An evidence-based and critical analysis of the Fediverse decentralization promises
An evidence-based and critical analysis of the Fediverse decentralization promises
Abstract
This paper examines the potential of the Fediverse, a federated network of social media and content platforms, to counter the centralization and dominance of commercial platforms on the social Web. We gather evidence from the technology powering the Fediverse (especially the ActivityPub protocol), current statistical data regarding Fediverse user distribution over instances, and the status of two older, similar, decentralized technologies: e-mail and the Web. Our findings suggest that Fediverse will face significant challenges in fulfilling its decentralization promises, potentially hindering its ability to positively impact the social Web on a large scale.
Some challenges mentioned in the paper:
- Discoverability as there is no central or unified index
- Complicated moderation efforts due to its decentralized nature
- Interoperability between instances of different types (e.g., Lemmy and Funkwhale)
- Concentration on a small number of large instances
- The risk of commercial capture by Big Tech
What are your thoughts on this? And how could we make the Fediverse a better place for all to stay?
I‘d say I‘ve fully embraced the fediverse for over a year, running half a dozen instances for many fediverse services.
The discoverability is indeed an issue for many services but the worst on peertube. It actually has great content but nobody sees it due to it not being properly suggested.
On lemmy vs reddit I can proudly say a lot of topics have great content and its not easy to run out of it if you subscribe to varied communities. One big problem is how spoiled the users of commercial socials are. The amount of people there is of course insane compared to here so someone used to heroine (x, facebook and reddit) will always feel withdrawal on lemmy, mastodon and such.
Imo, we need to keep making strong, compelling cases for the fediverse, against the corpoverse and increase our technical arsenal. Peertube needs clients for every platform and a central discovery (for example instances.joinpeertube.org).
We also need more straightforward installation procedures so more people can host their own. Of course non tech folks will have a hard time either way but a „fire and forget“ compose file or ansible playbook, ideally next to one another like with awesome selfhosted on github.
heroine
Heroin :)
We also need more straightforward installation procedures so more people can host their own.
Hosting your own instance is not a fire and forget operation. The closest thing is single-user instances, but even then there are matters the admin must handle. Plus, there's little incentive for doing all this work.
Discoverability is an issue that I identified quickly. One reason why artists mostly stick to X may very well be the small user base, as well the fractured nature of the fediverse making it hard to gain reach
Be great to get actual instance operators and admins to chime in on this. I already feel like a single aspect of that (Lemmy) is fantastic and I'd be satisfied if it was at its zenith already in terms of what it brought to the table
It's a reasonable MVP, but still needs major progress around discoverability.
I've tried dragging some friends in, and they're not opposed to leaving reddit, but the refrain is always 'topic x isn't there' or 'nobody is posting anything'.
You can easily pick the "wrong" community on a topic, and see zero content when there's another one full of posts but... how do you know which community on what server is the "right" one without finding a 3rd party tool that can provide metrics and you've lost most of the people who were interested at that point.
And, since Lemmy is quite a lot slower, it's also hard to tell if you're in the right place but nobody is posting or if you're in the wrong one and nobody is ever going to post anything, which kinda makes this require a lot more time than just picking the single subreddit that looks like what you're after.
I’ve tried dragging some friends in, and they’re not opposed to leaving reddit, but the refrain is always ‘topic x isn’t there’ or ‘nobody is posting anything’.
You can easily pick the “wrong” community on a topic, and see zero content when there’s another one full of posts but… how do you know which community on what server is the “right” one without finding a 3rd party tool that can provide metrics and you’ve lost most of the people who were interested at that point.
@[email protected] , our discussion earlier today 😄
It does the job. I don't use corpo socials anymore
I think its been interesting to watch. What has happened is that there is now a super large instance in Lemmy.world, and a handful of smaller ones with above a thousand users.
The promise of proper decentralization didn't really happen. There are hundreds of small instances but they are not self contained and completely depend on the larger ones to get content.
Defederation seems to be common since admins don't want to deal with moderating hostile conversations, which makes a lot of sense. But it also makes it a echo chamber to some degree. We see mostly memes and jokes instead of meaningful discussions. So it's great for a fun time but not so much more than that.
Still, I'm happy it's an alternative to reddit and those shitty services. I love that it's run by ordinary people and not tech companies. And no ads or tracking. All good stuff.
I started on beehaw and moved here because they got too defederation-happy. I don't want to post on an antisocial network, if I want to be alone with my thoughts I won't go online at all. It's a valid choice for them to make but I believe in Lemmy because I want a non-corporate non-evasive Reddit, which kinda needs lots of different communities.
We see mostly memes and jokes instead of meaningful discussions.
I blocked meme, some interesting conversations emerged.
can have those
Also the [email protected] threads bring more visibility to smaller active communities
Re Concentration I'm not concerned that it is as of yet a problem. However I do think it is also a larger problem for Mastodon and other user-centric platforms than it is to Lemmy and other community-cetric platforms.
If a Mastodon user wants to leave their server there are migration pains. If your server makes a controversial change, you may have to migrate. As a follower if something goes wrong I have to remember that I was following Ada & Bob, but maybe Bob now goes by Bobby.
However as a Lemmy user I can just abandon my server and be done with it. If my server makes a controversial change, I can just leave. As a community follower can watch as Star Trek Memes becomes Risa, or Risa becomes Ten Forward. The names changed completely but it's easy to find my community again.
If the server goes bust, the community is gone.
Remember lemmy.film 😔
So the community (users) can move, but I just realized that when an instance shuts down the community (posts) limps on, preventing the community (posts) from actually dying and the community (users) from moving on.
For instance, if you asked me, a lemmy.world user about [email protected] I would see, https://lemmy.world/c/[email protected]
But if you ask a sh.itjust.works user they see, https://sh.itjust.works/c/[email protected]
And lemmy.ml users see, https://lemmy.ml/c/[email protected]
We all see different versions of the same community (posts).
I think https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/issues/4619 would fix this.
Good to have a reality check, but this is still better than what we had before
While the researcher is someone with some really solid knowledge and experience I don't think he was fair in his analysis.
I see those challenges mostly affected and still affect e-mail and the Web and survived somehow so far, they are indeed not free from them, threats return from time to time when a Big Tech get a large quota: not like my opinion is important nor an expert one but I think the decentralisation philosophy is well beyond the fediverse only and its destiny is linked to it in the same way as other things.