2y ago

Should we also take a serious look at properly governed centralised solutions instead of federations decentralisation? What about a non-profit running a platform with democratic governance?

While the second paragraph has been slightly debunked, the first paragraph is an interesting idea I've underappreciated/neglected until now.

What do you think? Perhaps this is easier/more-scaleable than having federated instances with decentralised and often complex governance?

11 comments

I can see non-profits, but I do not want governments running social media platforms. Regulating them, yes - but not running them. They do not have any competence in moderating online conversation, and it would be bad to give them the sole authority to do so.
- Agreed. I meant governance in general - but not the government.
I don't think it matters how democratically elected a centralized solution is, it will still require decisions to keep the platform profitable which disenfranchises the users that provide all the content for the platform.
Decentralizing reduces that overhead cost, removes the need for appealing to investors, and places the power back into the users hands. It's currently skewed because everyone is flocking to larger instances, but when people are finally comfortable with the platform we should see a load balancing. And, if people are worried about being defederated on their large instance, they can always self host for almost free and have access to everywhere.
- still require decisions to keep the platform profitable which disenfranchises the users that provide all the content for the platform.
  This is independent of the centralisation/Decentralisation part. Infrastructure and Moderation costs are created anyways. Ideally, these are finances by community donations and co. But a non-profit isn't going to focus on profit, because it's non-profit and because the community at large can vote them out if they start to worsen the platform.
  In general I agree with your benefits of decentralisation. However, for people not much into Lemmy/Reddit/etc. the decision making is indeed much more difficult - and hard to comprehend.
Wikipedia is doing a thing: https://wts2.wt.social ActivityPub is on the roadmap apparently. @swnt
- Interesting! Thanks!
Federation will live forever, it's not that certain with anything centralised.
- Yes and no.
  Usenet is decentralised but hardly any relevant discussions in society happen there. (Unless you prove me wrong.)
  What matters is that the platform in question is useable and solved relevant communication/coordination problems. And it's not clear, that one is always better than the other.
  For Blockchains and crypto, automation and decentralisation works well in hand. But for softer topics like like aggregation forums, it's not clear IMO.
  
  Usenet is decentralised but hardly any relevant discussions in society happen there. (Unless you prove me wrong.)
  Huh? It used to be more important than reddit ever was. And people can always go back there. It is decentralized but does not feel decentralized to users. All discussion groups from every server are automatically merged together into one.

11 comments