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I'm betting on ATProto

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Re: I'm betting on ATProto

#41

Post by neelc »

manifoldgeo wrote: post #22

I'd be curious to see how ATProto stacks up against ActivityPub in the long run. I was very excited by the prospects of Mastodon, PeerTube, and a few other Fediverse apps. I even started implementing my own ActivityPub library based on their RFC before I fizzled out. But, the Fediverse never really seemed to take off in the mainstream. Mozilla launched their own mastodon instance around 2023 and then closed it in 202…

I could be wrong, but I hold the opinion that ATProto is the CDMA (3GPP2) of social media protocols, while ActivityPub is GSM (3GPP).

CDMA had better radio tech than GSM, but at the expense of openness. Qualcomm basically owned CDMA, and still does, while GSM was cross-licensed among everyone.

Likewise, ActivityPub is truly open while ATProto is "open" but you're basically a prisoner to Bluesky Social, the way CDMA put you in Qualcomm's prison.

Bluesky has the initial lead, but it's Twitter's estranged child. People used to Twitter find Bluesky an easier replacement. CDMA was also an easier upgrade from analog 1G networks than GSM was, due to re-using the back office systems and ESN identifiers.

Yes, Bluesky has a better experience. But maybe future ActivityPub releases will catch up for a large part. UMTS caught up to CDMA while being more open, and LTE became the universal 4G standard, with GSM-centric IMEI and SIM cards and such. And maybe PDS implementations will converge to ActivityPub with an ATProto fallback.

Keep in mind that I know nothing about the protocols, so I could be missing what makes ATProto a better tech, or not.

Re: I'm betting on ATProto

#42

Post by verdverm »

tolerance wrote: post #31

I think that a lot of people are going to get ATProto whether they want to or not. I don't want to believe that anyone involved with it at in a decision-making or policy-driving capacity is a big enough loser to only want better social media out of it. Decentralized web apps are a proof of concept.

fyi, Bain Capital (private equity) now has a say in where things go. Technically since April of last year, but we are now just finding out because they withheld their $100M "funding"

Re: I'm betting on ATProto

#43

Post by BugsJustFindMe »

esbranson wrote: post #29
manifoldgeo wrote: post #22

I'd be curious to see how ATProto stacks up against ActivityPub in the long run. I was very excited by the prospects of Mastodon, PeerTube, and a few other Fediverse apps. I even started implementing my own ActivityPub library based on their RFC before I fizzled out. But, the Fediverse never really seemed to take off in the mainstream. Mozilla launched their own mastodon instance around 2023 and then closed it in 202…

The Fediverse did take off. Then large numbers of influential people got banned by randos and realized how much better and reliable (non-profit or not) corporate censors are.

Banned for what?

Re: I'm betting on ATProto

#44

Post by officeplant »

esbranson wrote: post #29
manifoldgeo wrote: post #22

I'd be curious to see how ATProto stacks up against ActivityPub in the long run. I was very excited by the prospects of Mastodon, PeerTube, and a few other Fediverse apps. I even started implementing my own ActivityPub library based on their RFC before I fizzled out. But, the Fediverse never really seemed to take off in the mainstream. Mozilla launched their own mastodon instance around 2023 and then closed it in 202…

The Fediverse did take off. Then large numbers of influential people got banned by randos and realized how much better and reliable (non-profit or not) corporate censors are.

>Then large numbers of influential people got banned by randos

Given the state of other social media. The randos were right to ban them probably.

Re: I'm betting on ATProto

#45

Post by verdverm »

pfraze wrote: post #35
verdverm wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Permissioned data is probably the most fundamental, the part I looked most deeply into myself. People want privacy over blasting everything out to the internet for anyone to scrape. The public by default forced upon users is a bad choice. The purported benefits never materialized. Many of the atmo developers have this belief they can skip the network effects, grift the data and social graph for their own use. Here's…

[flagged]

[dead]

Re: I'm betting on ATProto

#47

Post by packetlost »

verdverm wrote: post #34
apitman wrote: post #32

> Social media was supposed to connect us, but most of it has turned into ads, division, and loneliness. I'm betting on ATProto as a way to fix that I disagree with the premise here. I think the core mechanics of social media, ie instant communication between random strangers about random topics, creates toxic interactions regardless of whether it's manipulated by engagement algorithms. Some of the most toxic convers…

I'm not convinced it is social media wholesale, rather it is about size. Platforms like microblogging are more about the person, the quips, the dunking. If you are in any small communities using social platforms like Discord/Signal (chat rooms) or Discourse (forum), it's a very different feel. Most are genuinely positive experiences. I suppose it depends on how one defines social media. My definitions are more flexib…

Once someone builds a reasonable Google+ clone on ATProto or ActivityPub I'd probably switch to that. I don't think we've solved reputation when it comes to decentralized identity providers yet either.

Re: I'm betting on ATProto

#48

Post by verdverm »

packetlost wrote: post #47
verdverm wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not convinced it is social media wholesale, rather it is about size. Platforms like microblogging are more about the person, the quips, the dunking. If you are in any small communities using social platforms like Discord/Signal (chat rooms) or Discourse (forum), it's a very different feel. Most are genuinely positive experiences. I suppose it depends on how one defines social media. My definitions are more flexib…

Once someone builds a reasonable Google+ clone on ATProto or ActivityPub I'd probably switch to that. I don't think we've solved reputation when it comes to decentralized identity providers yet either.

For real, trust online is an open and hard problem. It's only going to get harder with ai bots running amok.

Re: I'm betting on ATProto

#49

Post by tolerance »

verdverm wrote: post #42
tolerance wrote: post #31

I think that a lot of people are going to get ATProto whether they want to or not. I don't want to believe that anyone involved with it at in a decision-making or policy-driving capacity is a big enough loser to only want better social media out of it. Decentralized web apps are a proof of concept.

fyi, Bain Capital (private equity) now has a say in where things go. Technically since April of last year, but we are now just finding out because they withheld their $100M "funding"

ahem, Bain Capital "Crypto", to be exact. Among others.

https://bsky.social/about/blog/03-19-2026-series-b

Did not know that Bloomberg was into VC now.

Re: I'm betting on ATProto

#50

Post by verdverm »

tolerance wrote: post #49
verdverm wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

fyi, Bain Capital (private equity) now has a say in where things go. Technically since April of last year, but we are now just finding out because they withheld their $100M "funding"

ahem , Bain Capital "Crypto", to be exact. Among others. https://bsky.social/about/blog/03-19-2026-series-b Did not know that Bloomberg was into VC now.

Bain Capital subsidiaries are still Bain Capital. Crypto makes it even less appealing imo.
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