(Reading through the explanations on why Echofeed is being shut down, I feel the painful technical part of it more and more and I'm kind of sad there wasn't a chance to provide more help to still sort of keep that running. But I am also left wondering whether this is sort of a watershed moment of learning that this POSSE approach often proposed by the IndieWeb crowd actually just works in a very limited DYIish content for people who are able to handle that on their very own within their very own small scale with handcrafted solutions - which excludes everyone not really able of doing so at all. And it makes me wonder whether, ultimately, the idea proposed by ATProto - keep all your data in one single repository and available, visible to multiple different applications catering to different needs - might generally be smarter than having to copy data all around the 'net dozens and dozens of times.)

Washed into my timeline, in between:

"Traditional federation lacks modularity. Hosting, distribution, moderation, algorithms, and business logic are located in the hosting instance. This creates a weak separation of powers. Ideally, users reduce the power of a popular instance by devolving specific functions to other providers. We want to preserve rights in the default course of operation; separating powers helps achieve that."

https://www.pfrazee.com/blog/practical-decentralization - definitely worth reading. In virtually every paragraph of it.

#digital_technologies #social_networks #atproto #activitypub #federation

Each and every time users decides to stay on a difficult instance because moving elsewhere means losing all their history and communications, that bright north star of the Fediverse is losing a bit of its shine. (Just imagine losing all your messages while switching your e-mail provider... .)

Interesting to notice that, even though things like that usually make it around here, the Digital Cleanup Day went by almost unnoticed by the different timelines I'm living in. Which is sad, because that's something that more than just a bit should be taken into consideration I guess. As in: Reducing energy consumption. Making machines last longer and perform better. Reducing network bandwidth consumed. Reducing personal time of life to be spent on digital tools and platforms. This seems a good thing to notice and keep in mind from an end-users perspective, as in "be aware of what tools you use, and try to minimize these as much as somewhat possible". But it also ... seems an interesting thing to consider for developers of software and operators of services. As in: How to ensure whatever "we" offer can be used by people under these circumstances? How to make sure our tools minimize energy consumption or resource demands on their end? How to make sure the tools we offer limit resource needs globally? How to make sure the tools we provide help people doing whatever they need or want to do without adding unneccessary clutter or complexity to their lives? There's still room for improvement, here and there.

https://www.digitalcleanupday.org/ 

#digital_technologies #linkdump #minimalism #sustainability