Unpopular opinion? I don’t think #Mastodon forks should increase the character count, especially not to 10K or more.
I got the impression this corner of the #fediverse is for microblogging. Micro. There are other #fediverse places for full-blown posts, essays, etc. I thought these functional distinctions were one of the core purposes OF a fediverse in the first place.
What’s next for forks - creating events? A marketplace? Please no.
When I see a giant wall of text here I just scroll now. 🤷🏻♂️
@chartier I think you're looking at it the wrong way around: instead of constraining writers, empower readers!
Firstly, there aren't really corners of #Fediverse. There are instances, but it's nominally one big, integrated universe with content flowing to all corners.
But sure, for people who don't want to read long posts, have a setting to skip those in the timeline.
(Also, events are already part of the #ActivityPub standard as it is, and #Mastodon says it supports them)
@volkris Well by 'corner' I meant like Mastodon, Pleroma, PeerTube, etc. As I understand it, there's a unifying protocol (ActivityPub) then different services/apps that sit on top of it.
Those apps all have different purposes, design goals, etc. Each their own corner of the web, in this loose analogy.
Well, we might actually be on the same page :) but just in case...
To illustrate, a Mastodon instance exchanges content with a PeerTube instance just as it would a different Mastodon instance, regardless of different design goals.
ActivityPub unifies them without concern for differences. Generally, anything participating in AP has to work with content from any other participants, as it thinks best for its readers.
Kind of different user interfaces to the same system.
@volkris Right, and why are there different user interfaces?
I think it's because each part - service, app, whatever we call them - have different purposes. You don't go to PeerTube to read 2,000 word essays, because PeerTube's core purpose is for watching and sharing videos.
WriteFreely's core purpose is longform writing. PixelFed's core purpose is sharing and browsing photos. And I thought Masto's pitch was always micro blogging. Micro.
Otherwise, why have different interfaces at all?
But they're different user interfaces to the same content, to the same universe.
That's what I'm trying to emphasize.
So you DO go to PeerTube to consume everything on the Fediverse, including those 2,000 word essays, even though you might or might not skip over them because the interface isn't very good at displaying them.
It's all the same content, so no particularly different corners.
We have different interfaces to empower different users to consumer all of that content in the ways they each prefer.
It's like, a book vs a book on tape: same content, just different interface because one person prefers to read the physical paper while another listens while driving.
@volkris I absolutely cannot buy the idea that people go to PeerTube to read 2,000 word essays.