Comment by usernomdeguerre
2 hours ago
The unfortunate part is that each individual who attempts to leave is fighting the Network Effect[0]. It's fighting against the human organism's basic social nature.
If every person wants to leave the platform but X person stays because Y person is there, and Y person stays because Z person is there, and Z person stays because X person is there then it's a feedback loop. Each person wants a better solution or platform, but none end up leaving because of the network effect.
Breaking that dependency involves the individual user but can't be overcome by the individual alone. Over time, the network re-asserts itself and monopolizes the connections.
I think Twitter is the best counterargument to this defeatism. I don't personally know anyone that uses the platform any more, and I don't recall needing it for anything for years. From that remove, it's now just the platform for lazy politicians, lazy journalists, and scammers of one form or another. If there's more exclusive information there I'm not aware of, I really don't need it.
Yes. And if something truly important should occur on the platform then it will be reported elsewhere.
What do we really think we're missing out on by not using X?
My solution to this is creating bots that repost content on sites like bluesky. The network effect can be overcome because people use a site for the content it has and not necessarily to interact with others
Of course I only do it with accounts that are very obviously intended to be public like news and government accounts otherwise x and meta can argue you were violating user privacy or some shit like that
Is there any service that exists to do this for people?
Like say you want your Twitter forwarded to your Facebook page and email list, you just punch in the logins and it does the rest?
Ideally it would fill in the details like formatting the images/video correctly
If This Then That?
Is it legal?
Why wouldn't it be? I know we've all got accustomed to the idea that preventing a billionaire from extorting money gets you in trouble, and it usually does, but it's not illegal.
Not really relevant for public service announcements like gp is talking about. I just want a live feed of my local services updates. I get weather alerts from my city and county over text (contracted by the government through a third party platform), I would take them as a dedicated app or rss feed or anything. I'm not connecting to my friends or family through a weather alert or train delay notice
I find texting pretty decent but not ideal. Most alert systems offer it already, you know it's going to be a short message, and you'll be informed quickly of things instead of having to reach out somewhere.
Maybe there should be a texting app where you can make pages of contacts to swipe between, and you can customize notifications. If you want to get fancy, maybe local AI to determine if something looks important or not? They'll always have ALERT or something in the message.
RSS was so good for this. No wonder Google had to kill it.
RSS still exists though? Do you mean Google Reader?
1 reply →
Yes, yes, and yes.
Let's revive RSS.
It's still good, even if it's been on the floor beyond the "five second rule".
If there were an API or reliable way to delete accounts programmatically, you could create a reverse-kickstarter-like site in which you pledged automatic future deletion of your account once a critical percentage of the people you followed (or who followed you) did the same. Action would be suspended for all participants until that critical threshold was reached.
I like this reasoning. Network effect means if a website gets very big it will be very big forever. This is why I get my news from the o rly owl on the world’s most popular website, the OffTopic Forums
Unfortunate, yes.
Futile? No.
Remember that AT&T once had a firm grip over human communication. That didn't last.
Remember that AOL once had a firm grip over how a massive percentage of the population accessed the internet. That didn't last.
Elon Musk currently has a firm grip on social media (via X) and internet access (via Starlink). This too will not last.
Remember AT&T only lost its monopoly because the government forced it to.
X and Starlink don't even remotely have a "firm grip" over the social media or Internet access markets. They have many active competitors.
> X and Starlink don't even remotely have a "firm grip" over the social media or Internet access markets. They have many active competitors.
Starlink's market isn't "Internet access" in general. Anywhere you can get fibre, fibre will be faster and cheaper. For many use cases a cell tower works better too, if you are in its coverage area.
Starlink's market is "high bandwidth / low latency Internet access no matter where you are on Earth". And for that it is by far the market leader. Its closest competitors are way behind – second place Amazon's Kuiper has under 400 satellites in orbit, Starlink has over 11,000. So Starlink is over an order of magnitude in front.
Ok. Show your work.
Which social network has larger reach than X? Which social network has stronger influence on humans who make policy decisions than X?
Which internet provider can deliver reliable access to remote regions than Starlink? Which internet provider has manipulated access in contested regions than Starlink?
Maybe you're right, maybe you're wrong. I don't know. What I do know is that your baseless assertions are meaningless to me. Show the facts and figures that support your claims. That's the only way to avoid being a garden-variety internet troll.
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Elon Musk learned from the other two and many others. Unfortunately, Silicon Valey techno-feudalism is built to last.
I agree that SV's regressive culture is a problem. I've seen it up close. I don't have a solution, but I am concerned about where this trend might lead us.