Re: A native internet protocol for social media

st 12. 4. 2023 v 13:21 odesílatel hellekin <how@zoethical.com> napsal:

> On 2023-04-12 12:16, Melvin Carvalho wrote:
> > Jack Dorsey, co-founder of Twitter, recently spoke about the need for
> > an international native protocol for social media. He also announced
> > his plans to start funding social protocols, beginning with a $1
> > million annual donation to Signal. There is an ongoing discussion
> > around reducing social media's dependence on the domain name system.
> > While a federated approach is better than a centralized one, nomadic
> > identity could provide even greater benefits. This can potentially be
> > achieved by fixing the ActivityPub standard to allow inverse
> > functional properties and also by addressing issues with the linked
> > data vocabularies. It would be valuable to discuss these ideas and
> > explore potential solutions further within the context of the
> > community group.
> >
> >
> https://habla.news/a/naddr1qqxnzd3cxyerxd3h8qerwwfcqy88wumn8ghj7mn0wvhxcmmv9uq32amnwvaz7tmjv4kxz7fwv3sk6atn9e5k7tcpramhxue69uhkummnw3ez6un9d3shjtnwda4k7arpwfhjucm0d5hsygyzxs0cs2mw40xjhfl3a7g24ktpeur54u2mnm6y5z0e6250h7lx5gpsgqqqw4rsf67qa5
>
>
> Here is what I have to say about Jack Dorsey's prose (I double-quote to
> avoid any confusion with what Melvin would have said earlier ;)
>
> >> Social media must be resilient to corporate and government control.
>
> Here we agree. He should have thought about it earlier when he did not
> make Twitter resilient from the start by making it free software.
>
> >> Only the original author may remove content they produce.
>
> I'm not sure about this. Spammers are the tip of the iceberg of why. I
> think Dorsey takes a naive position claiming social media are not
> hostile. And authorship, really? Are we not on our way to remove this
> cult of personality?
>
> >> Moderation is best implemented by algorithmic choice.
>
> Like, what? An algorithm would be better at ethics than a human? I get
> the point that exposing humans to the kind of horror posted on "mass
> social media" could encourage looking the other way and letting the bots
> take the blow, but I really think that 'moderation' is a feature of the
> (human) collective, not to be automated.
>
>  From there, I think the rest of the article becomes much less
> interesting. We all know the drill of the repentant entrepreneur who
> realize that their work was causing harm to society.
>
> Now, if I consider some arguments with a kind eye...
>
> >> It’s critical that the people have tools to resist this, and that
> >> those tools are ultimately owned by the people.
>
> Please, come and embrace free software.
>
> >> I’m a strong believer that any content produced by someone for the
> >> internet should be permanent until the original author chooses to
> >> delete it. It should be always available and addressable. Content
> >> takedowns and suspensions should not be possible.
>
> I'm not opposed to this in principle, if spammers are not "someone". For
> the technical part, ERIS, the Encoding for Robust Immutable Storage
> seems to me the best way to achieve this part of the deal.
>
> But then...
>
> >> The internet is trending towards a world were storage is “free” and
> >> infinite, which places all the actual value on how to discover and see
> >> content.
>
> Well, the Internet is on a planet that does not trend towards infinite
> availability. I certainly hope we'll prioritize water for directly
> sustaining life and not making more chips.
>
> >> Which brings me to the last principle: moderation. I don’t believe a
> >> centralized system can do content moderation globally.
>
> Thank Dorsey for stating the obvious. Also for stating that no algorithm
> at all may be an option for moderation.
>
> >> A “follow” action should always deliver every bit of content from the
> >> corresponding account
>
> Well, that is: if this specific account allows that follower in the
> first place. I find it tricky that Dorsey is considering accounts to be
> public ones, or at least not mentioning that this is not the case.
>
> >> The problem today is that we have companies who own both the protocol
> >> and discovery of content.
>
> Here we go again. Dorsey is not unfamiliar to free software. Yet, he
> argues that the (about 15) existing free and open protocols for social
> media today are irrelevant to his declaration. He takes for granted that
> there should be one global public conversation --- no, thank you.
> Fragmentation of the public space is pretty much a feature, as it is one
> guarantee that no SPOF will appear.
>
> Now,the rest I cannot see with a kind eye, because of the previous
> divergence...
>
> >> Many of you won’t trust this solution just because it’s me stating it.
>
> No, it does not matter who states it, it matter how it is stated, what
> it does say about your intentions. And your intentions are to make more
> business, more profit. It has nothing to do with the social, cooperative
> approach that make the core of social media based on free software,
> decentralized instances, and interoperable small islands in the Net.
> Jack Dorsey wants "phenomenal business" and he wants to tap into the
> "massive collection of conversation". This is hubris talking again.
>
> >> I do believe absolute transparency builds trust.
>
> I do believe selective opacity builds confidence. And I take the
> opportunity of Dorsey endorsing Wikileaks to quote Julian Assange:
> "Transparency for the state! Privacy for the rest of us!" --- I include
> corporations in the State, since at all levels, the lever of Growth is
> commanding spending public money to "create jobs" and so on (it took
> 3000 years for the theory of price to come back to the original
> Aristotle version that power makes price, not the so-called 'law of
> offer and demand').
>
> As far as I know, more knowledge does not always translate into more
> action. The Snowden Apocalypse, as I like to claim, was only the Snowden
> revelations, as the press got to call it, and many other massive leaks
> followed, and Dorsey's still wondering how to make money and claiming
> "there's nothing to hide... only a lot to learn from". One thing we
> could have learned from all those leaks is that things move slowly, way
> too slowly when the imbalance of power is threatening all life on Earth.
> Criminals remain in place, belligerent strategies remain the norm,
> "public" investment keeps engaging in warfare, while global private
> banking remains a stronghold of corruption and dangerous investment
> policies. More of the same.
>
> >> This is a focused and urgent push for a foundational core technology
> >> standard to make social media a native part of the internet.
>
> Oh, maybe something like GNUnet, RetroShare, Tor or I2P...
>
> "to make social media a native part of the Internet" is such an empty
> phrase. What do you mean by it Jack Dorsey? I may give you the benefit
> of the doubt, remembering that R. Buckminster Fuller wrote that
> "humanity invented all the right technologies for all the wrong
> reasons."
>

Hi Hellikin

I would like to share some positive experiences we've had with Jack
Dorsey's sponsorship of free software initiatives, including Nostr. Nostr's
collaboration with Jack has been successful and fruitful, resulting in
impressive growth.  Jack is a big supporter of free software, and has
donated millions of dollars to multiple projects.  With more to come.  I
think it is worth operating in good faith.

Since Jack Dorsey tweeted about Nostr and subsequently supported it through
a tumultuous time when it was banned (and later unbanned) by Twitter, it
has seen a significant increase in its user base. it went from 600 accounts
to 12 million in just five months. The first conference in Costa Rica was
also a success, with 400 attendees and Jack kindly offering to pay for the
venue and food.  Edward Snowden has also endorsed nostr, which has helped
it to grow.

Nostr is a grassroots project that has attracted over 1000 developers
working on hundreds of projects. It is seeing a new client or app being
created for Nostr every day.  Developers like it because it is a simple two
page spec that can be understood in an hour, and it is possible to build a
client or a server in a weekend.  Many have done exactly this.

It is built on web standards, namely http and websockets, which are widely
deployed.It also has a well-functioning bridge to the fediverse, and the
author of Pixelfed, is looking at adopting Nostr. There are also in talks
with the Kosmos/Unhosted team regarding integration, and also potentially
with Sockethub to provide network optimizations.

While Nostr may not be as mature as the fediverse, it is emerging as a
legitimate piece of the social web. This advantage lies in making it
difficult to entirely cancel people, which is all too easy on Twitter and
even doable on federated systems.

I believe that the social web CG can help all these projects work together.

>
> ==
> hk
>
> P.S.: congratulations for getting Dorsey support for Nostr, Melvin.
>