My main concern is that this is just Facebook Meta utilizing the “Embrace, Extend, Extinguish” strategy that Microsoft used against Netscape in the 90s.
I feel like our small communities here - which are just getting started - are going to be flooded by Threads users who don’t even know what federation is and then all the content, power & control will realistically be in Meta’s hands.
My gut says that is probably Meta’s goal, but what do I know? I’m just some internet person.
Decentralized networks are a threat to Meta’s entire business model which runs on advertisements. That doesn’t work very well when your users can just jump to another instance without ads.
Meta wants to nip the fediverse in the bud now before it’s too late for them to get a foothold. I think they’re gonna do it by (trying) to port their massive userbase to Threads, make other instances dependent on their content and users, and then pull the plug so they can go back to selling everyone’s information to advertisers.
Edit: https://i.imgur.com/4U0g4Bk.png
I saw this image floating around a few days ago that I think helps illustrate that even if a fraction of Meta's userbase migrates to Threads it will be enough to dominate the fediverse. Instagram has two billion users, and the entire fediverse only has around 1.5 million.
Threads, despite its name, is not a threaded discussion forum like the Threadiverse. It's more like Mastodon, a microblogging protocol. I don't think we'll be seeing Threads users flooding here because the format of these communities isn't really compatible with that.
How would power be handed to Meta just because Threads has more users? The communities are under the control of the instances where they were created, and Threads users couldn't create larger communities to replace them either since it's only a microblogging platform.
The concept is that overtime, communities and connections will organically grow. If Threads has a disproportionally large ubserbase, then overtime they will create a similarly larger number of communities. This then would give them a lot more influence over the fediverse and anyone federated with them.
For smaller instances that become accustomed to seeing those communities and content, the danger is that Meta can just “pull the plug,” defederate, and extinguish the competition, or at the very least hurt their competitor's users experiences when interacting with content from Threads. The reason they might do this is purely because it fits into their business model which is selling user data to advertisers; it is in Meta’s interest to have as much data on their users as possible, and to have those users be based on Meta’s platform.
As I said in another comment, I could be totally wrong and this could benefit the fediverse. I just think the opposite is more likely because I do not trust Meta. I think they will play nice in the beginning, but then start to flex their muscles once they feel they’ve got enough influence.
Also, there is nothing stopping them from expanding Thread’s capabilities to include the threadiverse. Kbin has already demonstrated both are possible in one app.
If they pull the plug on ActivityPub and take their users back, things would just be exactly how they are now. Since they can't create communities or magazines like we can (and it's very unlikely Meta is going to try to implement this), if they want to participate in discussion here, they'll be posting in our communities. Kbin's magazines are uniquely suited to this as well because content gets sorted into them based on hashtags, so they wouldn't even need to know that they're posting to a magazine to do it.
We're already in a situation like you describe though with lemmy.world's near monopoly on large communities, which seems concerning to me as is.
And I agree, lemmy.world does have a near-monopoly on large communities. I attribute that to lemmy being more developed and having apps ready and kbin simply not being completely ready in June (no shade thrown at ernest - he’s great and I like kbin better.) I hope overtime kbin grows some of its own large communities so it’s not so skewed towards a single instance.
Just to clarify what I mean, lemmy.world's position is bad for the threadiverse as a whole. It's where most of our users and largest communities we all post to are. If .world goes down, it'd be a major blow to our current, mostly stable, position and we'd be significantly worse off than if Meta were to come and go. Things are improving though and communities are slowly spreading to other instances! I also deeply appreciate that we have kbin as an alternative to Lemmy - thank you Ernest
Are you sure about that? They take up valuable real estate that could be better served promoting active magazines. Having a good portion of the home page filled up with empty links is not helpful at best.
None of the communities I actually need ever migrated here; most people just did not care. I still go to reddit for things relating to Japanese residency topics, finances, etc. as it is the only place I know of. I only visit those subs, though.
There are also people like me who post like one thing a year (though I comment much more).
I think ultimately, this would be the best move for the users, and would open them up to a lot more content all across the board. But Reddit does not care about its users, so it won't happen.
@Chozo Thank you, yeah I was thinking that it would help push the Fediverse well making the users that want to stick to Reddit the ability to do so, or even more away well still having access to the previously preferred boards.
microblog tab: depending on whether i have to micro-manage or not:
kbin's mod tools are buggy, e.g. an account banned from a magazine can still spam the microblogging section > mods better look inside the microblog tab ...
otherwise depending on my mood
viewing microblog posts in my home feed: all the time - i like it even more on kbin than on specific microblogging fedi platforms tbh
aggregated view is great! i keep boosting loads of microblog posts via kbin ✨
Yeah, aggregate view is the best, and I think it's currently one of the big advantages Kbin has over other fediverse platforms. Hopefully we see more improvements to microblogs once Ernest is done with the new ActivityPub module.
Sun dial proves flat earth.
Just imagine a sun dial on a ball earth.
You need a very strong belief to believe in ball earth.
Check out 4 Kings 20:11 (Go and read it).
We always believed rightly until people started believing imaginations and fancies.
So few years before Christ, we had few fanciful school of thoughts.
Speaking to all:
How did Eratosthenes get the circumference of the earth?
The length of shadows.
Now for those who believe such a science:
Let us pretend the earth is a ball.
In 24 hours, let us take the distance between the earth and the sun to be constant (not changing) (change negligible).
But in that same 24 hours, no shadow, short shadow, long shadow, very long shadow could be obtained.
So, constant distance, changing shadows.
Inference:
You cannot obtain the distance of the sun from shadows.
Conclusion:
If the distance of the sun cannot be obtained, Eratosthenes is finished!
The idea that historically people were somehow less, or more intelligent than people today.
Saying things like “ancient people knew over 300 plants and what they do” as if this is somehow amazing. Kids can name 300 Pokemon, and their movesets and how they relate to eachother. Your sportsfan cowoker can name their top 100 players and all their stats. This is not amazing, we just focus on other things nowadays.
Nor were ancient people stupid. Obviously they noticed things like certain events happening at fixed times of the year. They just didn’t have encyclopedias, but they did have centuries of passed-down knowledge.
Despite not being a fan of Twitter, I've actually really enjoyed the microblogging side of Kbin. I have my home feed set to Subscriptions (All Content), so I get a nice mix of threads from my favorite magazines and microblog posts with relevant tags. I also occasionally make microblog posts for things that I feel wouldn't warrant full threads, such as small bits of pixel art or idkbin updates. Unfortunately, these don't seem to federate to other microblogging platforms particularly well, and I ironically get more interaction from Lemmy (which just shoves Kbin microblog posts into its threads feed) than Mastodon.
That’s a good one. I was thinking older history, but trickle-down economics has had a long enough run of endless disaster without any hint of trucking down for long enough now that we know it doesn’t work. If only we could keep it in the history books!
I used to in the beginning but soon realized it's either kinda dead (people don't use it, people from lemmy don't even see it) or completely filled with spam (because the magazine has some generic tags).
It also didn't work reliably and it wasn't clear which posts go to Mastodon and which don't, but that might have been resolved since.
It's a neat idea for small discussions or questions that don't warrant a thread, but it needs better implementation and wider adoption in order to be actually useful.
I actually joined kbin specifically because it had both of these features. I have read some microblogs, but haven't determined how I fit in with that culture enough to interact. Magazines are more like the bulletin boards of the past, which I am very familiar with. I like the opportunity to interact with the microblogs, tho, and don't expect to create another account just for that. I like this setup very much!
Understandable. I personally don't care quite enough about microblogging to use a dedicated app for it. Much prefer using it in bits and pieces alongside threads.
I don't use Kbin for microbloging. Had started at Mastodon.social>Kbin>Misskey.io .
Switched from posting from Mastodon to Misskey as more people I would enjoy content or would watch my content (well being En speaking on JP server has it -) but I play Arknights and do silly challenge clear that I enjoy, so posting it there with # that will pickup our kbin magazine. Most of art is on Misskey.io as it is on the rumours for many was, but they limited it to Japanese with ever new server being English one.
So use Kbin Microblog to see anything interesting show up on magazine or just in general. Mastodon for "war" news and reports while Misskey for fan art.
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