I compared the architectures of AT Protocol (Bluesky) and ActivityPub (Mastodon, etc.)You can see the tradeoffs between complexity and: - The ability to get a global view of the network.
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Armando :rick:replied to ⁂ Justin (StayGrounded.online) last edited by
@JustinH happy to. Moderation is not centrally managed. Each of the boxes on the diagram, including moderation services and feed generators, is a service that can be offered by anyone.
As for the benefits of the design:
- Your data is not tied to your server. You can move your identity, social graph, and posts to a different server even if the server shuts down without notice.
- Your identity is not tied to your App View. It's managed by your personal data server (PDS) and you can even move to a different PDS without the server's involvement because you have a recovery key and (optionally) a local cache of your data.
- Scalability - The event log services and aggregators gather activity from the servers instead of flooding small servers with traffic.
- You can use your domain as your handle.
- You can design your feed by choosing algorithms and moderation services offered by anyone. -
⁂ Justin (StayGrounded.online)replied to Armando :rick: last edited by
@santisbon But are there any servers other than the one?
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Armando :rick:replied to ⁂ Justin (StayGrounded.online) last edited by [email protected]
@JustinH I'm not aware of any other major implementations of the App View or PDS. But you can make your own today by forking Bluesky (github.com/bluesky-social/social-app) and/or deploying your own PDS (github.com/bluesky-social/pds).
Other tools including what looks like an implementation for event management are listed at docs.bsky.app/showcase -
⁂ Justin (StayGrounded.online)replied to Armando :rick: last edited by
@santisbon Thanks, I keep seeing people describe BlueSky as "decentralized" but if I'm understanding you correctly it looks to me like it has the *potential* to be decentralized, but nobody other than BlueSky (the company) has set it up yet, so for now it is centralized.
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Kuba Suder • @mackuba.eu on 🦋replied to ⁂ Justin (StayGrounded.online) last edited by
@JustinH @santisbon The architecture is decoupled into many different pieces, and a lot of them are currently offered by third parties, while two important ones could be but aren't at the moment. Whether this counts as decentralized, centralized or partially (de)centralized probably depends on your definition
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Armando :rick:replied to Armando :rick: last edited by [email protected]
And it now looks like Mastodon wants to build something similar to the atproto crawlers. This is good news.
www.fediscovery.org
We might also eventually get some form of account portability on AP
swicg.github.io/activitypub-data-portability/lola.html -
Boris Mannreplied to Kuba Suder • @mackuba.eu on 🦋 last edited by
@mackuba @JustinH @santisbon to reinforce what Kuba is saying, there are several hundred PDS instances that people self host https://blue.mackuba.eu/directory/pdses
Plus independent moderation, feeds, etc etc
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⁂ Justin (StayGrounded.online)replied to Boris Mann last edited by
@boris @mackuba @santisbon This may be a dumb question but what's the point of self hosting if owners aren't able to moderate the content they host?
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Armando :rick:replied to ⁂ Justin (StayGrounded.online) last edited by
@JustinH @boris @mackuba you can moderate the content you host.
github.com/bluesky-social/atproto/blob/main/packages/api/docs/moderation.md -
⁂ Justin (StayGrounded.online)replied to Armando :rick: last edited by
@santisbon @mackuba @boris Ok I see, earlier you made it sound like moderation was not local to a single server. So it's basically the same as Mastodon from a user perspective then correct?
Multiple servers, each with it's own Admin and content policy, and BlueSky (the company) is simply one of many.
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Armando :rick:replied to ⁂ Justin (StayGrounded.online) last edited by
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Kuba Suder • @mackuba.eu on 🦋replied to ⁂ Justin (StayGrounded.online) last edited by
@JustinH @santisbon @boris PDS moderates its own users, but not the content that these users can see - PDSes don't interact directly with other PDSes, so there isn't really such thing as defederation of other PDSes or blocking users PDS-wide. This is mostly the role of labellers (moderation services). Someone running a PDS could also run one, but this is generally a completely separate role. So you could entrust your data hosting to one team, and your safety from trolls and haters to another.
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⁂ Justin (StayGrounded.online)replied to Kuba Suder • @mackuba.eu on 🦋 last edited by
@mackuba @santisbon @boris Ok thanks, another possibly dumb question... what's the incentive of paying for a PDS? If you don't control the content, it's just free hosting for BlieSky inc?
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Armando :rick:replied to ⁂ Justin (StayGrounded.online) last edited by [email protected]
@JustinH @mackuba @boris in the diagram you can find a good summary of what you get out of having your own PDS: All your data (including your private signing key) is there, under your control. No instance can decide to nuke your account by banning you or shutting down unexpectedly. This benefit applies even if you use someone else's PDS, of course. It comes with the fact that it's decoupled from any App View.
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Armando :rick:replied to Armando :rick: last edited by
@JustinH @mackuba @boris something really cool is that if you keep a local copy of your data along with your private recovery key and the PDS you use shuts down or suspends you, you can set up your own PDS and use your recovery key to update the DID registry to point to your new PDS in addition to uploading your data to it. No cooperation from your old PDS needed.
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⁂ Justin (StayGrounded.online)replied to Armando :rick: last edited by
@santisbon @mackuba @boris Mastodon works that way too. Your account can't be deleted if you own the instance. I'm still struggling to understand, if PDS owners aren't responsible for moderate the content they are hosting (although someone else told me they are) what's the appeal of running a PDS vs Mastodon instance?
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Armando :rick:replied to ⁂ Justin (StayGrounded.online) last edited by [email protected]
@JustinH @mackuba @boris no, Mastodon doesn’t work that way. If your instance shuts down or suspends your account then your account is gone. If you use Bluesky with your own PDS and Bluesky shuts down you still have your account and data. Also, you don’t need to host your own App View to host your own PDS.
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⁂ Justin (StayGrounded.online)replied to Armando :rick: last edited by
@santisbon @mackuba @boris If you own your own Mastodon instance it cannot be shut down by anyone but you, same as the PDS right?
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Armando :rick:replied to ⁂ Justin (StayGrounded.online) last edited by
@JustinH @mackuba @boris they're two different things. In AP the instance is both your Appview and your data repo. If you lose one you lose the other e.g. your instance has a catastrophic failure and you can't recover the database (it's happened to many Mastodon admins).
In atproto the Appview and the data repo are two different things, possibly hosted by different parties, including yourself. This decoupling has many advantages, already covered in this thread. For more info please refer to the documentation on each protocol and for a deeper dive feel free to consult the existing literature on Kappa architecture. -
Armando :rick:replied to Armando :rick: last edited by
I’m now convinced that it’s a good thing that we have both #ActivityPub and #ATProto. Competition and cross-pollination will make both better and bridges are essential. Mastodon’s Fediscovery and W3C LOLA portability are clear examples.