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I don't seem any claim in GP's comment that it would make it decentralized. It does seem, by looking across your comments in this thread, that

(1) You feel very strongly about what decentralized means w.r.t. social media, bluesky, and the PLC

(2) ATProto accepts that it's not planned to be as decentralized as some want, and that it is currently centralized with secondary validators.

(3) No answer or plan for the PLC is going to satisfy you. Nor is any argument you make going to change the plans for identity in ATProto for the foreseeable future.

This is all fine, people can have different perspectives and work/play in different ecosystems, no one is right or wrong. This is precisely why there are multiple protocols out there and bridges between them.

May I then ask why you keep making comments to the same effect aas those you made in the post and multiple times here ~12h ago?

 help



> This is precisely why there are multiple protocols out there and bridges between them.

Yes, that's great! What's not great is Bluesky attempting a hostile takeover on federated and decentralized social networks. It's been advertised from day 1 as an alternative to centralized silos and it's a lie. [0]

To be fair, projects like Blacksky try to decentralize it (except the identity server, as it's impossible??), and there's now a vibrant developer community around ATProto. That doesn't make the centralization and false marketing claims any less problematic.

Develop the protocol you want. Don't lure my friends into it by pretending it's something that it's not.

[0] https://arewedecentralizedyet.online/


"lure" comes off as real biased, what reasons do your friends give?

> What's not great is Bluesky attempting a hostile takeover on federated and decentralized social networks.

Can you clarify this? Am I unaware of some active, intentional campaign?


> what reasons do your friends give?

In my (arguably not very representative) circles, unlike the big Facebook->Instagram migration, which was motivated by "i don't like that it's run by a Silicon Valley tech-bro neofascist, but that's where everyone's at", the Twitter->Bluesky migration was motivated by "finally an alternative that's not centralized so it can't be bought and controlled by american neonazis".

> Can you clarify this?

Well Bluesky's number 1 selling point was always decentralization. Just looking at a few past articles from the wikipedia page's sources:

"Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey announces a new research team, called Bluesky, to create a set of open and decentralized technical standards for social media platforms" (CNBC)

"Bluesky now operates as a “decentralized” social media platform, which means users can create their own servers on which they can store data and set their own rules" (Forbes)

To be fair, they did fit some of the bill which is now why we're complained that Bluesky is not 100% federated/decentralized. And they did improve compared to AP in terms of nomadic identity and letting users know everything on the platform is public (unlike Mastodon where people had a false sense of security).


The whole premise of a free social media protocol is that it is resistant to hostile takeovers. All issues stem from this.

1. I absolutely feel very strongly about decentralization. If there is a part of the stack that isn't it opens up the whole project to the kind of issues I'm talking about in the blog post.

2. Then it is not made to be resistant to the above problems

3. Actually, this is where you are wrong! If atproto implemented a more robust, decentralized default identity system I would be a very happy camper.

I make comments because I care about the subject, obviously. I use Bluesky a lot and I don't want it to end up like Twitter.


There is not one right answer and being hostile towards atproto doesn't earn you friends or support for your ideas.

I recommend adjusting how you argue for your position, especially the tone. If you want to pay it forward, and repair some the damage to your ability to make proposals within the atmosphere, I would further recommend you write an alternative version with a leading apology and take down the antagonistic version you have published.




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