A non-federated decentralized social protocol based on Git
1–10 of 41 posts
Re: A non-federated decentralized social protocol based on Git
#2How do notifications work with this?
Re: A non-federated decentralized social protocol based on Git
#3Unless I misunderstand, this is federated - each instance stores data related to its user, and fetches from other instances the data it's interested in (from other users the user is following.)
It also doesn't do much to address the reasons users in federated systems tend to congregate around large(r) servers, like discoverability and reliability.
It's a neat PoC but I think the communication needs some work.
Re: A non-federated decentralized social protocol based on Git
#4Unless I misunderstand, this is federated - each instance stores data related to its user, and fetches from other instances the data it's interested in (from other users the user is following.) It also doesn't do much to address the reasons users in federated systems tend to congregate around large(r) servers, like discoverability and reliability. It's a neat PoC but I think the communication needs some work.
When the federation is per-user, that's typically called "peer-to-peer" rather than federated...?
Re: A non-federated decentralized social protocol based on Git
#5Unless I misunderstand, this is federated - each instance stores data related to its user, and fetches from other instances the data it's interested in (from other users the user is following.) It also doesn't do much to address the reasons users in federated systems tend to congregate around large(r) servers, like discoverability and reliability. It's a neat PoC but I think the communication needs some work.
When the federation is per-user, that's typically called "peer-to-peer" rather than federated...?
Also, git doesn't work p2p, it uses centralized servers. If i understand correctly, the only real difference between Twitter and this is that you have your data downloaded, so switching to a new platform is a matter of adding a new remote and pushing it there.
Re: A non-federated decentralized social protocol based on Git
#6Unless I misunderstand, this is federated - each instance stores data related to its user, and fetches from other instances the data it's interested in (from other users the user is following.) It also doesn't do much to address the reasons users in federated systems tend to congregate around large(r) servers, like discoverability and reliability. It's a neat PoC but I think the communication needs some work.
If its based on git then more than likely, copies can be made and shared separate from the user instance. Users own their signature so changes cannot be forged but valid data can be proxied and cached. User data is fully portable from one vendor to the next.
Would you call git federated or decentralized?
Re: A non-federated decentralized social protocol based on Git
#7Earlier quoted context omitted.
When the federation is per-user, that's typically called "peer-to-peer" rather than federated...?
Also, git doesn't work p2p, it uses centralized servers. If i understand correctly, the only real difference between Twitter and this is that you have your data downloaded, so switching to a new platform is a matter of adding a new remote and pushing it there.
You can certainly work with git in a p2p fashion.
Re: A non-federated decentralized social protocol based on Git
#8Earlier quoted context omitted.
When the federation is per-user, that's typically called "peer-to-peer" rather than federated...?
Also, git doesn't work p2p, it uses centralized servers. If i understand correctly, the only real difference between Twitter and this is that you have your data downloaded, so switching to a new platform is a matter of adding a new remote and pushing it there.
My understanding of this implementation is you can use arbitrary git urls to follow. That could point to any process serving data. P2P is 100% possible.
It would be smart to use a personal domain for the git url you give your followers, so you can update the hosting location without causing any disruption.
Re: A non-federated decentralized social protocol based on Git
#9I'm sorry but I believe I'm missing something here. How does this solve any of the problems that people commonly have with decentralized, federated social networks?
* You're still either hosting your own, or at the whim of whomever hosts your repository. Mastodon.social or GitHub.
* Hosting your own Git is not particularly easier than hosting your own GoTo Social or Akkoma.
* What if you end up with either a big following, or a big follower list? Aren't you going to be rate limited by GitHub?
* Is signing up for GitHub easier than signing up for mastodon.social, especially if Mastodon et al already have good mobile clients?
* What about moderation?
* What about media?
And I mean... Isn't Git federated by nature? Multiple machines store multiple copies of the data. That's defederation isn't it?
But OK, let's put the federated social networks we do have aside for a moment.
The site says: Every user stores their application state in a git repo they own and control.
But you don't do that if you're on GitHub, right? Not really, anyway. What is the benefit from doing this over git? What if I want to delete something? What is the overhead of the git protocol?
If it's just a toy, then that's totally cool with me. But it says that Microsoft Research is involved. I'm a bit confused. What is this?
Re: A non-federated decentralized social protocol based on Git
#10Earlier quoted context omitted.
When the federation is per-user, that's typically called "peer-to-peer" rather than federated...?
Also, git doesn't work p2p, it uses centralized servers. If i understand correctly, the only real difference between Twitter and this is that you have your data downloaded, so switching to a new platform is a matter of adding a new remote and pushing it there.
Git was designed from the beginning to be used p2p. It’s how the Linux kernel development is done.