 |
-------------------------------------------- |
|
Decentralization |
|
2018.03.18 16:49:18 CET |
|
-------------------------------------------- |
|
|
|
I'm a supporter of decentralization. Not only because of the risks |
|
associated with monopolies and monocultures, but primarily because |
|
enjoy the organic nature of do-it-yourself self-hosted content. |
|
|
|
Social networks have made it very easy to reduce a member to a fix |
|
number of dimensions and interaction down to pre-conceived ideas |
|
about what members want. This minimizes the learning curve when |
|
joining, at the long-term cost of minimizing oneself. Decentralize |
|
protocols offer an alternative by specifying *how* things are shar |
|
instead of *what* things are shared. |
|
|
|
Unfortunately, most users make decisions with short-term gains in |
|
sight and migrate when frustrated later. This is my explanation fo |
|
the rise-climax-decline of successive social networks, with Facebo |
|
now trying to delay kismet. |
|
|
|
I've seen a number of recent phlog posts about decentralization of |
|
Gopher servers and I'm all for it. One of my pet projects, which i |
|
unfortunately halted at the moment, is a IPFS-based Gopher server. |
|
All the mirroring is done automatically, anyone can spin up a serv |
|
and deliver the same content as everyone else. The server becomes |
|
simply a gateway to the individual expression of members. |
|
|
|
One thing I do wish we had in Gopherspace is RSS. This would make |
|
much easier to aggregate, follow and consume content by others, wh |
|
making decentralization even easier. |
|
|
|
Just writing about these things get me excited again about working |
|
that project of mine. |
