I’ve thought about it a bit and the Fediverse has been around for a while now. There are some really cool applications being made to replace the mainstream ones, but they just aren’t taking off.
Why do you guys think that might be? Ease of use? Addiction to the mainstream platforms? Lack of marketing?
So my personal impressions is that mainstream services are garbage, but that mirrors the mainstream culture that consumes them. If most people want to stay on Instagram or Facebook, I would prefer they do, because as we saw when they did the Instagram Boycott on the 20th, we got a lot of new users, but it brought a lot of toxicity over from Instagram and once again somebody who really wasn’t a bad person at all got bullied off the platform by a small, but loud group of people. I came over here to escape the toxicity of the big social media platforms and found something resembling leftist solidarity. I appreciate that most of these services don’t tolerate bigotry to nearly the same extent as the mainstream services, that I would say often amplify hateful things because controversial content gets prioritized by the algorithms. The reason I like the fediverse is quality, not quantity. Mainstreaming these services would require either conforming to the norms of the mainstream internet culture, or somehow getting the mainstream internet culture to conform to our norms here. Both of these tasks seem pointless. Maybe the goal shouldn’t be total market saturation, but sustainability of the communities we have come to love. I think we get a lot of user share, but more than that we get a lot of really great, friendly and welcoming people for the most part. I think the toxic voices tend to get drowned out over time, because we have tools to filter that out and while we may have shitty things that happen from time to time as will any community, a lot of our instances function as a community and really do feel like a home on the internet.
In terms of social media, it comes down to content. I know every time I’ve joined something was because there was enough content that I wanted to look at for me to do daily. Right now, lots of fediverse stuff is about FOSS and tech, which a vast majority of people don’t care too much about. But it is slowly starting to spread, nd facilitating those groups by contributing and allowing to grow will do wonders.
I’d also say if you have friends somewhere, you follow them there. I know that was me for all my mainstream social media joining (other than tumblr, that I got my friends to join and I joined because of the content I found).
But seriously, like the others have said, it’s really taking off and you know its true by how many alternatives there are! Almost every mainstream social network has a fedialt, which, if it wasn’t as popular, wouldn’t exist yet!
I think that the fediverse has already taken off. It’s not mainstream -perhaps never will be-, but it reached a critical mass and that’s crucial. The content network effect of the commercial social networks is very strong, but don’t forget it also carries drawbacks. Something similar happens with cities: many people want to life there (services, jobs, cultural offer…) but doing so also leads to problems (road traffic congestion, air quality and many more!).
Fediverse has proven it’s viable, is getting more mature and it’s gaining impulse on many different niches. I think these are all good signs. ‘Cities’ are going to exist for a long time (the capital’s machine is very strong), ‘towns’ need to keep working and fitting the needs of the burned migrants (respecting privacy, respecting languages, avoiding harassment…) without repeating the ‘cities’ errors: monetization of free giant services --> tons of adds, massive profilation, lack of privacy, development of addiction thought algorithms…
Let’s see how much the fediverse can grow (technological sovereignty of grass roots, governments…) and where is the equilibrium with the big commercial social networks. I’m sure we are in the beginning of a long and interesting transformation :-)
I think it depends on the definition of taking off. I see the Fediverse as a huge success with millions of people using it every day. At this point it’s proven itself to be both viable and sustainable. I only see it growing going forward.
The Fediverse hasn’t gone mainstream, but I think that’s a different discussion. Fediverse primarily attracts people who are dissatisfied with the status quo for one reason or another. The existing mainstream platforms obviously work well enough, so there is no reason to expect average users to start migrating from them.
IRC is also sustainable and still being hosted today, but I don’t think most people want the fediverse to be just sustainable. They want it to be a fully capable alternative to the big platforms.
The existing mainstream platforms obviously work well enough, so there is no reason to expect average users to start migrating from them.
I half agree and half disagree with that. Obviously, you’re right that they’re good enough that most people won’t migrate away. But I also think most people are dissatisfied with them and want alternatives. It’s just that the fediverse isn’t providing what people want in an alternative. On Facebook/Twitter it’s a combination of family/friends and news sites, but the fediverse is pretty vehemently against news publishers posting here. People want to follow content creators, but the fediverse has chased away multiple large personalities.
I completely agree that it would be good for Fediverse to keep growing. I’m just noting that sustainability is an important milestone.
I do agree that network effects play a role as well. People go where their friends are and where there’s more content. That said, I don’t think the Fediverse lacks content creators, there are plenty of people producing content all the time including some well known personalities.
The reason Fediverse got popular in the first place is because people got sick of commercialization and were looking for alternatives. So I don’t think it makes sense to chase commercial content to attract users because getting away from that was the whole point.
So I don’t think it makes sense to chase commercial content to attract users because getting away from that was the whole point.
I don’t want that at all. I just meant that that’s what I think the large majority of people on the centralized services are looking for. But I’ve never seen a PeerTube video that had anything near the production value of some of the basic YouTube channels I watch. I’m thinking about game streamers on Twitch/YouTube or culture critics posting 15-20 min video essays. And if there’s no way for them to make money on PeerTube, then I doubt we ever will see them crossposting or migrating.
Peertube’s really still brand new and hasn’t got much critical mass, but that doesn’t mean people can’t make money on Peertube - the platform paying the creator shouldn’t be all that necessary, as, from my layman’s understanding of things, those ‘content creators’ have a variety of income sources, Youtube income is pretty small for some.
If one of those ‘influencer’-types put a few bucks in to a few Peertube instances and started working on their audience, there could probably be a pretty sizeable chunk of viewing that could start to migrate over. They could continue to put up pointer videos on Youtube, too…
But, is that what we all really want?
Also, I think you’re conflating issues - when you’re saying you don’t want the commercial content, but then complain about the Peertube content being of generally lower production value, where do you think all the snazzy production value comes from?
Also, I think you’re conflating issues - when you’re saying you don’t want the commercial content, but then complain about the Peertube content being of generally lower production value, where do you think all the snazzy production value comes from?
I don’t want algorithmic ads rolling in the middle of a person’s sentence, or above every video on index pages like on YouTube. That’s what I mean when I said I don’t want commercial content. There’s a difference in Hollywood production values (or even professional YouTuber production) and what’s on PeerTube. I don’t need huge budget production, I’d just like to see something a little nicer than hobbyists with phone/laptop cameras/mics. Look at the podcasting space. Most of the shows I’ve listened to started by new podcasters at least had decent mics and knew to record in a closet to dampen outside sound.
But there’s no reason for people to put in that level of effort if they’re just doing it for fun. And nobody is going to spend time/money to add even that tiny bit of production if they’re not going to see any kind of return on it. I don’t want to see YouTube recreated; I don’t want to see PeerTube millionaires, but people should be able to make a decent earning.
the platform paying the creator shouldn’t be all that necessary, as, from my layman’s understanding of things, those ‘content creators’ have a variety of income sources, Youtube income is pretty small for some.
Right. They get most of their money from sponsorships, but you can’t get sponsorships on a platform with no viewership.
I don’t want algorithmic ads rolling in the middle of a person’s sentence, or above every video on index pages like on YouTube. That’s what I mean when I said I don’t want commercial content.
I would then ask to please say what you mean: ‘ads’ or ‘intrusive ads’ or whatever it is you actually mean - the content is the thing you’re watching, not necessarily the intrusive ads, and on Youtube I’d argue most of what you’ll find and/or see promoted these days is commercial (for profit). It’s mostly commercial content.
Right. They get most of their money from sponsorships, but you can’t get sponsorships on a platform with no viewership.
I’d argue that’s not the platform’s fault. Viewers can and will follow people and can and will discover things on a variety of platforms. YouTube is a behemoth now, but one doesn’t have to be too old to remember that it didn’t exist not too long ago.
TikTok wasn’t much of a thing mere months ago. Zoom was in very few people’s lingo for several years until the media had a pandemigasm all over it.
How much advertising budget has the fediverse got? 0? So, could take time for it to explode in to the hearts and minds of people like commercial platforms do. Yes, there’s plenty of refinements that could be had and done for user experience, but I don’t think, aside from app knowledge/availability, these are preventing people from ‘migrating’.
This is pretty off-topic but I don’t know why everyone thinks Zoom invented group video calls in 2020 suddenly. My work uses Zoom now even though everyone was doing fine with group calls in Skype for Business and/or Teams.
I see the Fediverse as a huge success
I don’t think anyone is trying to disparage it, just wondering why it doesn’t rival corporate social media.
I imagine it’s due to the fact that the main reasons to switch are ideological. Corporate social media has a much bigger user base having been around much longer, and that means people there are a part of an existing social network.
Moving to Fediverse means abandoning your existing network and building a new one or trying to convince your friends to move with you. This takes dedication and effort so people need a strong motivation to give them a push. People who care about privacy, dislike ads, don’t like their content curated by algorithms, and so on are the ones taking the plunge. This turns out to be a fairly small percentage of the overall population.
On the flip side, Fediverse is predominantly populated by people who care about these things, and hopefully this culture stays strong as it grows.
I think it has taken off. I know more real life peoples on mastodon that I did a year ago. It’s like a nice little opt-out of surveillance capitalism.
And it feels more like the close-knit internet days of yore.
Unfortunately I don’t know a single person that uses Mastodon. I envy you.
It doesn’t have millions in marketing to pay for adverts everywhere. Very few people are aware of it’s existence and the mainstream media are going to ignore you unless you grease a few palms, know what I mean?
Lots of interesting points have been brought up here but a large amount of it can be chalked up to the fact that if your friends aren’t on a platform already, most people can’t be arsed to switch. Also, 90% of the fediverse are either programmers or people like me who are quite deep into the FOSS rabbit hole, so they can’t get their main content there.
As far as I’m concerned it has taken off. I come on sites like this and there are all these active users, so people are definitely using them. The reason why other platforms are still more popular is just the network effect. People want to be on platforms where “everyone” is, and sometimes they don’t even want to be on them but have to be. Just imagine what percentage of Facebook’s user base were compelled to use it while otherwise having not interest in such things?
It’s the same story with the Internet and e-mail. Most people avoided them to years until they couldn’t avoid them anymore. Lemmy et al. are nice because the people who are here actually want to be.
Lack of influencers/celebrities on the fediverse is why it’s adoption is low. Someone important would have to make a conscious choice to only use Mastodon/Lemmy/PixelFed, etc. instead of Reddit, Twitter, Instagram. There would be the other challenge that if someone did do that, someone might create a bot to repost their tweets, or set up an instagram account to repost their photos, etc. With the inertia that exists it will be a slow process. I think Lemmy and Mastodon have a good shot just by the communities they are building.
But then you have things like that Star Trek celebrity trying to use Mastodon and being bullied out of the software because of a militant trans community. That could also be problematic for adoption if there are social barriers being put up to entry.
The worst part is that there are tons of actually terrible people on the fediverse, but Wil Wheaton accidentally blocked some trans people that one time and he’s cancelled for life from Mastodon. I actually saw someone bragging about having helped to bully him off of Mastodon the other day.
that’s sad and those people shouldn’t use inclusive services like the fediverse. They should found their own small echochamber and let other people be.
This does absolutely apply to mastodon and pleroma, but maybe doesn’t apply to lemmy (where the focus is on communities so as @kixiQu@lemmy.ml pointed out, small niche communities can grow easily).
I still think it applies to Lemmy. Niche communities are always going to be niche, so their growth potential isn’t that high. There are communities here on lemmy that are also on reddit and the reddit size is way larger. If a community moved from reddit to lemmy, I bet you would see a ton of user growth.
For instance, If I wanna talk about web stuff, I can talk about it here on lemmy, where there are 200 subs and posts get around 5 comments, or I can talk about it on reddit where there are 200k subs and posts get hundreds of comments.
Exclusivity is always going to be a powerful influence for platforms
I use the fediverse every day and lots of new websites are being made. I see it growing steadily.
Lack of apps and lack of need for most people. I think instances that fill a niche and provide a service that is better than the non federated service will help.
The dominant theory seems to be ease of use/simplicity and the front page of everything having furries, hentai and a bunch of nerd chat.
I think a good way to solve a few of the issues is to have the main instance of each platform market themselves a little harder and not so much on the pods/instances - teach that to the people later after they get in to the atmosphere of the Fediverse. For example, someone goes to Mastodon.social, all they see is that it’s the main instance, and other that the word instance, it looks like a simple Twitter alternative.
Then later if they want to delve a little deeper (the customer), they can learn about instances/pods. From there they can host their own, or search for a new one. (Most of the instance directories could use some simplifying too)
Then to go along with that, each main instance would also have to be moderated quite heavily to keep things clean for when people first join.
Thoughts?
That would require easier instance switching (like nomadic identities on Hubzilla). But also the very idea of a “main” instance is counter-productive. The current theme based instances is a better idea to cater to the current niche audiences.
Maybe in the future there could also be more mainstream regional instances. Something similar to your regional/city newspaper, where it is more about local content and localized exchange.
All the fediverse social networks are just federated alternatives to already existing social networks + federation. This means that the bulk of people won’t adopt them unless they care about federation with a small community over the non-federated network.
Federated solutions won’t rival major social networks unless they are innovating the next features and solutions instead of making alternatives to already existing and dominant networks.
- There are no platforms/client/protocols for meaningful discussions, like NNTP/usenet was, only twitter/reddit/instagram clones. The fediverse often tries to compete with FAANGs on their own turf instead of choosing new paradigms.
- Interesting content is key. Most platforms don’t have any effective and user-centered search/filter algorithm.
- Architecture issues: users have to trust random strangers to run a server reliably and securely (or fall for yet another blockchain)
Architecture issues: users have to trust random strangers to run a server reliably and securely (or fall for some blockchain-based scam)
Even though it’s a bit more scary, its actually likely to be more secure. If there are many smaller instance, unless there is a fatal security flaw with the software itself, it is unlikely that more than one instance at a time gets compromised, which leads to much less total damage done than if a GAFAM is hacked (and that happens, recently twitter was hacked , which lead to a bunch of CEO’s account being hacked and being used for a scam).
Distributed networks obviously distribute risk, but with more attack vectors and more non-professional instance managers it definitely is less secure.
This does not solve the problem of reliability. Also, better solutions are possible: Briar, for example, does not require a server to store and forward (cleartext) messages.
Besides the first mover advantage, I’d say the biggest thing is lack of good mobile apps. Most people do social media on their phones nowadays, whereas the biggest sites got popular in a time before that was needed.
I’m not a huge fan of the twitter style of social media, but I might use mastodon or pleroma more if the apps were a bit better. Lemmy also has this problem cause we have no apps released yet, although a few like lemmur are in the works.
