In case you young whippersnappers have no clue what is so special about September:
Back then, the internet (and usenet, bitnet, talk) community had been nearly 100% academic. No idiots, no stupid loudmouths, no antivax moms, no politicians. Each September was an inflow of new students accessing the net for the first time, and it was up to the existing population to educate the newbies on things like netiquette and overall good behavior. People learned to use free and open services without abusing them. Back then, those newbies were usually quick to learn, so any problem arising from people who might cause issues usually was over within a few weeks.
Then, The Flood came. The Eternal September began. The time where AOL disks were so common that people used them as coasters. The Internet and all the services on it never were the same again. The existing netizens were no longer capable to educate new users on proper, civilized behavior, and usenet posts solely consisting of text like "me too" became common. It went downhill from there. Formerly open services closed up because of unmitigated abuse. One day, even lawyers invaded the net, people despicable things like Sanford Wallace, for example. You newbies today cannot imagine a time like it was before criminals like him invaded this space.
As part of the eternal September myself, we didn’t just use AOL disks as coasters, we used them for awesome pranks like filling eachother’s cars to the brim with them. It was truly astonishing how many of those disks were around.
Good. On one hand it’s good to see fediverse stuff coming mainstream, on the other hand the last thing we want is a load of celebrities and brands trying to cannibalise said fediverse as an opportunity to corner the market instead of genuinely useful resources for communication
If the Fediverse is truly the architecture of the future, then shouldn’t it be able to stand any attempt by Meta to control it? If Meta is able to control it, then isn’t it the wrong solution?
No, projects like the Fediverse require initial protectionism. If you let megacorporations into your project, they will dominate and gain control over how the protocol develops in the future. Google Chrome’s huge share of users has enabled it to get dangerously close to locking other browsers out of most of the Internet (the Web Integrity API shenanigans are just the start). Chrome also removed support for JPEG XL, killing that attempt at a standard and enshrining its own WebP. It’s called “Embrace, extend, and extinguish”.
If the Fediverse actually wants to grow, it must unite against this. Otherwise we will end up with a couple hundred thousand Fedipact hardliners and millions on Facebook 2. No progress will have been made.
Defederation is silly here in my opinion. I’d personally prefer more content and more mainstream stuff. We’re basically isolating ourselves. If it’s so great, it’ll flourish; instead we won’t allow it. So much for an open community. :shrug:
We also collectively downvote people who think this which is also silly. Heck even this post is more/less to bully these instances into doing what this group wants.
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