FR#150 – On ICE, Verification, and Presence as Harm

9 pointsposted 12 days ago
by colinprince
(connectedplaces.online)

9 Comments

user

12 days ago

[deleted]

jacquesm

12 days ago

Bluesky is just a twitter reboot, not unlike MariaDB vs MySQL.

You're wasting your time if you truly believe that Bluesky is not going to end up the same way.

Remember: all this shit started with PayPal, they have tons of money and can afford to buy up any place where sanity still prevails and if BlueSky is that place then that's what will happen - again.

SideburnsOfDoom

12 days ago

> You're wasting your time if you truly believe that Bluesky is not going to end up the same way.

Indeed, there are the same incentives and commercial pressures. But you don't have to believe that that it will last for ever, you can dance while the music plays, and be prepared to leave when it stops.

Choosing when to leave as a platform gradually enshitifies is tricky, but making your peace ahead of time with the idea that it is temporary is good preparation.

jacquesm

12 days ago

True but then you'd be giving legitimacy to the entity that you will inevitably abandon at some point.

SideburnsOfDoom

12 days ago

I don't regret being on twitter while it was good, but I would regret being on twitter today.

jacquesm

12 days ago

I regret giving it legitimacy that effectively enabled Elon to gain a bigger mouthpiece.

SideburnsOfDoom

12 days ago

You don't ever know the specifics of the trajectory such as "selling to Elon", but the general arc under commercial pressures is predictable - that's the thesis of "enshitifcation".

I understand that not signing up in the first place is a valid choice.

But I also feel that using these services, on the understanding that they don't guarantee to remain good, and so you don't guarantee to remain there at all when they succumb, is also valid.

You don't owe them that. Another one will be along in a minute. That's why we went from MySpace to LiveJournal.

"legitimacy" is not binary nor eternal, and Elon's mouthpiece is leaking it's remaining legitimacy.

jacquesm

12 days ago

Yes, but it is a massive investment in time to establish a presence and if it is all going to be used by some asshole billionaire in the long term then I'll just opt out.

SideburnsOfDoom

12 days ago

Sure, if you feel that your presence is that valuable and not portable then that's a valid choice.

I follow many people on BlueSky that I followed on twitter, and I don't feel that I have a valuable brand, that's not what I do.