diff --git a/Non-Commercial, Open Source, and Federated Social Platforms as Effective Community Alternatives.docx b/Non-Commercial, Open Source, and Federated Social Platforms as Effective Community Alternatives.docx new file mode 100644 index 0000000..0e9ef61 Binary files /dev/null and b/Non-Commercial, Open Source, and Federated Social Platforms as Effective Community Alternatives.docx differ diff --git a/notes/Eugen Rochko Interview Transcript.md b/notes/Eugen Rochko Interview Transcript.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8719b6a --- /dev/null +++ b/notes/Eugen Rochko Interview Transcript.md @@ -0,0 +1,337 @@ +# Eugen Rochko Transcription + +## Note: This transcript was created with an automated service and has yet to be edited. + +Hello hello, can you hear me? OK yes alright so I'm I'm supposed to know German are you German? + +I am German. + +OK, so is it Eugen? Yes, OK. I'm sorry I just I had never seen that name before. And it's. + +It's a very rare name, let's but I I'm absolutely fine with being called Eugene by Americans or United people. + +Yeah. + +Well, First off, thank you for taking the time to talk with me. You're welcome. Do you have a you have a time limit? + +Well, I guess yeah. + +Yeah, I I feel like this is probably a really huge day so. + +It's it's not a hard limit, it's. + +Just in terms of I have lots of other things to do. + +Absolutely well, let's try Max of like 20 to 30 minutes. I've got a few questions, but. + +I kind of want to to be honest. I'm imagining you're going to have press on your doorstep and they're gonna be talking about the service. And I'm I'm actually kind of curious about you. Of course you don't have to talk about you, but this is kind of a big deal. Can I like? + +Just ask like some basic things like how old you are, yes? + +You went to school. + +Yes, I yes. I AM 24 years old. I did go to school and I did go to University and graduate with a Bachelor of Science in computer science, OK? + +I guess so Mastodon was there. What's the story behind? + +The project did you, did you see an empty void to fill? Do you remember like Aspice? + +That moment when you decided I'm going to do this. + +Yes, I do remember such a moment, but it start to build up to that many years ago, like more than six years ago I had a friend who was into you know, Federated Networks. But back then it was a really knew thing. That was when identica identi.ca. + +Was first created. If you know about that one, yeah and I was just, you know I was 16 or so at the time. + +And I didn't really understand much. I was just, you know, doing WordPress coding and stuff. It was very at the very beginning of my developer knowledge and career and stuff. Sure anyway, so that sort of build up the prepared me for the idea that this exists and it's it's an idea, you know. And then obviously I was a heavy Twitter user. I have over 90,000 tweets on my account that I created in 2010. + +After deleting a previous one that I created in 2008. + +Um so I. + +Yes, I'm a heavy query user, so I just wasn't happy with where it was going, so I decided to check how the you know the Federated stuff was doing in the Meanwhile and I found it in a very sad state and I decided that maybe I can do something about it. It sort of was in the vein of my general. + +Behavior in terms of you know I, I'm the kind of person who runs their own XMPP server. Yeah, except that in the mean time I have already given up on XMPP. + +Nobody uses that, so you know that that's ship has sailed, especially with Google's closing down the Google talk servers. Yes, so I decided to check in it. I thought that I could contribute. I found that the state of it was very bad in terms of the code base that new social code base, so I decided. + +OK, I'm gonna do my own. I am really used to the Tweetdeck layout. So if I'm going to do something it needs to have real time updates an it needs to have columns and look. + +Something like tweetdeck. So I I started with a prototype. I was still doing at the time. It was the beginning of last year, May or April or something like that and I made very very bare bones prototype. It was federating with new social notes and it had absolutely no user interface, only in API. + +That I was using from the comment line. + +An an an iPhone OK it works that's great and I then exams came and I had to concentrate on that and I slowly dropped it for awhile. But after I graduated I thought OK I have an opportunity for now. After graduating I can take a break from everything and just do this thing that I wanted to do. + +So I started working on it and I eventually opened the Patris on, and the first people to contribute to my page where you know, close friends and people who. + +Believed in me and then after a while after I created the basic user interface, you know if you compare the user interface of then with now it was really really basic even though it looked somewhat you know, somewhat like the current one. Yeah, but there is a YouTube video. The demo that I released when I published on Hacker News, yes. + +That's great, yeah, you can check it. It feels really different. + +Upload up, I'll keep talking, um? So yes, yes, that brings me to yes. I announced it on Hacker News and that was the first public release of the project. That's when I got my first users who weren't my friends and who weren't already users of Federated Networks. + +That was done with that specifically, do you remember? + +101 days ago OK. + +Wow. That said, I'm only saying it. + +Like this because. + +That's how hacker news shows when you submit something, and I looked it up yesterday. + +Wow, just somebody. + +Asked so yeah, that's within my mind, right? That's when I got my first users. First feedback started working on feature requests from people started shaping the project a little bit differently. People were a lot more focused on privacy features than I thought they would be. + +Yeah, although in retrospect it makes sense. You see the previous project, new social did not really have such a. + +Focus on privacy features or have anything built in. By default they just you know, public feeds open to the world, my megaphone basically. And so I had to do a little bit of I don't want to say innovation because that's a big word, but the little bit of changing to get it to work with you know more. + +More looked down stuff more to work down content. + +Um, yes, and then overtime I just kept working on it, kept working features and waves of new users came when it went viral in certain circles of people. For example, first on this hacker news and product can't. Then there was the arrowbile. Can Twitter user with over 30,000 followers. + +Picked up the project and. + +Give give it a shout out and even did a little giveaway of his app. He makes the better app for iOS. Yeah, I'm not really sure 'cause I'm not an iOS user but he did. Like if you join Massillon you get this app for free and lots of people did and it's yeah it was really nice of him because we have. + +Really no affiliation whatsoever. + +It's just it just thought it was a good project, sure, so he had a lot of followers from Holland apparently, and so in the next few days the project went viral on Dutch Twitter. The message on Timelines became mostly Dutch by language and. + +I had lots of people talk to me in Dutch and. + +Um, yeah, after a while. That sort of died down and then the next wave of users came left leaning communist Marxist Twitter anime fans from Twitter discovered. + +That was the way that I came in on yes months ago. + +Probably let safaris. Lots of LGBT people. + +And that's when we. That's when I really like focused on privacy features and making sure that all blocks work and stuff. Because you know, these people needed a safer platform than than Twitter could offer. That's when I really focused on that. Then after a while, I think there came a second wave of certain the same people. + +But much bigger wave. I don't really know. In retrospect how it looked an now, it sort of looks like a small wave in comparison to what's happening now. Yeah, there is a screenshot that I shared in hold on, let me scroll up. + +I just saw 800 users in the last hour. If that on the about page, but that's live updated. + +The about page is updated live, yes. + +I think the graphs are ridiculous. + +Gorgrond this is the graph discordapp.net. + +I should be able to see this is the graph from the Sidekick Dashboard. Sidekick is as a program that runs background processing jobs and background processing jobs. They correspond roughly to user activity because they're usually something that needs to be done. + +Because a user has done something but it would take a long time to do it straight away and you need to sort of delay it to process it anyway. + +So as you can see, the first bump is when the hacker news announcement happened and the second bump is arrabal can then the third part is that came shortly after the second one is the Dutch Twitter, then came the enemy Marxist there. Then again, something like I'm a Marxist here, like more of the same and you can see that. + +What's happening right now and I took this like in the morning. So it was like beginning of the day. That's why it goes down like that. But it's like double the highest of the. + +Previous waves yes now yes. + +It's very astonishing. I since last week it's like almost doubled in users, I think. So, are you responsible for all of the code? Is all you. + +Yes, I mean technically you can look at the GitHub page of contributors and you can see. + +I thought I. + +Think breakdown of who contributed. How many lines of code OK? + +You'll see that I'm at the very top with a large margin, but there is obviously a couple people have contributed interesting good features and fixes and. + +Um, localizations and user guides and documentation. Yeah stuff. + +Like that, so that's The thing is like and asking you things. So much of this is public and you're really really good at telling this story. Actually, you've been systematically answering all my questions. + +Is there a story behind the name? + +Well, the story is not. + +Particularly interesting, it's just that I I am progressive metal fan and Yep, I listen to the band Mastodon sometime. + +And then they have a really cool name that refers to a really cool animal. + +It's a fluffy elephant. What's not to love, yeah? + +It was the reason why such a cute mascot was born. Actually, thanks to my friend who is a YouTube artist, makes a little animated series. His name is Dokha too. I feel like. + +I should give him a shout out. + +He creates a when I first I came up to him and I said I need an error page because there were some issues at the very first wave. + +And there were lots of times that people were seeing an error page. It was like, OK, I need something nice to show the people. And I was like OK, everybody remembers the fail whale. I need something like that but with the name Mastodon and so he came up with this elephant and it was a huge success. + +I think I saw you send that to Sarah Jeong a few days ago. + +That's a it's great, yeah. + +While I'm thinking about it, actually, have you put together a press kit yet with like a big logo? And I don't know if that's important to you, but it's going to be asked. + +No, I have not, and that's big. + +But I know that's probably the main consideration, yeah? + +No, but it is annoying that it's not there. I realize the fact of the matter is I'm not even a big fan of the current logo. + +It's not very distinct, it's just a circle with three speech boxes inside. I paid $75 for that logo at the very beginning. That's actually that's cheap considering how much design actually costs. Yes, it was a special offer of a design firm, but. + +It's just a you know it's it's not. It's not endearing like an elephant. I am considering changing it, but yes, so that brings it. Another thing is that. + +The logo in a small format is actually in the public GitHub repository and you can get it, but obviously it's not like you can't scale it up a lot from that so. + +We actually have a thing where I can our image styles. We scale up images really big and then compress them so. + +It's kind of a. I don't know. You might hate it, we'll see. + +Gar Grown said youtube.com. + +I'll be sure to include that. Thank you, Federated. The term Federated. I know you've already explained it on Medium, but I guess could you elaborate a little bit on what that means to you, 'cause it's obviously like this is. You've put a lot of effort into this. + +Yes, right, the biggest problem with. + +This term is that. + +It's new for lots of people. + +And that means that there's actually. + +Yeah, it's it's very easy to tell two kinds of people apart. People have come across Federated networks in the past, instantly understand what it means and how it works, and people who are new to the concept have really a lot of trouble before it clicks, and that's obviously a big problem. But on the other hand, you know when Twitter just started. + +People probably wouldn't have understood what retweeting means, right? It's it's also a new thing, so that's not unique to not a unique domain problem. Sorry, problem domain. + +Um, so the the biggest misunderstanding that people have about Federation is just you know what exactly it means and how it works, because people think. + +I actually don't know where it comes from, maybe from BitTorrent, but people seem to think that when something is decentralized that everybody gets the same thing, right? + +Then it's all synchronized one to one, but in actuality, Federated means that people are in different instances and they can talk to each other. But like the content on the instances is different depending on the users there. And depending on what those users do and who they follow. So for example, if you were on instance. + +A and I was instance B and we weren't following each other. You would see only your posts and I would see only my posts. But if you. + +To follow me from your instance, you will start seeing my posts and if I followed you back I would start seeing your posts back as well. That's how it works. It works by following and if you add a lot more people in, you know only one person has to follow somebody from another instance to get that person's posts into your instance. So it sort of grows like that organically. + +Sounds like a lot of data. + +Indeed, it would have been even more data if instances somehow synchronized one to one all the time, but they turn like the main. + +In master instances, like I think it's over 3000 posts per hour. Right now I need to check the user account bug. + +User account so imagine imagine that in network traffic. Oh my God, it's 4000. Yep. + +Yeah, so I think I read this indirectly. We've got a patrion up for server costs and then living costs too. Yeah, I really don't know what this going so I'm not going to speculate, but. + +What does that look? + +Like if all the sudden you see a huge jump in patrons and I guess I feel like it's either going to go big and people won't understand why it's not commercialized or they'll doubt it because of that. And I just like for you personally. Your future is kind of up for grabs. This is like that. OK, that's not a little bit. + +No, that's absolutely true. My future is up for grabs. + +So you can answer this off the record if you like, but what if Twitter comes to you in the next few weeks? Few months and offers you a job? + +What's the answer to that? + +OK, if if you used any other company but Twitter for this example, I would have said, oh I should think about it, you know, because it's a job is a staple source of income and it depends on the company. But maybe you know you be doing something important as well. But Twitter. I just, you know I have 0 faith in that company. + +Yeah, which I wouldn't go there I. + +I have a friend or like friend of a friend who I'm rarely talked to. Is the Twitter engineer, and I secretly wish that he would you know that he that my work wouldn't affect his because I'm sort of worried for him right? But I'm also worried for him because of what I think of Twitter. + +Yeah, yeah, I can imagine it's not too much about corporate culture, but I definitely know enough to say. + +That it's it's a mess. Is it OK? So what I really want to include on the record if it's OK, is that if. + +It was any other. + +Can include anything but the Twitter friend because I don't want to accidentally put him into the like. I don't think that anybody could make the connection who it is, but just in case, just sure no don't include. + +That I appreciate that. Yeah, I'm not gonna not gonna oust anyone who you're really good at telling that story. + +I guess OK. Here's a personal curiosity. Does this mean I get to live out my personal dream of having Twitter in serif? + +Swear in serif. You mean the font? Yes yes. If you start your instance or find somebody you can change the style sheets and. + +So, legally, if I were to set up a Mastodon instance and then start charging for its use, that's just that's just an OK thing. I can just take your code. + +Yes, OK, that's OK. + +The the code is licensed under the AGPL version 3 license I. I'm not a lawyer, I have to preface by saying this. I'm not a lawyer. I picked this license because other projects in the same space are using this license, and my understanding of it is, you know, as far as I can get, but obviously not a lawyer, so. + +Might want to research. + +This yourself in similar positions, the. + +Basic difference of age. EPL and GPL is that a GPL forces you to contribute back to the App Stream code repository. If you make any breaking changes. + +OK, so let's take for example what happened with XMPP and WhatsApp. WhatsApp used XMPP for their chat protocol. + +And at the very beginning. + +You were able to connect to WhatsApp accounts just from your G Talk account or you know Facebook or your own server. + +But as they moved on, they started locking down their platform and now you can't possibly tell that WhatsApp is still XMPP is completely locked away. So to prevent this sort of thing from happening from somebody taking Mastodon code. + +And putting it. + +And locks and stripping out the Federation part and just making a Twitter number two I'm I'm using this license. + +Yeah, that sounds, but. + +The thing to remember about free software is that free means freedom of the user, an not that it's 0 cost because it's perfectly fine to charge for free software. + +Because developers need to live too. So if you were to start an instance and you wanted to have membership fees, find this. + +Your cold I guess. I just. + +Worried about that they use, but that sounds like a competent thing from what I understood of it. I think I'm more or less out of questions. 01 more thing about the multilingual stuff. This is kind of petty seeming now, but so Twitter has the translation from being. Yeah, is that something that we can expect? + +On the main instance or in OK. + +I I can't. I don't think I can possibly put in translate this tout button in there because these APIs from Google and Bing. + +Are quite expensive at scale and four. + +1000 troops per hour is. + +Already quite a scale, right? Yes, but I could do. And what I am possibly going to do. I'm not 100% promising this because there is obviously lots of stuff to do on the table, but I can probably put something in where people can select which language they post in. + +And then just filter the timelines by language. That's that's what at least solved the problem of, you know, being. + +Front with lots of French posts without knowing any French yeah. + +Actually kind of like that. I always was fine with copying and pasting, but the the only thing that I see in termsof I know everybody's gonna make conversation about Twitter when the like the basic format in a lot of ways, resembles Twitter obviously, but. + +I don't know. I feel like like the things are virtually unrelated, but that's. + +So the last feature that I hear a lot of complaining about about Twitter that's not addressed is editable. Toots. Is that like a possibility? + +Happen that one happened. There's actually a good reason why they don't do that. It's for the very simple reason that you could make it to about one thing. Make lots of people favorited. + +And share it. + +Link it from other places and then suddenly it says you know Hail, Hitler or. + +Whatever, I've never understood that complaint either, but. + +OK, well I think I'll let you get back to it, but I really, really appreciate you taking the time to talk to me. And specially you're welcome should. + +Probably worth mentioning that I have 20 minutes ago or so when we started talking. I have put up a notice on the messaging dot social front page for. + +You know an anonymous users. + +That registrations are closed. Then they should check other instances because I want to get some grip on the scale where it is now. Ensure quality of service for existing users and also to promote other instances so that not everything is centralized around a standard social. + +Sure, well, I wish you the best of luck. + +I think this is if we ever get a chance to talk again, you'll probably be a lot bigger, but thank you. + +I don't know. I think I actually probably can get a feature up. It's it's not going to be a huge deal, but I think Sarah's story breaks in like an hour and 45 minutes so. + +That'll be interesting, yeah, better. + +Set up a timer for that, yeah? + +Yeah, well thank you again. Maybe at some point in the future we'll get to talk again, thank. + +You for interviewing me? + +It was my pleasure. Have a nice day you too. Thanks bye bye. \ No newline at end of file diff --git a/notes/Mastodon Vs. Twitter Innovation.md b/notes/Mastodon Vs. Twitter Innovation.md index d3bf944..613b7cb 100644 --- a/notes/Mastodon Vs. Twitter Innovation.md +++ b/notes/Mastodon Vs. Twitter Innovation.md @@ -14,6 +14,12 @@ Twitter announces it's going to "try out" a doubled character limit (280) just f ## Audio Posts +[Initial resistance](https://github.com/tootsuite/mastodon/issues/7495#issuecomment-389511213): + +> As-is, Mastodon is not a file sharing service. Even though it allows people to attach images and videos to toots, there is no expectation of format or quality fidelity (e.g. max 8MB videos, webm/mp4 only, jpg/png only, large images are downsized to at most 1280^2 pixels). So even though you could encode a song in a video, it's far from sharing MP3 or FLAC files. You can't share ZIP archives. You can't send someone a PSD file. +> +> I think it was a good decision to not allow audio uploads. Yes maybe it would've been fine. Or maybe the media would have branded Mastodon as a pirated music sharing service, and our project would start getting blocked from search results. Not a risk I am interested in taking *at all* when the most simple solution is to just include a link to soundcloud, instaud.io, vocaroo.com, dropbox, google cloud, your own server, or whatever else. Mastodon should not be a file sharing service!! It's a specialized problem domain with specialized solutions. + "[Your Tweet, your voice](https://blog.twitter.com/en_us/topics/product/2020/your-tweet-your-voice.html)" | Twitter Blog (June 17, 2020) "Add audio uploads" - [Tootsuite Version 2.9.1](https://github.com/tootsuite/mastodon/releases/tag/v2.9.1), June 22, 2019. (From [Mastodon Changelog](https://github.com/extratone/mastodon/blob/master/CHANGELOG.md))