Richard MacManusDec 21, 2022
My interview with @blaine, who was there at the very beginning of Twitter; now he's focused on building #fediverse infrastructure that will help #Mastodon scale. https://thenewstack.io/why-a-twitter-founding-engineer-is-now-all-in-on-mastodon/
Why a Twitter Founding Engineer Is Now All-in on Mastodon

Blaine Cook was there at the very beginning of Twitter; now he's focused on building fediverse infrastructure that will help Mastodon scale.

The New Stack
Show threadJames GleickDec 21, 2022
@ricmac @blaine I happen to agree with this: “Many people would like to join a Mastodon instance that lets them open their posts up for indexing, so that we can search content on that instance — it’s good for topic tracking, monitoring news, etc.”
Show threadWiredfire Dec 21, 2022

@JamesGleick @ricmac @blaine I'd argue that the safety of those who have historically been targeted by trolls using such indexing trumps that.

Of course being instance-specific lessens the impact but also the usefulness.

But rather than bend Mastodon into something it’s not designed to be the better question is “is Mastodon the right place for such discourse?”. The answer might be “no”, which is absolutely ok.

The web is not short of platforms, you may find one better suits that use case.

Show threadWiredfire 

@JamesGleick @ricmac @blaine mastodon does not need to be, nor is it trying to be, all things to all people.

It’s a big internet out there 😊

Dec 21, 2022 at 7:26pmWeb
Show threadblaineDec 21, 2022

@wiredfire @JamesGleick @ricmac totally. The caveat is that the fediverse (not even just federated microblogging) isn't just Mastodon, and we'd all be worse off if Mastodon ended up consuming all the oxygen there.

The time of centralized online "platforms" is over; we need to think about ecosystems, instead.

Rather than trying to control everything everywhere all at once, I'd love to see us tackle the question:

How can we all live happily and together with emergent complexity?

Show threadblaineDec 21, 2022
@wiredfire @JamesGleick @ricmac non-western approaches to understanding are key; we have a unique opportunity to apply lessons from so many incredible thinkers (James Scott, Elinor Ostrom, David Graeber, Suzanne Simard to name a few from the Western tradition – I am owning that I don't have a similar list from outside those folks to hand, and need to do better) and build a rich, diverse, and evolving future quite apart from the monopolizing trends of the past few decades.
Show threadWiredfire Dec 21, 2022

@blaine @JamesGleick @ricmac agreed wholeheartedly. I only referred to Mastodon as the post above did, but you’re absolutely right that we need the fediverse to be more than Mastodon (in the same way we need web browsers to be more than Chrome / Blink / WebKit).

The more folk see that and start exploring the wider systems out there with excitement, instead of trying to make the one they’re on right now beaten to fit, the better 😁