@quillmatiq @mike @mmasnick @ricci
Understand that there are a lot of interesting and creative things going on with AT Proto.
The reason for referencing Rob's AWDY metric is to help with convos like the one between you and Mike. That is, he states it is not meaningfully decentralized and you reply with a list of apps and projects. He's talking about ground truth and you are addressing technological potential.
Perhaps decentralizable and decentralized, although that let's a lot of pushback.
@mike @mastodonmigration @mmasnick @quillmatiq eurosky isn't running anything at all so far, not even a PDS so far as I can tell. Northsky runs a PDS, but uses Bluesky's relay and appview. I don't know about the others, except to say that they don't show up in the largest PDS lists.
Blacksky is the only one that's credibly full stack, and they opened beta access to their appview literally days ago.
There is a lot of buzz, and there is real stuff behind it, but it's also important to look at actual status and track it over time
@ricci oh! I specifically said "coming up" for that reason. My bad for the misunderstanding of your earlier reply.
@quillmatiq @mike @mmasnick @ricci
So, while you are all here perhaps we should mention the issue of whether AT Proto is in fact really even "decentralizable".
The issue has been raised by @cwebber as to how the network scales geometrically as it goes wide. Have not seen anyone refute this.
This would render any real efforts to broadly decentralize effectively impossible. Have not seen anyone address this analysis.
Anyone?
@mike @quillmatiq @mmasnick hey Mike Fraser you were in the audience when I gave this talk at #Fedicon weren’t you?
I gave this presentation at [[Fedicon]] 2025 in Vancouver.My goal was not to do a protocol deep dive, but rather showcase all of the beyond microblogging app...
Boris Mann's Homepage (bmannconsulting.com)
It has a list of some of the many projects in the ATProto ecosystem
Please don’t erase the #ATProto community. We’re on the same side.
@mastodonmigration @quillmatiq @mmasnick Which raises questions.
If this network is profiling with photo verification etc for all users , will it allow people to connect with other parts of Bluesky, where there are bots or unverified accounts? If so, the purpose is lost. However, if it remains closed to other parts of bluesky, it will most likely be isolated. I don’t think this will take off either way .
@quillmatiq @mastodonmigration @mmasnick @ricci My original comment was more about moving the needle in terms federated decentralized applications. No one Denies there's activity in the Atmosphere but does it fulfill the promise of independent but federated social media. In my mind it hasn't reached that high water mark.
@quillmatiq @mike @mmasnick @mastodonmigration by the way, I posted the Atmosphere equivalent of this map over on Bluesky, or you can load the map and play around, it's interactive and lets you select between the social networks and apply other filters
Launching their new social network, W, the EU posted a map of where other social networks are hosted. It showed nothing in Europe. But their map is wrong. Here's what Bluesky and the broader Atmosphere actually look like arewedecentralizedyet.online/map/?source=at
Bluesky Social (bsky.app)
@quillmatiq @mastodonmigration @mmasnick So interop is being worked on through third parties? There's different interop for different applications?
@mike Yup - highly recommend reading up on Lexicons in ATProto!
If you want a really deep dive, I'm a fan of Kuba's breakdown of the system: https://mackuba.eu/2025/08/20/introduction-to-atproto/
@boris @quillmatiq @mmasnick I was Boris, I'm just not sold on atmosphere as fulfilling my personal requirements for an independent federated space. Simply too many roads run through BlueSky which I feel has been captured. In any other time I wouldn't be as sensitive to this as I am now however my country is under existential threat and I simply don't feel that atmosphere can be trusted. The fediverse though not perfect self regulates more effectively and independently.
@mike @quillmatiq @mmasnick that’s fine - but “not really moved the needle” is incorrect - there’s a sample of a dozen or so apps, out of many more.
All using the same protocol just like the AP ones you listed.
Go yell at Bluesky! It’s a company! They can do what they do and you can disagree.
The #ATProto community is building bottoms up.
It’s like saying you aren’t going to trust the email network because Gmail and Office365 are involved in routing email. This is how protocols work.
@mastodonmigration @quillmatiq @mmasnick Why not use a true and tried European (distributed) social network like Mastodon? Seems like a no-brainer to me.
@boris @quillmatiq @mmasnick My comment is not simply in regards to the number of apps. It is in the number of apps that truly federate between each other and in heterogeneous environments. My original comment was meant to convey that BlueSky/AT folks often talk a lot about dectralization and federation but from what I can see from the outside looking in it seems like lip service.
@boris @quillmatiq @mmasnick And if we're going to use the email analogy AT right now more resembles AOL email than SMTP.
@mike @quillmatiq @mmasnick all of the apps I listed and every account all federate with each other. There are over 2000 PDS hosts.
The data lives in every users account. Apps aggregate them as needed. It’s all connected and run by many people.
The criticism you are looking for is “Bluesky hosts too many of the accounts”…
…which the ATProto community is actively bottoms up growing. Yelling at us is not helping.
Got any suggestions? Want to donate? Support Blacksky, invest in Gander.
@mike it does not.
It’s an open protocol with 1000s of account hosts that anyone can spin up in seconds at low cost.
Oh, and it’s applying to join the IETF, just like SMTP.
@grumpydad @mastodonmigration @quillmatiq @mmasnick There’s no money involved in that
@doktorzjivago @mastodonmigration @quillmatiq @mmasnick No. But there are fewer right wing fascists here.
@boris @quillmatiq @mmasnick I'm not really "yelling" at you as voicing my misgivings about the atmosphere. I have no interest in participating in the AT community and I think I've already outlined my reasons why. Basically the fediverse checks most of my boxes while the atmosphere does not so that's where I'm directing my effort. I was merely trying g to explain why.
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