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Threads is officially starting to test ActivityPub integration
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this post was submitted on 13 Dec 2023
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I look forward to reading everyone's calm and measured reactions
My primary concern is that they appear to be allowing Thread content to be pulled into other Fedi clients, but not the inverse. So Threads content on Mastodon, but no Mastodon content on Threads. That’s not super great for Mastodon exposure.
Also, given the vast differences in daily active users, wouldn’t Mastodon become flooded, and eventually dependent, on Threads content?
You know what, I was very confused why they would add Fedi integration but unidirectional integration makes a ton of sense from a corporate scumbag POV.
Just defederate them and move on.
Jfc sounds like they're just paving over the community with a giant ad of themselves
Servers only pull subscribed user content, so it's not like the option is nothing or The Firehose. Meta can't push content into the Fediverse.
I think it's important to note that Meta doesn't have more power than anyone else here. They're just a large instance. They have the same forces keeping them honest as anyone else and their size doesn't change the incentives for mods and admins. Mods don't have an interest in working for Meta for free. If they're spending too much of their time moderating that content, Threads will be limited or defederated.
Given Meta's size and history it's understandable to be concerned. At the end of the day though, they'll either play nice or get bounced. I think we'll be fine either way.
What about clients that have discovery feeds for content you might not be subbed to? Would that be a problem?
That's a good question. I don't know. My guess is that you could be exposed to Threads content you don't want in the same way you could be exposed to Mastodon content you don't want. I can't imagine they're not set up to respect blocks, mutes, or server suspensions though, right? They have a way bigger problem than Threads if they don't.
What do you mean discovery feeds? Like the federated/all tab?
Because those feeds only show posts that the instance knows about, which is (mostly) posts from people that at least one person on your instance followed.
If you check the all tab on a small instance, it's a lot quieter than it is on something like mastodon.social.
https://ploum.net/2023-06-23-how-to-kill-decentralised-networks.html
I personally remain neutral on this. The issue you point out is definitely a problem, but Threads is just now testing this, so I think it's too early to tell. Same with embrace, extend, extinguish concerns. People should be vigilant of the risks, and prepared, but we're still mostly in wait and see land. On the other hand, threads could be a boon for the fidiverse and help to make it the main way social media works in five years time. We just don't know yet.
There are just always a lot of "the sky is falling" takes about Threads that I think are overblown and reactionary
Just to be extra controversial, I'm actually coming around on Meta as a company a bit. They absolutely were evil, and I don't fully trust them, but I think they've been trying to clean up their image and move in a better direction. I think Meta is genuinely interested in Activitypub and while their intentions are not pure, and are certainly profit driven, I don't think they have a master plan to destroy the fidiverse. I think they see it in their long term interest for more people to be on the fidiverse so they can more easily compete with TikTok, X, and whatever comes next without the problems of platform lockin and account migration. Also meta is probably the biggest player in open source llm development, so they've earned some open source brownie points from me, particularly since I think AI is going to be a big thing and open source development is crucial so we don't end up ina world where two or three companies control the AGI that everyone else depends on. So my opinion of Meta is evolving past the Cambridge Analytica taste that's been in my mouth for years.
You had us in the first half, but anyone who thinks theres any part of meta thats trustworthy is either paid off or an idiot. Sorry bud, but thats fresh horseshit flavor thats rinsing the CA taste from your mouth.
Facebook isnt even actually dead yet, youre 4-6 decades too early to even entertain the thought that meta is safe to conditionally trust.
That's totally fair and I knew that would be controversial. I'm very heavily focused on AI professionally and I give very few shits about social media, so maybe my perspective is a little different. The fact that there is an active open source AI community owes a ton to Meta training and releasing their Llama LLM models as open source. Training LLMs is very hard and very expensive, so Meta is functionally subsidizing the open source AI community, and their role I think is pretty clearly very positive in that they are preventing AI from being entirely controlled by Google and OpenAI/Microsoft. Given the stakes of AI, the positive role Meta has played with open source developers, it's really hard to be like "yeah but remember CA 7 years ago and what about how Facebook rotted my uncle's brain!"
All of that said, I'm still not buying a quest, or signing up for any Meta social products, I don't like or trust them. I just don't have the rage hardon a lot of people do.
Big difference between "large company tries to undermine its competitors" and "large company is working with people to advance new tech."
Meta is using open source to try and slow down its 2 biggest enemies in the field who have better funding and resources. That open source benefits the masses is incidental and likely regretful from metas perspective. They just dont have a better option to prevent themselves being left in the dust.
I'm not going to argue Meta doesn't have a profit incentive here, but if they just wanted to slow down their rivals they could have closed source their model and released their own product using the model, or shared it with a dozen or so promising startups. They gain nothing by open sourcing, but did it anyway. Whatever their motivations, at the end of the day they opened sourced a model, so good for them.
I really dislike being in the position of defending Meta, but the world is not all black and white, there are no good guys and bad guys. Meta is capable of doing good things, and maybe overtime they'll build a positive reputation. I honestly think they are tired of being the shitty evil company that everyone hates, who is best known for a shitty product nobody but boomers uses, and have been searching for years now for a path forward. I think threads, including Activitypub, and Llama are evidence that their exploring a different direction. Will they live up to their commitments on both Activitypub and open source, I don't know, and I think it's totally fair to be skeptical, but I'm willing to keep an open mind and acknowledge when they do good things and move in the right direction.
Im also sure they are sick of their reputation.
I just dont see how open sourcing a new type of tech that is riddled with ethical issues over intellectual property rights and content replacement in a way that doesnt actually really address those ethical questions has done anything to change their reputation.
Id love to see them move in a right direction. But I dont think chasing the heels of their competitors swinging a bolas in the hopes of catching a dropped lunch is the right direction.
(And if you dont wanna keep arguing it 100% fair, but they definitely benefit from open sourcing their work.)
I actually agree with this take.
but is mainstream social media
If they opened as read only then they created API in a most convoluted way possible. If that ridonculous claim is true then I wonder when we see first third party Threads apps.
People on Mastodon are preemptively blocking federation. What can I say 🤷
Just a nice high five for them not falling for corporate embrace and extinguish bullshit when it is in the embrace phase!
Kinda lame. I wonder what site allows it
Me too! Just keep calm and scroll!
Came here to learn whether I'm supposed to like this
Do you like snarky Wendy’s ads?
...kinda?
Well you are not allowed to
Oh. Sorry, I'll stop.
Well that was civil
And informative!
Over the last week I've truly learned the depths of this and my researched conclusion is .. no bueno
did you join fediverse to escape big companies
Me, not necessarily. I think it will be a good thing when big companies run fediverse instances too. The point of the fediverse is to have choices whom (including which big company) to trust.