#ThoughtProvoker 🤔

#ThoughtProvoker

#SX #SocialCoding #SocialWeb #ActivityPub #ReimagineSocial #fediverse #peopleverse

As precursor to my blog post announcement later today, here's my #SocialHub response to the topic on how to treat the #LinkedData based #ActivityPub open standard where messages can be expressed both as plain #JSON as well as in #JSONLD, leading to the most costly misconception that has dragged the #fediverse sideways from its original promise and power..

Practices around JSON formatting of JSON-LD messages

ActivityPub is primarily a Linked Data standard. It offers an option for developers to treat it as plain JSON for convenient processing by web technologies. I wonder about the common practice to @context mapping of name…

SocialHub (socialhub.activitypub.rocks)

#ThoughtProvoker

#fediverse is at an inflection point.

Either revival and course correction to the original #ActivityPub protocol power and promise. With the potential to #ReimagineSocial.

Or keep current track with fedi-we-have. Be content with a few great and reasonably popular app platforms. Surely some more to come. But with a messy wire protocol that stifles #innovation and isn't future-proof.

#AskFedi do you dare to dream?

This special thought provoker is based on personal reflection and 8 years of #commoning. Deliberately exposed to the inherent unsustainability of the #FOSS movement. Burning privilege by spending my savings.

Goal: 1st-hand experience to learn the #social dynamics that make a #commons tick.

I invite you to a #brainstorm & #ideation ride. To ponder how #fedi can organically evolve. Become unbeatable by #hypercapitalism.

Grassroots fediverse evolution

Social dynamics in the grassroots fediverse ecosystem and laisséz-faire practices led to divergence from power and promise of the ActivityPub protocol. Grassroots standards and the ActivityPub API initiative can get us back on track.

Social coding commons (coding.social)

But in an age of #AI who still reads long handcrafted #blogs? Fill in the #poll.

#SX #SocialCoding #SocialWeb

@smallcircles None of your choices, instead I look for hashtags and or search in the page for terms of interest.

@bechele I made option 4 a combo mashup, that includes "Other", so you may still add your vote.

@smallcircles I want to read it, and it's on a topic of importance to me, but I recognize that I don't have the focus or time.

Also, I'm quickly running into information for which I lack referents, making it difficult to digest what the article is saying.

I think what I'd need (for whatever that may be worth) in order to be able to digest this properly is some backgrounders on the major pieces mentioned:

• what is "solid project"?
• how does the "two people / pillars" situation correlate to the current state of Mastodon, specifically the Mastodon Foundation?
• exactly how has fedi strayed from [standards, early promise...]?

I'd probably have more to ask/say but I keep getting interrupted, which perhaps gives you some idea of why I'm not able to read the article properly right now...

#ThoughtProvoker

Back to promise and power of AP?
Sustainable #evolution, hmm, yes.
#Emergence, you say? Right, umm..

#Fediverse-we-have vs. #ActivityPub, which is more powerful and #versatile ?

Lego Sets vs. Lego Blocks, which is more powerful and versatile?

View the video mentioned in the article about Emergent Complexity..

Emergent Complexity

"milliards" means "billions" btw.Here is Emergent Garden's thoughts on emergent complexity. I go through a tour of simple systems that produce unexpected com...

YouTube (www.youtube.com)

Can you influence and steer emergence and evolution? Some people like me, with Social experience design think so. Another person is Richard D. Bartlett known from #Loomio who also is behind #Microsolidarity, which I was reminded of the other day. Have a look for yourself..

Microsolidarity

(www.microsolidarity.cc)

#SX #SocialCoding #SocialWeb

@woozle the article was described as "fairly long thinkpiece" by @Profpatsch which with 53 min. read time is an understatement of "fairly long" where it comes to typical online content.

Thank you for taking the time and ponder things! I think that is the most important. We are all so pragmatic and want to have quick results. And our society is asking to be hurried. Everything is urgent. All is in peril. But giving in to that urge is a trap, that makes us weaker as mankind to face our wickedest problems.

Besides "Hammock driven development" mentioned in the article, #Emergence is key. And emergence is WEIRD and fascinating. I just tooted about it in..

🫧 socialcoding.. (@smallcircles@social.coop)

Attached: 2 images #ThoughtProvoker :blobhyperthink: Back to promise and power of AP? Sustainable #evolution, hmm, yes. #Emergence, you say? Right, umm.. 🤷 #Fediverse-we-have vs. #ActivityPub, which is more powerful and #versatile ? Lego Sets vs. Lego Blocks, which is more powerful and versatile? View the video mentioned in the article about Emergent Complexity.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0HqUYpGQIfs Can you influence and steer emergence and evolution? Some people like me, with Social experience design think so. Another person is Richard D. Bartlett known from #Loomio who also is behind #Microsolidarity, which I was reminded of the other day. Have a look for yourself.. https://www.microsolidarity.cc #SX #SocialCoding #SocialWeb

social.coop (social.coop)

--

I used #SolidProject just to contrast a totally opposite approach to how fedi evolves: Fully formal #OpenStandards driven, but with risk to evolve into a 'standards maze' without ecosystem support.

#Mastodon Foundation is a new development. Hopefully they care beyond the app.

#SX #SocialCoding #SocialWeb

@woozle @smallcircles
Length of time to read something “from start to finish” should not be the only “value measure” of an expressed written article as I typically don’t read an article only once to fully comprehend(build a personal mental model). Otherwise I will skim and speedread to create a “mental gist” summary.

I’ve read “once through” all of the article with Saturday morning coffee, otherwise I would have read what I could within an allocated timebox to make previous time commitments.

@dahukanna @woozle

Well said. Esp. when things are HARD, like the wicked problems that ail our world, #ClimateChange for instance. Everyone should contribute their fair share, right? Give just their 2 cents?

#Emergence deals with radical #Simplicity. But simple ain't easy.

Wicked problems require wicked solutions. Numerous tiny #solution increments made all over the place by different people. It requires 'thinking at scale' for prolonged times, and 'doing' on the basis of that. In terms of planning for that 'Bigger Ideas' need time to mature and ripen, and this too involves many people. And is emergent and evolutionary in nature too! This great animation on "Where good ideas come from" calls this the 'Slow Hunch"..

WHERE GOOD IDEAS COME FROM by Steven Johnson

One of our most innovative, popular thinkers takes on-in exhilarating style-one of our key questions: Where do good ideas come from?With Where Good Ideas Com...

YouTube (www.youtube.com)

#SX's slow hunch took 11 years.

There's another great vid by Rich HIckey, creator of #Clojure, besides "Hammock Driven Development" mentioned in the article, titled "Simple made Easy" given at a #StrangeLoop conference..

"Simple Made Easy" - Rich Hickey (2011)

Rich Hickey, the author of Clojure and designer of Datomic, is a software developer with over 30 years of experience in various domains. Rich has worked on s...

YouTube (www.youtube.com)

#ThoughtProvoker

@laurenshof wrote fabulous reports analysing our #SocialWeb and sadly this included raging techno-ideological #ProtocolWars too. How can we turn that to #Progress?

So much friction and heat in the raging discussions #ActivityPub vs. #ATProto

What is *much* more relevant in #Bluesky vs AP is WHY Bluesky + ATProto gets the bigger uptake, despite compromising on #moral and #ethical values and #principles we hold dear.

Knowing the answers to that is where #opportunity for strategic action comes from. And subsequently following what you may call #FocusedPragmatism instead of just 'wild-coding' the chaotic #fedi with countless independent, uncoordinated "Show, don't tells" of yet more code to shove onto the #BigBallOfMud that fediverse-we-have increasingly represents.

#ActivityPubAPI provides such Opportunity.

To revive on a *greenfield basis* doing #Protocol design and adopt lessons-learned from APv1 #Microbloggosphere vs. #Atmosphere.

#SX

#ThoughtProvoker

For those who chimed in to join the #brainstorming and want to be nerdsniped potentially you may ponder that..

♟️ #Chess is a great example of an #EmergentSystem.

Recipe for #Emergence of chess #game

- [chess ingredients here]

And then to continue onwards and think how the relationship is between #FOSS individuals who give their all-in best-efforts for world improvement, make real sacrifices, and who gift their 2 cts with best-intentions, still are faced with uncomfortable questions.

To turn that into solution-orientation we must find a good recipe, and note down #recipe ingredients..

Recipe for Sustainable open social systems i.e. #SOSS

- [sustainable FOSS ingredients here]

Hint / rule: Max. ingredients is 10.

🫧 socialcoding.. (@smallcircles@social.coop)

#ThoughtProvoker :blobhyperthink: Uncomfortable questions.. - To what extent is #FOSS complicit to the rise of #BigTech? - To what extent is FOSS complicit to disruptive #AI craze we face today? - To what extent are vibe coding #LLM even possible without FOSS? "BUT.. BUT.. The License!" - To what extent does slapping on a license free us from responsibility, knowing that it hardly offers protection from abuse? - To what extent did FOSS too just introduce the tech and damn the externalities? - To what extent is FOSS complicit to the current state of the world? - To what extent is it enough to consider FOSS to be "imbibed by good morals and values" if we can't defend those? #poll #ethics [ ] We are clear. Because our intentions are good. [ ] We are clear. We just code. Bad actors abuse it [ ] We must find better ways to protect our work. [ ] Other (please comment)

social.coop (social.coop)

@helge Recipe support on the #ActivityPub fediverse?

#ThoughtProvoker

The fun of #SX is that you don't have to learn it, nor do you have to get it taught to you.

Like chess you should #experience it to gain #experience, and you do that by meeting other #people and #practice it. By #SocialExperience with your friends and peers in the chess world #SocialGraph. Weaving #SocialFabric where you can be playful, creative and do experiments, engage in #challenges. This keeps one intrinsically #motivated to stay into the #game. Learn more. Enter a virtuous circle of rewarding #exercises.

And perhaps one day. Suddenly and unexpected, #opportunity finds you to play against #MagnusCarlsen. And WIN!

The important thing is: You need not have any *expectation* for that. And most people shouldn't, as it is boils down to 'hanging yourself up to a Vision' if you simply don't possess the 'chess genius gene'. Most people don't.

However you can still #Dream about beating Magnus one day to have fun at every level of your progression path to mastery.

@smallcircles

I have been working on a "move slowly and build things" basis for some time now -- arguably to excess [insert rant here]

Unfortunately, as you noted, Life keeps going at its own breakneck pace regardless of whether I'm interested in breaking any necks

I do appreciate a good deep-dive, though, and hopefully I'll have time to absorb more of it

@Profpatsch
cc: @eryn

@woozle @Profpatsch @eryn

Thank you! I am delighted to hear that. An *intent* in itself is already valuable. And even more so, being *intentional* in what you do. Both of these have emergent properties. So you are *already* practicing #SX by sending this toot, it constitutes your 2 cents. And hence, truly, you may call yourself Social experience designer, if that were your dream job like it is mine.

This is how weird and wonderful emergence is. At least that is my *expectation*. I am also merely practicing, ha ha

#SX #Emergence #ParadoxOfEmergence

#ThoughtProvoker

Emergence. So fascinating, that. I came to some deep insight re: commons organization, a concept I call the Paradox of (commons based) Emergence. Hope to post a forum topic on it soon.

I told so often on the channels that I shouldn't explain so much about SX concepts. That it was a failure condition. And it is. It was also my method to reiterate to myself for testing and improving them against various statements. And to jog my bad memory.

#SX #ThoughtExperiment. #Emergence needs 2 ingredients: Simple building blocks and a set of rules. What if you were the first person to invent chess? For chess you can write them down in a heartbeat. Then though, this first designer / inventor of the game, who thinks it through..

Can they imagine at that time Magnus Carlson level complexity?

1/2

There exist no other chess players yet. Can they train with others? Will they understand the excitement of a deep philosophical session where the inventor got an inkling of Magnus Carlsen level genius? Probably not.

Today there are libraries full of chess books. But not then. Should the inventor write all that? He can't. The only way to 'spread' chess about, is for others to experience it with others: social experience. Learn by doing.

My mistake was that I was encouraging people into *doing*, but my continuous explanation seemed to ask "join me on something very complex and vague". That complex and vague being the reverse engineering of complex social dynamics that exist in the #commons, back to simple building blocks and rules. What an emergent designer does. But not at all what you need to know to participate in SX solutions. Everyone does their own thing.

The paradox: Concrete SX practice steers intangible emergent value creation, but what you see at a time is just your 2 cents.

@smallcircles That's a really strong article, solid all the way through. I'm glad you acknowledge the small web as a plausible alternative to the fediverse.

I'm strongly of the opinion myself that whenever humanity tries to design something it never ends well, but that organic creation is the only way forward (compare new towns to very old ones which have character and community), and also that protocols really need to be as simple as possible.

/cont

They should follow the UNIX philosophy of doing one thing well, and then the stack functions harmoniously to provide high-level functionality. Thus I think that ActivityPub is utter pants, including the whole W3C management of it.

I'll have more to say on my own blog in a couple of weeks, when I've worked some things out. I'll keep you posted, and look forward to reading other comments on your piece here

@woozle @smallcircles @Profpatsch @eryn "I have been working on a "move slowly and build things" basis for some time now..."

This is absolutely fine. Anybody who thinks a new order of independents is going to emerge in five years is delusional: first, we can all only do so much in a given time, and second we have to wait for each other to come up with successive evolutionary steps.