With respect to #ActivityPub

Ben Pate 🤘🏻

@lily @puppygirlhornypost2 @jenniferplusplus @hrefna

I think something like this is the most realistic way to simplify ActivityPub development, so it would be invaluable to understand why LitePub is now a ghost town.

If any of the elders here know the story of what happened there, this'd be a story worth telling.

Call it ActivityPub 2.1. It could start with some simple refactors to make all of our outbound messages rational and self-authenticating.

Ben Pate 🤘🏻

@lily @laurenshof @puppygirlhornypost2 @jenniferplusplus @hrefna

I don’t know if that’s because of the AT protocol or the community/culture of ex-Twitter users.

Same with Nostr (an interesting technical idea) vs. the Nostr community of crypto-bros and “don’t tread on me” / “free speech absolutists”

lily

@benpate @puppygirlhornypost2 @jenniferplusplus @hrefna @laurenshof i think it's both. when you see literally everything that's being talked about, that's so much stuff to be constantly paying attention to, and it gets hard to build meaningful connections

Ben Pate 🤘🏻

@lily @puppygirlhornypost2 @jenniferplusplus @hrefna @laurenshof yeah, I see that too. I also have a lot of trouble with updates on Macedon. For example, even in this thread, it’s hard to always know what’s happening in the conversation.

I blame that on the clients, and lazy UX design, and not ActivityPub itself. But who knows? The protocol could easily be skewing things in One Direction or another.

smallcircles (Humanity Now 🕊)

@benpate @lily @jenniferplusplus @puppygirlhornypost2 @hrefna @helge

Many points have been brought up in the course of the year and discussed in a variety of different contexts. Trouble is that all of that is now fragmented and dispersed.

Ideally we should exchange ideas and insights in a more central location. SocialHub may be too AP-themed for this.

I can offer forum space at https://discuss.coding.social and a dev portal at https://fedi.foundation and also Hedgedoc, Codeberg org, Matrix space.

smallcircles (Humanity Now 🕊)

@benpate @lily @jenniferplusplus @puppygirlhornypost2 @hrefna @helge

Note that I won't be direct member of the initiative but can facilitate it within Social Coding movement, where the initiative itself retains full independence.

smallcircles (Humanity Now 🕊)

@benpate @lily @jenniferplusplus @puppygirlhornypost2 @hrefna @helge

Note that I won't be direct member of the initiative but can facilitate it within Social Coding movement, where the initiative itself retains full independence.

The initiative falls within scope of the movement which is dedicated ultimately to the vision of the Social Web. "Social reimagined".

Seb Potter

@lily @puppygirlhornypost2 @jenniferplusplus @hrefna @benpate One way out of this particular chicken-and-egg conundrum is to provide a reference translation layer or proxying client that will provide compatibility with AP whilst allowing implementers time to migrate. Then you can make decisions about what subset of features to expose without having to burden your protocol with compatibility. Experience with AP suggests to me there's significant value in reference implementations.

Ben Pate 🤘🏻

@sebinthestars @lily @puppygirlhornypost2 @jenniferplusplus @hrefna

Depending on the specific changes/simplifications to AP, this could be an excellent solution... like a single you attach to your USB-A cables so they plug into a USB-C port.

Amber

@[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected] Can we replicate how that breaks power delivery by making it invalidate HTTP Signatu.. oh fuck. yeah im seeing a problem here

Ben Pate 🤘🏻

@puppygirlhornypost2 @sebinthestars @hrefna @jenniferplusplus @lily

*Depending on the specific changes...

Of course HTTP signatures throws a monkey-wrench in any migration plan (not to mention "Authorized Fetch")

But all of this is academic until we have a specific list of changes. I'm pretty certain (depending on the list) that we could chart a smooth-ish migration path forward.

I'm happy to write up my own thoughts for others to pile on to. We have to start somewhere, yeah?

Amber

@[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected] @[email protected] also although it might sound nihilistic to list out every potential problem it is actually worthwhile to come up with a list of "potential issues" to workaround.

Ben Pate 🤘🏻

@puppygirlhornypost2 @sebinthestars @hrefna @jenniferplusplus @lily

So, apparently I'm collecting a list of #ActivityPub pain points, now.

(shit)

What's your top ten list? I'd love to compare, and make sure I collect a complete picture, even if I don't have a good solution to the problem just yet.

Mike Macgirvin 🖥️

Really the biggest issue I've encountered is that the people who have been driving the bus when it comes to specifying the transfer of ActivityStreams between actors can only see the world through Twitter-coloured glasses.

ActivityStreams itself is what it is. Like HTML, it's a mess. Best practices will emerge (this is still happening) and eventually the spec will evolve. FEPs are a good step forward. Not perfect either, but it's a really just collecting the best practices and extension proposals and letting folks pick and choose. Some FEPs will turn out to be 'Recommended' and a few 'Mandatory'. The hardest part will be keeping brands and politics and corporations the hell away from messing with the Mandatory column.

silverpill

@benpate @hrefna

>filled with actual implementers

Oh yes, I would love to see that. Participants should also be required to communicate using the software they are developing.

Johannes Ernst

@benpate @puppygirlhornypost2 @sebinthestars @hrefna @jenniferplusplus @lily

One of my pet peeves: Guarantee that the the "fetch"-based sequence of activities is the same as the "POST"-based sequence. In other words, guarantee that if I missed receiving a POST, I can recover by browsing the outbox.

Tim Chambers

@benpate @puppygirlhornypost2 @sebinthestars @hrefna @jenniferplusplus @lily

1. Remote server interactions need a solution that is invisible to user
2. Account migration to other servers needing to be standardized beyond just Mastodon’s technique
3. Reply moderation needed - including hide reply to all
4. Simple solutions for Auto backfill of missing replies, old follow counts, etc

CassandraVert

@benpate
Here's one
Why can i see that you have two replies but i can't see those replies?

Ben Pate 🤘🏻

@CassandraVert Yep, great example. I think this is called something like "phantom replies" or "dropped replies"

And, I think the "Threaded Discussions Working Group" is working on something for this, but (as always) support may be spotty.

I've read several replies from people saying versions of "this is just because of the nature of 'Federation', so deal with it" but no other self-respecting social network would allow this behavior.

We're building ONE system, not many interconnected systems.

Ben Pate 🤘🏻

@tchambers @puppygirlhornypost2 @sebinthestars @hrefna @jenniferplusplus @lily

Thank you, and yes. Excellent issues to fix.

I'll add these to my list, with some placeholders for "Proposed Solutions"

--
I can't stand when people sit on the sidelines and gripe about my work, but don't propose any way out of the problem, so I'm determined to not do this here.

I have plenty to gripe about, but feel like we should at least say what we'd do about it -- even if nobody else is listening