Re: RFC: tent.io (protocol for social networking)

Hi Daniel,

I think tent.io is awesome, and if any of the developers is reading
this: Welcome to the list! :)

Since you asked for our opinions, let me also list three remarks re
tent.io after reading their faq:

1) On http://tent.io/ there is a section 'what about the federated
social web', which i think is interesting. They describe the federated
social web as a "network of networks of servers", in which some
functions only work if two people are on the same server (instance), a
slightly smaller set works if two people are on the same software, and
only a relatively small subset will work of two people are on
different software.

I think this is accurate, and identifies an important problem. I do
not think that tent.io is currently proposing a solution though. But
let's hope they will add private messaging and some other things in
the future, and can come closer to a fully multi-feature fedsocweb
protocol. What is admirable is that they seem to design their protocol
independently of their server implementation, although unfortunately i
think it's naive to think that other software projects will now
suddenly switch to their protocol for that reason.

2) in "What can Tent users do that they could not on other social
networks?" it states that you can migrate your tent.io account from
one server to another without (as i understand it) losing your friends
list, and without your friends losing you from their friends list. but
i had a look in the api docs to see if i could find any 'migrate'
functions, but couldn't find them, so i don't see how they do this.

3) 'Tent will be a completely free and open standard. To prevent
fragmentation before launch, the original authors currently retain
copyright.' - let's hope they make it non-proprietary soon.

In general, i believe in a federated social web where there is one
name space of contacts, yet multiple languages (OStatus, xmpp,
ActivityPump, tent.io, diaspora-protocol, StatusNet-protocol, zot,
etcetera, but also just good old smtp) in which two servers, or a
client and a server, can communicate with each other. I think we
should stop looking for "the" protocol, and just be happy that there
is such a wealth of different specialized protocol being used for
different tasks. All those protocols together can be used alongside
each other, and not all servers need support all protocols.

As long as the namespace in which each account refers to all its
contacts is generic across all those protocols.


Ciao!
Michiel

Received on Monday, 24 September 2012 11:50:51 UTC