no more billionaires and no more american run social networks pls
Seems iffy to have any sort of federated system for a video based format. Maybe there are some clever compression or hosting tricks to reduce data load.
tapping the “there are no good billionaires” sign
remember when Jeff Bezos bought the Washington Post, slapped “Democracy dies in darkness” on the masthead, and a bunch of MSNBC-brained liberals thought it was going to be the newspaper that led the resistance against Trump?
I just woke up from a years-long coma. could someone tell me how that worked out?
I love seeing “democracy dies in darkness” peeking through the paywall/login barrier.
Send Loops/Pixelfed a cheque instead
Only if the cheque goes towards improving the UX of it all. The main thing that prevents normal users from switching is forcing them to learn new concepts like federation, picking a server, and all that entails.
People here are in a bubble where they think everyone else is as tech savvy as them.
And people beginning the conversation with “blah is a service you can self host” doesn’t help. Such a personal pet peeve.
It’s the new “btw I use arch”
Btw I use Arch.
He shoudn’t send DanSupp a cheque directly, but help him setup a non-profit or foundation for Pixelfed, then give that foundation a cheque.
Dan is doing a good job developing Pixelfed, but it looks like a one-man show, and that’s a bottleneck for the project.
Yeah, no thanks. We have Pixelfed, let’s just make that even better.
Honestly I think that reels in general are toxic to mental health. I say we just move on.
Unfortunately that’s not going to happen. They’re something people have become accustomed and addicted to. There’s no going back now. The only hope for combating them is to come up with something at least as compelling, but hopefully less harmful. Like vaping is to smoking. What that is though, I have no idea.
I say we just get everyone on hard drugs. Only kidding, don’t worry. But I’d definitely like some hard drugs for me.
Arguably, ActivityPub has its shortcomings. Also, having another protocol similar to ActivityPub creates more competition which drives innovation (and gets people away from corporate-controlled sites like Meta).
And you think Mark Cuban is funding what, exactly? A member’s co-op?
If you are referencing this article, then he isn’t funding anything. He is willing to consider backing a TikTok like platform that uses the AT Protocol.
I think the problem is that people aren’t hooked to the short video format of TikTok, which there are already many alternatives for, but they are hooked to the algorithm that feeds them endless personalized content with simple guidance (show me more/less like this).
It’s possible to create curated and algorithm-like feeds on Bluesky, but they don’t allow for easy personalization in the same way.
i donno, tiktok is good for maybe one or two videos before it devolves into doomscrolling. it has the same shortcomings as any other engagement-baitgorithms. even my wife complains that they won’t miss tiktok for how boring it gets.
The thing about the TikTok algorithm seems to be that there are a lot less… fingers in the pudding so to speak, it doesn’t seem to have much preference on what kinds of content users get steered to, responding more actively to what they actually show interest in.
Other systems seem to have strong preferences about what topic and styles they steer users too or away from. Distorting what content users are steered towards tends to flood their feeds with things they’re not super interested in, because what they actually showed interest in is not promoted by the system, or even actively demoted.
I can understand the convenience of these algorithms, but they always have the same subtly undermining goal: to make people addicted. The fact that TikTok’s algorithm is so good at this is worrying to me even if it doesn’t have an overt bias. It’s also why I think people are having such crazy reactions to the pending ban, even the thought of withdrawal is too much.
I think its appeal mainly comes from the fact that it’s not overtly biased. Other algorithms could achieve the same if it wasn’t for the fact that they’re so heavy handed in what they allow the feed to promote.
It’s also why I think people are having such crazy reactions to the pending ban, even the thought of withdrawal is too much.
I feel like this is a pretty shitty over simplification. People are mad about the censorship aspect and see it as yet another step towards authoritarianism (or deeper into it, not trying to split hairs about the current state of the US government).
Oh yeah it must be the Trump years again because Mark Cuban is back at it pretending to be the stopgap solution everyone is already bypassing
Tik Tok doesn’t become better just because another one creates the same.
