@chartier But if they don't build a model to help fund the expense of running servers, this will all got the way of IRC, Email, Newsgroups etc. Users must be the customer in order to prevent becoming the product.

@zaskoda @chartier What if professional organizations ran servers and paid for them via providing verification? A rel=me link in your profile page at your professional society's website would be meaningful verification from the perspective of the person reading posts.

@williamgunn @chartier In that specific context, the problem of paying for the server is resolved - assuming that organization has the budget for it. While that model works great for lots of things, it's not a solution to the greater problem. Consider that email is federated and any company can run their own mail server but we still live in a world where most people get their email from one of a few large providers who abuse their data.