The reason I'm optimistic about Mastodon is that they very clearly understand the challenges involved in running software this way, and have spent the past 6 years plucking away at them It's not perfect, but I think it's now Good Enough, especially for this unique moment
OPEN SOURCE
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Mastodon App Sees User Return and Significant Improvements
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Genuinely the first time I've heard of that app Lots of people who tried out Mastodon a few years ago have been signing up again (or reactivating old accounts) and expressing surprise at how much it has improved since they first tried it
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Thousand tiny servers bloom: Mastodon financial sustainability model
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That's another reason why I'm optimistic: may a thousand tiny servers bloom Mastodon users seem to get that they should open their wallets – there are no ads so it's pretty clear that people need to help financially support the servers they are using – or volunteer time, or both
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Decentralized Moderation: Distributed Responsibility Across Thousands
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I really do think that's one of its strengths though: there are genuinely thousands of servers, so the moderation responsibility is shared by a very wide set of volunteers
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Server Administration Responsibility in Decentralized Technology
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Running a server for other people is definitely not a responsibility to be taken lightly! This post really influenced my thinking about that https://
ashfurrow.com/blog/mastodon-
technology-shutdown/
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ActivityPub recognized as essential protocol for decentralized networks
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And thank you very much for your many years of work on ActivityPub, it appears to be exactly what we need right now!
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Building AI Projects with Hugging Face Spaces
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Would be so cool to build a http://
hf.co/spaces with it! -
Large AI Teams: BigScience Lessons on Project Organization
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yes, agree on the exhaustion feeling. BigScience was an experiment in trying to involve as many/diverse people as possible but a take-away is that too large teams can be counter-productive. Smaller projects like T0/ethics/RAIL were more successful inside BS than larger Bloom imo
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Five-Year GitHub Issue in Mastodon Core Remains Unresolved
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Turns out this has been an open issue on GitHub for Mastodon core for five years now https://
github.com/mastodon/masto
don/issues/2668
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Running Your Own Instance Without Vendor Lock-in
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No idea I'm afraid! That's why I chose to run my own instance, I didn't want to have to pick one (though apparently you can move between them without losing your profile, which is reassuring)