Pluralistic: Enshittification isn't caused by venture capital (20 Jan 2025)


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Pluralistic: Social media needs (dumpster) fire exits (14 Dec 2024)


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Pluralistic: Bluesky and enshittification (02 Nov 2024)


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Pluralistic: Pinkdrunk Linkdump (18 Nov 2023)


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  • Pinkdrunk Linkdump: Your semi-regular weekend declaration of link bankruptcy.
  • This day in history: 2003, 2008, 2013, 2018
  • Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming/recent appearances, current writing projects, current reading

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Fool Me Twice We Donā€™t Get Fooled Again

Thereā€™s a crucial difference between federatable and federated.

A pair of fake screenshots, one from Threads, the other from Bluesky. The top one is from a verified account called ā€œgwb1946ā€ whose avatar is George W Bushā€™s flightsuit-clad crotch. The post reads, ā€œThereā€™s an old saying in Tennesseeā€Šā€”ā€ŠI know itā€™s in Texas, probably in Tennesseeā€Šā€”ā€Šthat says, fool me once, shame onā€Šā€”ā€Šshame on you.ā€ The second post is from an account whose handle is ā€œRegimechange,ā€ and whose userid is @missionaccomplished.failson. It reads ā€œFool meā€Šā€”ā€Šyou canā€™t get fooled again.ā€

ā€œAre you on Bluesky?ā€

Friends, colleagues and strangers have emailed me to ask whether Iā€™ve set up on the new, federatable social media incubated at Twitter and spun out, which many view as a viable Twitter successor.

ā€œAre you on Threads?ā€

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Pluralistic: What the fediverse (does/n't) solve (23 Dec 2022)


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Pluralistic: 12 May 2022


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Dead letters

Email could be the last federated internet technologyā€Šā€”ā€Šbut it isnā€™t.

Vintage engraving of a dead letter office where postal officials struggle to decipher addressing information; captioned ā€œWho is it for? A scene in the dead letter office experts trying to decipher an illegible addressā€

It feels like only yesterday that we were living through the Substack bubble, as mailing lists enjoyed a new renaissance (rebranded as ā€œnewslettersā€), a tangible expression of the techlash and our collective disgust with the platforms and their attempts to enclose the internet and convert it to ā€œfive giant websites, each filled with screenshots of text from the other four.ā€

In the abstract, mailing lists/newsletters represent the promise of a return to a Jeffersonian internet, where each of us can garden own little patch, not subject to the whims of third parties. That, after all, is the original design brief of the internet, to be an ā€œend-to-end networkā€ where any party can connect to any other party without needing permission from anyone else.

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Pluralistic: 12 Aug 2020


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Pluralistic: 04 Aug 2020


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