUVoice accounts on Mastodon and EUVideo Peertube videos.

• These early adopter accounts are still learning how the Fediverse works, what the culture is and e.g. how we value accessibility and image captions. You can help them discover.
• Many accounts are still Twitter bridges and broadcast only. Some others respond and interact with fedizens, notably @EC_OSPO, @EDPS and @EC_NGI. The operators of the Twitter bridges don't know what the value of Fediverse is to them, and if they should spend time with us. All reactions by us are monitored, so we can help them here.
• There are people giving highly toxic reactions to almost any EC-related toot. There are many things to be critical about. Politics is about the discussion of these issues, and good arguments help more than toxicity. Here we have opportunity to show we are different than the cesspit that Twitter is.
• Do not expect too much, too soon. There is a complex organization structure at the EC, and given the politically sensitive nature all communications are weighed carefully and undergo multiple levels of approval. Plans move slowly, but they are in motion.

→ Let's give the fedi accounts more followers than they have on Twitter, if possible.

• For instance the Director General of Informatics at DG DIGIT, Veronica Gaffey, has 191 fedi followers in short time, while on Twitter she has 279 followers.

→ If you are on Twitter, then help encourage EC institutions to also have an account on EUVoice.

• A notable example is the European Parliament. Respond to their tweets and name-drop the fedi as THE place to be.

→ We are gathering a group of volunteers on SocialHub that can help train EC representatives in how to use the Fediverse effectively and understand its culture.

• The activities we do here, starting later this year, stand to benefit any administration or institution interested to join the Fediverse, not just EU representatives.

This post is also cross-posted to the Social Coding Movement that is dedicated among others to establish a Peopleverse on top of the fedi. Social Coding is not yet officially launched.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/346124

Innovation requires resources

Innovation happens wherever we put our efforts towards. The space race and the technologies it gave us is an example. Finding ways of reducing the cost of production of commodities is another. The green transition is another example.

These are the bounds that determine how innovation happens in federated social networks. They will only innovate when there is enough effort put towards them. Beyond technical innovation (perhaps in a TOR kind-of-network way, or in a Git kind-of-version-control way), a full-fledged piece of software that is effective and attractive enough for people to use, takes resources.

These resources largely refer to labor power. Remember, we're not talking about maintenance costs, but development costs. Programmers require money to survive.

FLOSS is no exception

Yes, FLOSS software can survive with volunteers, but even those volunteers have to pay their bills. Yes, the internet plus (as Bruce Schneier defines it), copyleft licenses, and already-existing technical know-how reduce the cost of production, but the costs are there nonetheless. Someone needs to do the work.

I think about open source projects I admire. Diaspora received exceptional funding, relative to its goals. Signal was heavily funded by donations. Element has a business model that lets them work towards improving Matrix. Linux has many companies that depend on it and are able to finance innovation on it.

This argument, applied to Lemmy, makes me wonder. How do Nutomic and Dessalines handle it? Are they precious exceptions that drive Lemmy forward because of their personal values and their willingness to use their technical know-how for the development of this platform? Will Lemmy thrive without them?

This brings me to another point: FLOSS and federated software has the advantage that many people are willing to spend their time working towards laudable goals. They are not motivated by profit as much as improving humanity.

FLOSS has a problem that others systematically address: making things attractive

The issue with FLOSS projects is that they mainly respond to thought-out worldviews. That is, people are willing to engage with this kind of software because of logical reasons (logos, as Aristotle and those guys would call it). It is rarer to have people engage with FLOSS and federated software because of emotions (pathos).

Unfortunately for humans, we are emotional creatures. I get put off by how unattractive the Free Software Foundation's website is, despite loving the values that the foundation stands for. I get put off by using terminals, despite the fact that plenty of FLOSS software does not have GUIs. I hate Thunderbird's calendar, despite using it daily.

Companies with investors and FLOSS projects with enough funding know this and therefore pay graphical designers, user experience experts, and sometimes market researchers to make products attractive. This takes money.

Conclusion

And that brings us back to my point: for free software to be chosen by most people, it has to have enough labor behind it to make it both effective and attractive. This is the hurdle it needs to be overcome.

Notes on my sources

These are reflections that arose after a series of conversations with a friend who works at an 'innovation office'. His job is explicitly to design an 'innovation ecosystem', which attempts to create innovation with minimal investment. Everyone at that office knows this is bullshit. Innovation rarely comes without money. Therefore, they basically look for investors for projects that don't have enough money. That's it.

This view, that innovation requires investment, is shared by Anwar Shaikh and classical economics.

However, it's more complicated with the research behind innovation.

Let's take 'platforms of innovation'. For example, cosmopolitan cities, the internet, and universities are hubs of innovation. However, it's a mistake to think that these are 'neutral' in terms of costs. All of them require operational costs. All of them imply costs of technical training. Even here, there are costs that cannot be ignored.

If we look at mission-oriented innovation, the situation becomes clearer. Universities doing cancer-related research, States doing green energy-related research, or companies doing market-related research all clearly align with the argument I made above.

Finally, it's perfectly possible that the argument I made above is not at all original. In fact, I doubt it is. If anything, it could be similar to a high-school student discovering their own proof of the pythagorean theorem: it's not new for the community of knowers who already know it, but it's new from the point of view of the student. At least I get to share this with you and hear your thoughts about it.

Oh, and given that Lemmy doesn't have terms of service yet, I wanted to make sure I could share this in the future. I licensed it under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Weird. I know. Oh well. At least you get to share it without fear!

@Houkime on itch.io has recently started organizing Gamejams on the Fediverse. This is a great idea to get some real creative hackathons going that drive fedi forwards at the same time.

This brainstorming thread is for posting game ideas that might be picked up in these sessions.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/71123

Alovoa looking for contributors! Can you help us implement decentralization for open source dating app?

ActivityPub?

Help us, join the project: https://github.com/Alovoa/alovoa

I've been thinking lately about what federation might look like in academic publishing. Publishing of academic research is currently a rather archaic system that serves to exploit the labor of researchers and academics, primarily for the financial gain of a few very large publishers. There have been some efforts to retake the publishing infrastructure and create scholar owned systems with varying degrees of success. Would the fediverse enable greater success in such an initiative or would it not make sense in this context?

Moderation on the Fediverse

Right now when people install federated server instances of any kind that are open for others to join, they take on the job to be the instance admin. When membership grows, they attract additional moderators to help with maintenance and assuring a healthy community.

I haven't been admin or mod myself, but AFAIK the moderation work is mostly manual, based on the specific UI administrative features offered by a particular app. Metrics are collected about instance operation, and federated messages come in from members (e.g. Flag and Block). There's a limited set of moderation measures that can be taken (see e.g. Mastodon's Moderation docs). The toughests actions that can be taken are to blocklist an entire domain (here's the list for mastodon.social, the largest fedi instance).

The burden of moderating

I think (but pls correct me) that in general there are two important areas for improvement from moderators perspective:

• Moderation is very time-consuming.
• Moderation is somewhat of an unthankful, underappreciated job.

It is time-consuming to monitor what happens on your server, to act timely on moderation request, answer questions, get informed about other instances that may have to be blocked.

It is unthankful / underappreciated because your instance members take it for granted, and because you are often the bad guy when acting against someone who misbehaved. Moderation is often seen as unfair and your decisions fiercely argued.

Due to these reasons instances are closed down, or are under-moderated and toxic behavior can fester.

(There's much more to this, but I'll leave it here for now)

Federating Moderation

From the Mastodon docs:

Moderation in Mastodon is always applied locally, i.e. as seen from the particular server. An admin or moderator on one server cannot affect a user on another server, they can only affect the local copy on their own server.

This is a good, logical model. After all, you only control your own instance(s). But what if the federation tasks that are bound to the instance got help from ActivityPub federation itself? Copying from this post:

The whole instance discovery / mapping of the Fediverse network can be federated. E.g.:

• A new server is detected
• Instance updates internal server list
• Instance federates (Announce) the new server
• Other instances update their server list
• Domain blocklisting / allowlisting actions are announced (with reason)

Then in addition to that Moderation Incidents can be collected as metrics and federated as soon as they occur:

• User mutes / blocks, instance blocks (without PII, as it is the metric counts that are relevant)
• Flags (federated after they are approved by admins, without PII)
• Incidents may include more details (reason for blocking, topic e.g. 'misinformation')

So a new instance pops up, and all across fedi people start blocking its users. There's probably something wrong with the instance that may warrant blocklisting. Instance admin goes to the server list, sees a large incident count for a particular server, clicks the entry and gets a more detailed report on the nature of said incident. Makes the decision whether to block the domain for their own instance or not.

Delegated moderation

When having Federated Moderation it may also be possible to delegate moderation tasks to admins of other instances who are authorized to do so, or even have 'roaming moderators' that are not affiliated to any one instance.

I have described this idea already, but from the perspective of Discourse forums having native federation capabilities. See Discourse: Delegating Community Management. Why would you want to delegate moderation:

• Temporarily, while looking for new mods and admins.
• When an instance is under attack by trolls and the like, ask extra help
• When there is a large influx of new users

Moderation-as-a-Service

(Copied and extended from this post)

But this extension to the Moderation model goes further.. we can have Moderation-as-a-Service. Experienced moderators and admins gain reputation and trust. They can offer their services, and can be rewarded for the work they do (e.g. via Donations, or otherwise). They may state their available time and timeslots in which they are available, so I could invoke their service and provide 24/7 monitoring of my instance.

The Reputation model of available moderators might even be federated. So I can see history of their work, satisfaction level / review by others, amount of time spent / no. of Incidents handled, etc.

All of this could be intrinsic part of the fabric of the Fediverse, and extend across different application types.

There would be much more visibility to the under-appreciated task of the moderator, and as the model matures more features can be added e.g. in the form of support for Moderation Policies. Like their Code of Conduct different instances would like different governance models (think democratic voting mechanisms, or Sortition. See also What would a fediverse “governance” body look like?).

Note: Highly recommend to also check the toot thread about this post, as many people have great insights there: https://mastodon.social/web/statuses/106059921223198405