this post was submitted on 06 Jul 2023
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It's not only the defederation. It's the message that it sends. Defederating "Threads" says: "We don't see any value in this service. People who think like us shouldn't join it."
Don't underestimate the power of influence we techies (or first movers) have. Regular people look to us for guidance on which service to choose from the wide variety out there.
If we say, "This doesn't hold any value." less people will choose it. The effect may be small, but it is there, and it is accumulative.
I guess that makes us both guilty of underestimating Meta's resources and influence.
Even in an unlikely event that people would notice our existence, should we choose to preemptively defederate Meta, it is much more likely for Meta to push the narrative that 'they' were the ones who deferated us. No one's gonna hear about our values and what we stand for, even if they did, why would they believe us over the platform which allegedly has the power to influence elections?
edit: They don't even need to make stuff up, they can just say they were unable to guarantee a safe and well moderated space as a company if they were to stay federated.
While you're right, they have massive influence, but we have the moral high ground.
The people we are close to, our friends, relatives, etc. will believe in us. That's all we need, because this is the most sustainable growth there is.
We don't need to spew marketing propaganda. We just need to stand our ground and not endorse companies which will operate opposite of our values.
That's too optimistic, even for me. Peoples' perception will decide the fate of the technology. You might be able to influence a couple of friends and family but the general public is much much larger.
Just take a look at what happened to cryptocurrency. It was an amazing and novel idea, decentrilizing money, cutting the banks, and the goverment from day to day transactions. It had it flaws but nothing that couldn't be fixed with a few iterations. Nowadays ordinary people won't touch it because it's either for 'illegal activities', 'scams', or 'gambling'.
While I might only be able to influence a few people, the act of defederating Meta will have the power to influence a lot of people to influence a lot of other people.
Why would anyone want to recommend an App which can't even interact with the most promising communication network in recent years?
Federating with Meta will send the opposite message: "Yes, we endorse them. You can choose either us or them. Have fun."
I do not endorse them and I don't want anybody I know of to think I do.