I have returned, with tea

[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.

[cwebber@social.coop]

As opposed to Google's "Don't be evil", a commandment for the everpresent, "the organization is a future adversary" acknowledges the realities of the future, that it is uncertain, and in fact, that power-dynamics-wise, there will be pressure to make things worse.

[cwebber@social.coop]

Making design decisions in the present which guard against the future is one of the most important things we can do. It is one of the most important reasons to choose FOSS licenses, for instance, which provide an exit plan and also counterbalance against temptation to enshittify a project.

[cwebber@social.coop]

To this end, Bluesky's goals of "credible exit" are actually very important. It creates a similar pressure for the organization itself to stay true as long as it can, even acknowledging the organization as a future adversary, and actually preparing for it.

I am pro-Bluesky-credible-exit.

[cwebber@social.coop]

And there *will* be a lot of pressure: Bluesky has taken VC money as investments; the pattern of such is that early on, things are very good and flexible, and after some time, the investors start placing pressure to enshittify.

I have seen good peoples' orgs clawed from their hands. It happens.

[cwebber@social.coop]

This happens despite the very best people with the very best intentions. Talk to early Twitter co-founders and they will tell you the org that things became was not the org that they envisioned.

A future adversary indeed. So we should plan for it today.

[cwebber@social.coop]

Before we continue further, I have done about every job imaginable in a FOSS project/organization. Fundraising, by far, is the worst, and the most stressful.

It's incredibly hard to raise anything to do anything. I think that's worth acknowledging.

[cwebber@social.coop]

The structure of an organization does matter. There's a reason that @spritely is a 501(c)(3) in the US. Any money we take in is a donation: we aren't "delivering on an investment" (though we must deliver on *results*)

Bluesky is a Public Benefit Corporation, also interesting

[cwebber@social.coop]

A Public Benefit Corporation has a mission for the public good, but can take investments in the way a nonprofit cannot. This also means it can move much faster. Given the influx of users to Bluesky, taking investments this way may have been the only load handling route available this fast.

[cwebber@social.coop]

Again, this is all tuned to "What is Bluesky trying to build?"

Bluesky might not be a good "decentralized Twitter replacement", but it is a good "Twitter replacement" with the possibility of "credible exit"

[cwebber@social.coop]

That Bluesky is providing needs for many users who are looking for refuge from a white supremacist site *today* is something to pause and acknowledge the difficulty and scope of doing so quickly and in the moment. I'm glad Bluesky is here at this stressful geopolitical moment in history.

[cwebber@social.coop]

There will be a lot of pressure soon from investors: run ads, make premium accounts that do not actually make sense in a decentralized way, so on and so on.

In this way, "credible exit" is the most important thing for Bluesky the organization and its community to push on *today*

[serapath@mastodon.gamedev.place]

@cwebber

Why give them soooooo much space?
Why talk soooo much about bluesky?

Did they pay you for it?
I havent seen you do this for other platforms, especially when mastodon and even nostr exist that are way more decentralized. It seems kinda weird and unexpected

[cwebber@social.coop]

What I will *not* accept is the goalposts being moved on decentralization and federation. Bluesky is neither decentralized nor federated.

If Bluesky wants to become so, it has an enormous amount of work to do, particularly in terms of architectural design.

Blogs are decentralized, Google is not.

[cwebber@social.coop]

Bluesky will face every pressure to be enshittified. Bluesky has even, correctly, acknowledged this. It is up to Bluesky and its community to rise to the challenge of "credible exit" knowing that this is a likely, perhaps inevitable, risk.

The org is indeed a future adversary. So what now?

[cwebber@social.coop]

And here it is. We have reached the final part.

I am not even going to take a tea break. I am not even going to go to the bathroom. I kinda have to, but we are powering through.

We have reached the conclusion of this megathread, and "summary" of an equally long article.

[cwebber@social.coop]

I laid out definitions of "decentralization" and "federation", and Bluesky meets neither, without major rearchitecting or moving the goalposts on those terms, which I cannot accept.

However, "credible exit" is a good goal for Bluesky. Bluesky created that term and it's a good and feasible goal.

[cwebber@social.coop]

I laid out a strong critique, but let me end on a call to empathy.

Bluesky is built by good people, and the fediverse is built by good people. Neither reflect the designs I presently would like to see today, but ultimately these are built by humans trying their absolute hardest.

[cwebber@social.coop]

The infrastructure we build reflects our social dynamics, and our social dynamics are made possible by our infrastructure.

This thread has been long, and I have said everything I have to say. Thanks for listening. I hope we can build a good future for each other.