I have returned, with tea

[cwebber@social.coop]

Let's leave the ocap stuff to the side for now, then. Let's focus on what Bluesky and the fediverse have to learn from each other.

- The fediverse should adopt content-addressed storage and decentralized identity
- Bluesky should adopt real, actual federation and decentralization

[cwebber@social.coop]

For this reason @blaine says of both ActivityPub done right and Bluesky done right, "they're the same picture" (The Office meme goes here, yes)

To a large degree, I think @blaine is right

[cwebber@social.coop]

Of course, adapting an existing system as deployed isn't easy.

I will say though that I think if Bluesky were to become *actually decentralized* it would look a lot like ActivityPub in terms of having directed messaging. This will also introduce similar challenges around eg replies, etc.

[cwebber@social.coop]

To the end of the fediverse, perhaps I sound bitter, "they didn't adopt ActivityPub the way *I* saw it!"

The truth is that Mastodon didn't, but Mastodon also saved ActivityPub. It then painted a vision of the future that wasn't, at least, what Jessica Tallon and I expected of it. But it saved AP.

[cwebber@social.coop]

The fediverse and Bluesky, at great effort, could learn a lot from each other in the immediate term.

In the longer term, neither is implementing the ocap vision I think is critical for the big vision, and in a way, I think maybe neither can be easily rearchitected to achieve it. Well, not yet.

[cwebber@social.coop]

When I laid out the ideas of OCapPub to various fediverse developers, the response was "this sounds cool but I have *no idea* how to retrofit a Rails/Django app for this kind of actor-oriented design".

And they were right.

Remember when I said Conway's Law flows in both directions?

[cwebber@social.coop]

Conway's Law says that a technical architecture reflects the social structure under which it was built. But the reverse is also true. The social structures *we can have* are made possible by the affordances of the tools we have available.

"Tech problems/social problems": false dichotomy.

[cwebber@social.coop]

It's for that reason that @spritely, while aiming for a *socially collaborative* revolution, is first focusing on a *technical* revolution.

It's too hard to build massively, securely collaborative tools right now. With Spritely's tools, p2p ocap secure tech is the *default output*.

[cwebber@social.coop]

Remember when I said that IMO @jay.bsky.team is the right person to lead Bluesky and that I am sympathetic with many design decisions of Bluesky (even if critical of them for being non-decentralized)?

Bluesky is building what they can for a scale big objective. The tech flows from goals.

[cwebber@social.coop]

So too does the social structure flow from the tech. It does on Bluesky, and it does on the fediverse.

I won't elaborate further on this, I actually would like you to pause and think about it. In which ways are tech and social systems bidirectional, here and otherwise? It's important.

[cwebber@social.coop]

The vision laid out for the fediverse, both independently in my writings and even in Jay Graber and I's joint proposal... well, it's a big lift.

@spritely would like to see if we can retrofit our version onto ActivityPub. Time will tell if that's a separate thing.

[cwebber@social.coop]

And perhaps this is all my *massive* Cassandra complex speaking. I won't deny that I have one, for better or worse

Still, despite all I have said about both Bluesky and the fediverse technically, it is because I want a hopeful direction for all of us. Secure collaboration. More important than ever.

[cwebber@social.coop]

Let's take another tea break. (And another bathroom break. This teacup is massive.) We're getting close to done, I promise. Just two sections left, they're both much shorter.

Then I can finally brave reading my notifications.

Maybe.

== TEA BREAK THE THIRD: BEVERAGE TRIFORCE ==

[cwebber@social.coop]

Hello, I am back again. Did you miss me? I still am not reading notifications.

Help I started writing this summary at 11am and it is now 6pm here I have wasted a whole day of work

But I have tea, and I also flossed my teeth, and it is time to resume this thread. If you are here, you know why.

[cwebber@social.coop]

Before we go any further, earlier I mentioned the US House of Representatives, and here I am giving a MASSIVE content warning for transphobia

But @evangreer is the coolest fucking person for standing up to Rep. Mace at the Project Libery summit https://www.fightforthefuture.org/news/2024-11-21-transgender-digital-rights-activist-confronts-hate-monger-rep-nancy-mace-at-internet-summit/

[cwebber@social.coop]

What I am trying to say is I don't have many heroes but @evangreer is absolutely a heroine of mine

You should donate to @fight they are some of the only people doing sensible advocacy against terrible internet laws

Also fuck TERFs

But anyway

[cwebber@social.coop]

Also you have reached it: the third secret egg

You have now collected the egg triforce and can defeat Gender Ganon

If you want to

The power was in you all along

But let's continue.

[cwebber@social.coop]

It's time, we have reached the second to last section: "Preparing for the organization as a future adversary."

I love this one because I love that phrase, and the best part is that the Bluesky team came up with it, "the organization is a future adversary". It's genuinely good and self reflective

[cwebber@social.coop]

Occasionally an org creates a phrase like this, and back in the day Google had "Don't be evil"

And yeah, people criticize Google for never having been sincere but it gave an opportunity for people inside and outside the organization to critique Google on its own stated values. That was good.

[cwebber@social.coop]

It was *at least* good insofar as the moment Google retired the phrase as never really meaning anything anyway, as evil as Google may have been before, Google got *noticably* worse.

To Bluesky people internally: keep that phrase going as long as you can, and use it reflectively.