Microblogging Blues

[grayestofghosts]

I am not sure if anyone is aware of the drama ongoing at BlueSky, but uh... essentially, Jay has been dismissive and making fun of users who do not want Jesse Singal on the platform, and moderation has gone on a spree of banning people who criticize her, including permabanning original long-time users. So naturally people are talking about alternatives.

And it's very disconcerting because the lifecycle of these sites are getting shorter and shorter, and people are pointing out how BlueSky is meant to be a protocol that can be used by other servers (? I am still not quite sure how this works and how it's different from Mastodon in that respect, but we will see) but lots of people are talking about jumping ship and going to Tumblr or even DreamWidth and the thing is these people seem to want microblogging and yet microblogging platforms continue to prove themselves to be terrible, and it's like... maybe there's a reason why microblogging platforms, specifically, tend to be terrible.

There was at least one user recommending microblogging from Dreamwidth (I guess several short posts per day on DW?) which I guess is possible but I'm not sure how that wouldn't drive people nuts. I do follow one person who does this, which I appreciate, but if everyone on my feed posted that way I think it would become unusable. I haven't been using my bearblog but I'm wondering how much it could be used for microblogging... as in, I am wondering if it would be worth it to test the character limits of the titles, and maybe it could be done. It definitely wouldn't be the same as BlueSky or even Dreamwidth at all but it could possibly be something?

I don't know, microblogging has created a unique niche in the ecosystem that I'm not sure can be replaced, and it's easy to question whether it should be replaced and even if I hate it I'm really not sure it should be.

Comments

Thoughts

[ysabetwordsmith]

>> I am not sure if anyone is aware of the drama ongoing at BlueSky <<

Alas!

>> And it's very disconcerting because the lifecycle of these sites are getting shorter and shorter <<

I agree, that's a problem.

>> lots of people are talking about jumping ship and going to Tumblr or even DreamWidth <<

Yay, incoming wave! :D I'd cover it immediately but today is my Poetry Fishbowl. I'll try to get to it later.

>> and the thing is these people seem to want microblogging and yet microblogging platforms continue to prove themselves to be terrible, and it's like... maybe there's a reason why microblogging platforms, specifically, tend to be terrible.<<

One obvious reason is that a short post means you can send it without thinking twice. The longer the post, the more time you have to reflect whether you really want to send it. The only way around that I've seen is having a nanny program pop up with "Are you sure you want to post this?" which seems unbearably obnoxious.

Another reason is the design itself. Many social media platforms, especially short-form ones, are specifically designed to be addictive and to play on parts of the human psyche that quickly lead to terrible places. It is a choice to build and use such things.

>> There was at least one user recommending microblogging from Dreamwidth (I guess several short posts per day on DW?) which I guess is possible but I'm not sure how that wouldn't drive people nuts. <<

There is a branch of DW users, mostly Twitter or Facebook refugees, who use DW for short-form blogging. That's fine, it's flexible. You can subscribe to them if you like that, or not if you don't. It doesn't have to be high frequency, although it can. Among the more common short-form post types are:

* Three Things Make a Post

* Word of the Day

* famous quotes

* just a link or image someone enjoyed

>> I haven't been using my bearblog but I'm wondering how much it could be used for microblogging... as in, I am wondering if it would be worth it to test the character limits of the titles, and maybe it could be done. <<

Give it a try and then you'll know.

>>I don't know, microblogging has created a unique niche in the ecosystem that I'm not sure can be replaced, <<

I agree that it has its own niche.

>>and it's easy to question whether it should be replaced and even if I hate it I'm really not sure it should be.<<

I'd hate to see it disappear because other folks love it even if it's not really my thing. I wish someone would make a healthier version though. At least, something with robust privacy and moderation tools so users could shut off content they dislike.

Re: Thoughts

[grayestofghosts]

I feel like a not insignificant amount of BlueSky and other microblogging sites could be replaced by journaling apps, as in, not every thought in your head has to be posted, but it's hard to argue that such sites have not had a significant effect on organizing since the Arab Spring and this isn't counting people who use them for art and business, so yeah, I don't think they can be 'gotten rid of' despite their problems.

Re: Thoughts

[ysabetwordsmith]

>> I feel like a not insignificant amount of BlueSky and other microblogging sites could be replaced by journaling apps, as in, not every thought in your head has to be posted,<<

True. Many people have tried long-form platforms and decided they liked the extra space.

>> but it's hard to argue that such sites have not had a significant effect on organizing since the Arab Spring and this isn't counting people who use them for art and business,<<

I'm an event reviewer and the most popular business site is Facebook. It's where people are putting their casual -- and sometimes even more serious -- craft businesses and announcing events. I don't like it, but if that's the only link I've got, it goes in the event report.

Also many people rely on these services who can't get to events or have a hard time going places to socialize. It's their connection to the world. There was a lot of ruckus when Twitter went to hell because so many disabled people were using it and didn't have an alternative. :/

>> so yeah, I don't think they can be 'gotten rid of' despite their problems.<<

True.

I did get a couple of posts up on newcomers today:

Trouble Brewing at Bluesky

Find Your Bluesky Friends

I'm not on Bluesky so all I can do is get the ball rolling. At least those posts are there for anyone who wants to pass them around as resources. I'm hoping that someone who uses Bluesky will chime in with more details about the conflicts over there and maybe a guide to Dreamwidth for Bluesky users.

[axolotls]

Re: Bluesky vs Mastodon (or rather, ATprotocol vs ActivityPub), the main difference is that the former splits the infrastructure up into several pieces that can be mixed and matched, while the latter just works with single servers talking to each other + clients for users to view stuff through. ATproto also has the benefit of decentralised user IDs, so actual migration to another server that hosts a user's data (in this case known as a PDS) without any disruption is possible. This recent post goes into it a bit more if you're curious.

[grayestofghosts]

I'm going to have to do some reading on it in case everything goes kaput again, but honestly though given that people thought Mastodon was 'too complicated' (rather than servers being able to run things like petty fiefdoms and disappear on a moment's notice like back in forum times might actually be bad) my hopes are not especially high. I don't really want to call it "dumbing down" because computers are horrible and having to know how they work is a curse but keeping the barrier of entry low enough that people who don't make Good At Computer a full-time job can be adequately connected and have broad reach while not having to deal with horrible providers might just not be possible in the current environment given profit motive etc.

[axolotls]

Maybe, yeah. From what I gather a lot of the backend stuff (which bits of the infrastructure are used and how) wouldn't be visible to end users at least, so all they'd have to care about would be where their data is hosted (the PDS), and which client apps they use (e.g. Bluesky through the official website, etc.). So hopefully things can be made user-friendly enough that folks just don't have to think about it much, not more than email (which server and address you're using, and which client (Gmail, Thunderbird, Outlook) you use to access it).

[zavodilaterrarium]

Oh, that’s not good. I don’t use my BlueSky acc and don’t keep up with news about it, so I was totally unaware.

[meridian_rose]

I don't even go here, as they say, regarding BlueSky but at what point do people learn to curate their own experiences and stop demanding censorship, cancellation, and in general think they should personally who is allowed to have a social media account on a particular platform.

Not a fan of microblogging via DW; but each to their own. Again I can follow/not follow a particular blog if it's posting so frequently I find it annoying.

[grayestofghosts]

It's hard to block site management or even anyone else if site management keeps deleting your block lists.

[meridian_rose]

That's a fair point. If I spend time blocking on any site I expect those blocks to be respected.