offf, this story about how Google made google search into a pile of seagull shit hits me hard:

https://www.wheresyoured.at/the-men-who-killed-google/
Around the time of this story, I was living through a similar situation in my work life (on a much smaller scope, of course, WordPress.com first, Tumblr later).

Back in 2019, working on WordPress, I started finding myself, almost weekly, arguing against people who wanted to take the product we were working at and made it worse if that mean they could squeeze 0.1% more revenue from it

The 0.1% figure is not even a random number: I remember this speciffic A/B test on WordPress.com that was declared a success and shipped to 100% of the users because it increased the free-to-paid conversion by 0.1%. Soon after it was released, I found out that as a side effect, it increased the churn of free users by 20 something %,so I called for an urgent rollback and removal of the change. So I was promptly explained that we didn't care about free-users churn, because finance had calculated the average long-term value of the free users to be something like $2 per year, and the increase in conversion was bigger than what we could get from them.

Everything became about growth hacking. Everything became thinly-veiled dark patterns. In our private dev slack channels, we joked that since it was impossible to make it smaller or less conspicuous, the next thing the growth team was going to ask us to do was to make the 'free plan' button flee away from the mouse pointer when the user tried to click it. We kept making our product worse, we kept consciously crippling the cheaper versions so we could force people to move to the more expensive options.

Back then I was the lead of one of the two dev divisions working on WordPress.com, so my job was mainly to discuss what we were going to be doing, when and how. And I was getting drained by a constant state of fight against a constant wave of shit they wanted us to build. So much than by the end of 2020, the CEO quietly told me to follow the growth team plans and shut up or step down.

So I requested to move to tumblr, because I thought the pastures were greener over there. But it was all the same: Adding login walls to what we were pretending to be "the last bastion of the free internet", cramping in embarrasingly obvious money-making schemes disguised as features, and making them silently opt-out instead of opt-in so the less people the possible would deactivate them, having to fend off the pressure from the CEO to make everything algorithmic timelines because, you know, tiktok makes a lot of money and why aren't we, etc etc.

I found myself in a place where building something good that people enjoy using was no longer a priority, but tricking people into generating more money for the company was. And when I looked around me, I could see that happening everywhere else, not only in my company. Experiencing the start of the enshittification years from inside wasn't easy.

And, as in the article, the people who decided to turn the shit-metter up to 200%, have a name, in every case. And these people, no matter if they are called Sundar and Prabhakar or Matt and Mark, are destroying the internet. These people are milllionaires, or billionaries, and are destroying our shared, common spaces to squeeze some extra cash from us.

That's why the fediverse and its principles are important. Because that's how we take back internet from their dirty hands. That's how we make internet resilient against them. That's how we build the commons.

Found 27 new servers and 38 servers died off since 3 hours ago.

22,817 servers checked. 13,992,392 Total Users with 1,589,223 Active Users today. Check out the stats!

New #fediverse servers found:

misskey.kazuiton.com a #misskey server from Private
social.catboys.co a #pleroma server from Private
station.y-space.de a #pleroma server from Germany
mistergreen.info a #mastodon server from Germany
465.onl a #mastodon server from Private
coisas.ruiandrebatista.com a #writefreely server from United States
pixelfed.realm3.synology.me a #pixelfed server from United States
social.acoret.online a #pleroma server from China
gifu.love a #misskey server from Private
creature.garden a #mastodon server from Portugal
rachelandrew.co.uk a #wordpress server from Private
blog.mecanique-roliste.fr a #writefreely server from France
mast.sabross.xyz a #mastodon server from United States
masto.colonelkrud.com a #mastodon server from France
lemmy.foxel.org a #lemmy server from Germany
chattrbx.com a #mastodon server from United States
gotosocial.fynhslittle.space a #gotosocial server from Germany
gts.chongcher.com a #gotosocial server from United States
misskey.tiaplate.org a #firefish server from The Netherlands
km.produkti.se a #akkoma server from Sweden
misskey.linux.it.teu.ac.jp a #misskey server from Japan
distributed.press a #sutty-distributed-press server from Canada
nintendo64.org a #akkoma server from United States
misskey.v-nr.net a #misskey server from Private
misskey.pannassh.net a #misskey server from Private
misskey.pink a #misskey server from Private
the.gayest.gay a #iceshrimp server from United States

Help others find a home, send them to fediverse.observer

Found 27 new servers and 28 servers died off since 3 hours ago.

22,827 servers checked. 13,992,392 Total Users with 1,589,223 Active Users today. Check out the stats!

New #fediverse servers found:

misskey.kazuiton.com a #misskey server from Private
social.catboys.co a #pleroma server from Private
station.y-space.de a #pleroma server from Germany
mistergreen.info a #mastodon server from Germany
465.onl a #mastodon server from Private
coisas.ruiandrebatista.com a #writefreely server from United States
pixelfed.realm3.synology.me a #pixelfed server from United States
social.acoret.online a #pleroma server from China
creature.garden a #mastodon server from Portugal
rachelandrew.co.uk a #wordpress server from Private
gifu.love a #misskey server from Private
blog.mecanique-roliste.fr a #writefreely server from France
chattrbx.com a #mastodon server from United States
gotosocial.fynhslittle.space a #gotosocial server from Germany
masto.colonelkrud.com a #mastodon server from France
mast.sabross.xyz a #mastodon server from United States
lemmy.foxel.org a #lemmy server from Germany
gts.chongcher.com a #gotosocial server from United States
misskey.tiaplate.org a #firefish server from The Netherlands
km.produkti.se a #akkoma server from Sweden
misskey.linux.it.teu.ac.jp a #misskey server from Japan
distributed.press a #sutty-distributed-press server from Canada
nintendo64.org a #akkoma server from United States
misskey.v-nr.net a #misskey server from Private
misskey.pannassh.net a #misskey server from Private
misskey.pink a #misskey server from Private
the.gayest.gay a #iceshrimp server from United States

Help others find a home, send them to fediverse.observer

Found 26 new servers and 25 servers died off since 3 hours ago.

22,828 servers checked. 13,992,392 Total Users with 1,589,223 Active Users today. Check out the stats!

New #fediverse servers found:

social.catboys.co a #pleroma server from Private
station.y-space.de a #pleroma server from Germany
mistergreen.info a #mastodon server from Germany
465.onl a #mastodon server from Private
coisas.ruiandrebatista.com a #writefreely server from United States
pixelfed.realm3.synology.me a #pixelfed server from United States
social.acoret.online a #pleroma server from China
blog.mecanique-roliste.fr a #writefreely server from France
gifu.love a #misskey server from Private
creature.garden a #mastodon server from Portugal
rachelandrew.co.uk a #wordpress server from Private
masto.colonelkrud.com a #mastodon server from France
gotosocial.fynhslittle.space a #gotosocial server from Germany
lemmy.foxel.org a #lemmy server from Germany
chattrbx.com a #mastodon server from United States
mast.sabross.xyz a #mastodon server from United States
gts.chongcher.com a #gotosocial server from United States
misskey.tiaplate.org a #firefish server from The Netherlands
km.produkti.se a #akkoma server from Sweden
misskey.linux.it.teu.ac.jp a #misskey server from Japan
distributed.press a #sutty-distributed-press server from Canada
nintendo64.org a #akkoma server from United States
misskey.v-nr.net a #misskey server from Private
misskey.pannassh.net a #misskey server from Private
misskey.pink a #misskey server from Private
the.gayest.gay a #iceshrimp server from United States

Help others find a home, send them to fediverse.observer

Found 23 new servers and 22 servers died off since 3 hours ago.

22,827 servers checked. 13,992,392 Total Users with 1,589,223 Active Users today. Check out the stats!

New #fediverse servers found:

465.onl a #mastodon server from Private
coisas.ruiandrebatista.com a #writefreely server from United States
pixelfed.realm3.synology.me a #pixelfed server from United States
social.acoret.online a #pleroma server from China
gifu.love a #misskey server from Private
rachelandrew.co.uk a #wordpress server from Private
creature.garden a #mastodon server from Portugal
blog.mecanique-roliste.fr a #writefreely server from France
masto.colonelkrud.com a #mastodon server from France
chattrbx.com a #mastodon server from United States
mast.sabross.xyz a #mastodon server from United States
gotosocial.fynhslittle.space a #gotosocial server from Germany
lemmy.foxel.org a #lemmy server from Germany
gts.chongcher.com a #gotosocial server from United States
misskey.tiaplate.org a #firefish server from The Netherlands
km.produkti.se a #akkoma server from Sweden
distributed.press a #sutty-distributed-press server from Canada
misskey.linux.it.teu.ac.jp a #misskey server from Japan
nintendo64.org a #akkoma server from United States
misskey.v-nr.net a #misskey server from Private
misskey.pannassh.net a #misskey server from Private
misskey.pink a #misskey server from Private
the.gayest.gay a #iceshrimp server from United States

Help others find a home, send them to fediverse.observer

Found 20 new servers and 19 servers died off since 3 hours ago.

22,829 servers checked. 13,992,392 Total Users with 1,589,223 Active Users today. Check out the stats!

New #fediverse servers found:

social.acoret.online a #pleroma server from China
rachelandrew.co.uk a #wordpress server from Private
blog.mecanique-roliste.fr a #writefreely server from France
gifu.love a #misskey server from Private
creature.garden a #mastodon server from Portugal
lemmy.foxel.org a #lemmy server from Germany
masto.colonelkrud.com a #mastodon server from France
gotosocial.fynhslittle.space a #gotosocial server from Germany
mast.sabross.xyz a #mastodon server from United States
chattrbx.com a #mastodon server from United States
gts.chongcher.com a #gotosocial server from United States
misskey.tiaplate.org a #firefish server from The Netherlands
km.produkti.se a #akkoma server from Sweden
misskey.linux.it.teu.ac.jp a #misskey server from Japan
distributed.press a #sutty-distributed-press server from Canada
nintendo64.org a #akkoma server from United States
misskey.v-nr.net a #misskey server from Private
misskey.pannassh.net a #misskey server from Private
misskey.pink a #misskey server from Private
the.gayest.gay a #iceshrimp server from United States

Help others find a home, send them to fediverse.observer

It’s a Thing!

Das Fediverse tut sich schwer, das volle Potential der verschiedenen Activity-Objects auszunutzen, hauptsächlich aus Angst, sie falsch oder schlecht darzustellen und deshalb teilen die meisten großen Netzwerke leider nur Notes.

Dabei könnte es so einfach sein!

@deadsuperhero schreibt auf seinem Blog, dass er eigentlich gerne Articles veröffentlichen will, aber (hauptsächlich) durch Mastodon zu Note gezwungen wird, wenn er sicher gehen will, dass der Text vollständig dargestellt wird.

Here’s the problem, though: the biggest player in the space, Mastodon, does a poor job of supporting Article. Instead, every post Mastodon uses is instead a Note. From a semantic point of view, it might not seem like there’s a lot of difference between the two: both are effectively texts posts that can contain some formatting markup, both can hold an arbitrary amount of characters, and both can effectively be used to represent a full article.

A Content-Fallback Mechanism for the Fediverse

Ironischerweise zeigt Mastodon eine föderierte Note vollständig an, auch wenn der Text weit über die eigentlich erlaubten 500 Zeichen hinaus geht, bei einem Article wird statt dessen aber nur die kurze summary benutzt.

Seine Idee: Ein Content-Fallback Mechanismus!

Das heißt jede Aktivität, egal von welchem Typ, liefert zusätzlich zu dem spezifischen Objekt, eine standardisierte Note (content-fallback):
{ "@context":[ "https://www.w3.org/ns/activitystreams", { "Hashtag":"as:Hashtag" } ], "id":"https://wedistribute.org/2024/04/iftas-dsa-guide/", "type":"Article", "content-fallback": { "content":"IFTAS, the dedicated Trust & Safety organization ...", "mediaType":"text/plain", "summary":"", "tag":[{ "href":"https://wedistribute.org/tags/fediverse", "name":"#fediverse", "type":"Hashtag" }], "type":"Note", "updated":"2024-04-11T20:55:29Z" }}Code-Sprache: JSON / JSON mit Kommentaren (json)
Ich verstehe das Problem und finde die Idee generell nicht schlecht, aber eigentlich bietet ActivityPub alles Nötige schon von Haus aus! ActivityPub oder besser ActivityStreams ist so aufgebaut, dass alle Objekte von einem Art Base-Object abgeleitet werden. Das heißt Article, Note, Event oder Place, haben ein gleiches Minimal-Set an Attributen:

• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-attachment]attachment[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-attributedto]attributedTo[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-audience]audience[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-content]content[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-context]context[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-name]name[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-icon]icon[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-image]image[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-inreplyto]inReplyTo[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-published]published[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-replies]replies[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-summary]summary[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-tag]tag[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-updated]updated[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-url]url[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-to]to[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-bto]bto[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-cc]cc[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-bcc]bcc[/url]
• [url=https://www.w3.org/TR/activitystreams-vocabulary/#dfn-mediatype]mediaType[/url]
• …und mehr

Und auch wenn beispielsweise Place oder Event einige spezifische Eigenschaften haben, die nicht jede Plattform „kennt“ und „versteht“, sollte es immer möglich sein, die Beschreibung (description oder summary) und den Titel (name) anzuzeigen.

Das Prinzip ist ähnlich wie, wenn nicht sogar inspiriert durch, schema.org/Thing. Auch hier basieren alle Objekte letztendlich auf einem Thing und trotz der wesentlich größeren Anzahl1 an Objekten und Attributen, können Suchmaschinen sich immer sicher sein, dass es zumindest einen name, eine description und eine url zum Anzeigen gibt.

Bevor wir über also über ein `content-fallback` nachdenken, sollten wir (meiner Meinung nach) erst einmal dafür sorgen, dass die vorhanden Möglichkeiten richtig genutzt werden.

1. The vocabulary currently consists of 806 Types, 1474 Properties 14 Datatypes, 90 Enumerations and 480 Enumeration members. – https://schema.org/docs/schemas.html ↩︎

Found 19 new servers and 37 servers died off since 3 hours ago.

22,923 servers checked. 13,955,384 Total Users with 1,599,899 Active Users today. Check out the stats!

New #fediverse servers found:

uncensored.photos a #pixelfed server from Canada
pl.mintyriver.xyz a #pleroma server from Private
ampersandwich.co.uk a #wordpress server from United Kingdom
alley.emberlift.house a #mastodon server from Germany
socials.cipher.moe a #mastodon server from Private
blog.auengun.net a #gotosocial server from Private
society.chee.party a #pleroma server from United Kingdom
haltia.social a #mastodon server from Finland
stryder.cc a #sharkey server from Private
newgrounds.club a #mastodon server from Private
posts.dship.biz a #writefreely server from Private
fedi.max.is-probably.gay a #snac server from United States
go.surfin.cc a #gotosocial server from United States
social.thepublicfloor.com a #mastodon server from United States
mastodon.tychosystems.uk a #mastodon server from Private
cafeout.in a #misskey server from Japan
tmisskey.aere-sanctuary.net a #misskey server from Japan
malding.online a #pleroma server from Luxembourg
x.qic.one a #sharkey server from United States

Help others find a home, send them to fediverse.observer

Found 18 new servers and 31 servers died off since 3 hours ago.

22,931 servers checked. 13,955,384 Total Users with 1,599,899 Active Users today. Check out the stats!

New #fediverse servers found:

pl.mintyriver.xyz a #pleroma server from Private
ampersandwich.co.uk a #wordpress server from United Kingdom
alley.emberlift.house a #mastodon server from Germany
socials.cipher.moe a #mastodon server from Private
blog.auengun.net a #gotosocial server from Private
society.chee.party a #pleroma server from United Kingdom
haltia.social a #mastodon server from Finland
fedi.max.is-probably.gay a #snac server from United States
posts.dship.biz a #writefreely server from Private
mastodon.tychosystems.uk a #mastodon server from Private
stryder.cc a #sharkey server from Private
go.surfin.cc a #gotosocial server from United States
social.thepublicfloor.com a #mastodon server from United States
newgrounds.club a #mastodon server from Private
cafeout.in a #misskey server from Japan
tmisskey.aere-sanctuary.net a #misskey server from Japan
x.qic.one a #sharkey server from United States
malding.online a #pleroma server from Luxembourg

Help others find a home, send them to fediverse.observer