I just sent the final proofs of the #ActivityPub book to the editors at O'Reilly.
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Evan Prodromoureplied to everton137 on last edited by [email protected]
@everton137 it was created because Jack Dorsey thought Twitter could spin out a business with a protocol as a product. They would connect big social networks, using the Twitter user and content base as an enticement. Those networks would pay BS to develop and maintain the pipes connecting servers.
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Evan Prodromoureplied to Evan Prodromou on last edited by
@everton137 using an existing open standard wouldn't work for this business model, because those big social networks could connect without paying anything to BS. They needed to make a new, incompatible protocol that other businesses had to pay for.
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Evan Prodromoureplied to Evan Prodromou on last edited by [email protected]
@everton137 Twitter gave them $13M, and they raised another $8M. They've spent that money developing their proprietary protocol. I don't think it's a successful strategy. They are shooting the moon; hoping to be successful at all other developers' expense.
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Evan Prodromoureplied to Evan Prodromou on last edited by
@everton137 my knowledge of this is firsthand. I talked with Parag, then CTO of Twitter, about it when BS first started. He laid out the entire business plan for me. I was part of the BS community that discussed different protocols to use.
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Evan Prodromoureplied to Evan Prodromou on last edited by [email protected]
@everton137 I don't agree that the primary motivations for starting BS were technical, in response to AP's failings. I don't think it's fair for BS people to position it that way.
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everton137replied to Evan Prodromou on last edited by
@evan got it. Thank you for sharing!
Just one point, isn't AT Protocol open source?
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everton137replied to Evan Prodromou on last edited by
@evan your points shared here deserve an article. :mastogrin:
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Evan Prodromoureplied to everton137 on last edited by [email protected]
Parts of the BS stack are Open Source. The protocol is not an open standard. There is no guarantee that if you make your own implementation with different source code, you will not be subject to patent or other IP liability.
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Evan Prodromoureplied to Evan Prodromou on last edited by
@everton137 you asked why the BS protocol exists. I just explained the why.
Once Elon Musk bought Twitter, the BS company's deal to federate Twitter first fell through. So they've been in zombie mode for the last couple of years; their original reason for existing is gone, but they had a big pile of money, and they didn't want to give it back to Twitter. So they kept it and kept going.
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Evan Prodromoureplied to Evan Prodromou on last edited by
@everton137 their big advantage over ActivityPub is a unified stack. There's one client, one server, and one user experience. Signing up for BS is just like signing up for a really faithful Twitter clone.
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Evan Prodromoureplied to Evan Prodromou on last edited by [email protected]
@everton137 I don't think the AT protocol will outlast BlueSky, the company.
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Evan Prodromoureplied to Evan Prodromou on last edited by
@everton137 if you really want to reach the BlueSky community, do it through the safety of the BridgyFed bridge. Develop for ActivityPub, and let BlueSky users reach your product through the bridge.
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Evan Prodromoureplied to everton137 on last edited by
@everton137 I've already written about BlueSky and what a dangerous distraction it is.
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everton137replied to Evan Prodromou on last edited by
@evan yes, that was my question. Your explanation is clear. And you raised important points the general public doesn't know. Again, thanks for sharing.
If I'm reading arguments from developers comparing both protocols, I think it's fair enough to ask. I hope more people can be aware of it. It's easy to follow the trend established by those with money.
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everton137replied to Evan Prodromou on last edited by
@evan is it somewhere I could read and share?
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Evan Prodromoureplied to everton137 on last edited by
@everton137 the one good part about BlueSky is that it's challenged us to do better with ActivityPub. They pointed out that AP's data portability isn't great; we're making a new extension, LOLA, that makes moving between servers a breeze.
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Evan Prodromoureplied to Evan Prodromou on last edited by
@everton137 the reason we are moving faster and doing better work on ActivityPub is variety. There are 100+ implementations of ActivityPub on the fediverse right now. Hundreds of developers making cool new clients and servers. Dozens who are defining extensions and building specs. It's a really lively period.
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John Francisreplied to Evan Prodromou on last edited by
@evan how about something that facilitates customer-side cooperative association to counter enshittification and monopoly? Generalized and dynamic global disintermedition between producers and consumers.
Should keep you busy a while.
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Evan Prodromoureplied to everton137 on last edited by
Evan Prodromou (@[email protected])
'Prodromou, however, has strong words for any organization looking to enter social media with a new decentralized social media protocol. “I’m not interested in any protocol besides ActivityPub,” he says. “Anyone working on brand new protocols in 2023 should stop immediately. They are going to do more harm than good."' This may be surprising for people who have known me for a long time. I've generally been supportive of trying new protocols and tools.
Prodromou.pub (prodromou.pub)
http://evanp.me/2023/10/06/activitypub-the-socialcg-and-the-social-web/
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Evan Prodromoureplied to John Francis on last edited by
@johnefrancis I was joking. I already have too many projects.
