Very soon in Flipboard I will be able to follow @Gargron who is on Mastodon and @mosseri who is on Threads and @dansup who is on PixelFed. And I will be able to see, like and reply to any of their posts. And they will be able to see my replies and follow me from whatever app they're using. And anyone else who is following one of the three of us will be able to see our activity from whatever app they're using in the Fediverse. This is how things should be.
@mike
It's about more than connection. It's about content too, and most of all culture. There are many reasons to exclude #Threads, #Medium and their like.
Most of those reasons are why the fediverse exists in the first place and why many people came here.
That so many, especially admins and indeed Eugen ignore them is a mystery to me. They make #Meta's job so much easier than it needs to be.
I don't understand why anyone, in 2024, still has a Medium blog. The experience reading it is terrible and they often hide the content unless you create an account (which I won’t do). So I just close the tab.
It's not worth bemoaning that #ActivityPub is, in fact, an open protocol.
And this is because it's not worth bemoaning that #SMTP is an open protocol. Or Hypertextual Transfer Protocol (#HTTP) is an open protocol.
Or for that matter that anyone can use these protocols as they see fit.
Do I like every use of these protocols? Not at all. We can't always have good things because shady assholes insist on exploiting the open web for their own greed.
The trade off is that we get to have an open web.
Now occasionally, I get people popping by who tell me, "Screw you! I don't care about an open web! I just want to keep my community intact!"
But the only reason your community exists is because we have open protocols.
If you don't think so, find me all those thriving communities still using AppleTalk or IPX/SPX. Wait. There aren't any.
And that's because the only entities that have bothered with a closed, proprietary protocol happen to be for-profit corporations that have largely discontinued them due to -- again, wait for it -- the prevalence of open protocols.
Which brings us to a further problem.
You can't use an open protocol while simultaneously pushing for it to be closed. The #W3C already validated ActivityPub. The proverbial cat is out of the bag.
So yes, corporations will adopt ActivityPub. That's already happening. #Meta, #Automattic, #Medium, #Flipboard -- many more to come -- are developing for it.
But openness also means you can build upon it. You can create your own thriving communities. And some of these communities can be private if you so choose.
Just as it's possible for you to build your own newsletter or publish your own webpage, it's possible for you built your own #Fediverse server.
FFS, write your own site/blog!
Host it for free on github or gitlab or codeberg or whatever pages.
Stop using #Medium! Own your content, make it available without gigantic cookies banners, without paywall and the like!
Write for you and your readers, not for a shitty platform stilling from you at the expense of us!
The Fediverse gives @coachtony “early internet vibes.” The Medium CEO joins Flipboard CEO @mike to discuss what’s wrong with the attention economy, why human curation still matters, and how decentralized social media is enabling entrepreneurs to “rethink everything.”
Not your typical writing magazine, because it’s not about writing. It’s about the lives of writers. Stories of love and loss, adventure and discovery. The world as seen through the eyes of a writer, twisted though it may be.
It is 100% hilarious but it never occurred for me to mirror my content to #Medium until @justin wrote this.
As a reader this makes a lot of sense as I can financially support as many authors as I can with one payment. I wish more #Substack writers will consider mirroring their content to Medium so I can help support them.
To everyone using Medium to post your free articles: If the article requires me to login, I lost me. I won’t create an account and login to Medium for a free article. Sorry to a lot of you out there.
hey, everyone!
my name is Forest, and i’m new to #mastodon. i’ve used it before but recently made this account on the #Medium instance. i’m an avid #writer, #photographer, and #tarot reader, so feel free to reach out for a reading! i’m still on #X under the xktober username but we’ll see how much longer i last.
anyway, that’s just a brief #introduction!
If you’re a @medium subscriber, consider dropping by and following my publication. You don’t have to subscribe to emails or anything, at least not just yet. Just click follow. Help get my numbers up.
It’s a daily column in the model of the classic newspaper columns of old about whatever crosses my mind each day. It’s usually pretty entertaining.
Goodreads is embroiled in an anonymous-book-reviews scandal that cost a writer a book contract. A similar scandal could hit #Medium if the platform keeps allowing--and boosting--book reviews posted under fake names, which could have been written by an author's mother, worst enemy, or paid publicist.
This week on my #podcast, I read my recent #Medium column, "Microincentives and Enshittification," about the way that monopoly drives mediocrity, with Google's declining quality as Exhibit A:
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
I'm trying to decide if Medium is still a viable place to grow my audience. Lately when I click on people's links I'm being taken to paywall pages (must be a member to read, not just logged in with my account), and I want to be sure I can set my material to be as widely read as possible.
But I know personally I'm starting to hesitate because it feels very pay walled.
I have two existing blogs there that have been dormant for a while.
Dla mnie rewelacja 📻 📰 👑 - rozmowa, z której dowiadujemy się, jakie systemowe myślenie o mediach było u podstaw założenia podcastu Dwie Lewe Ręce. To nie tylko o tym konkretnym podcaście, ale o sytuacji ludzi, którzy nie rezygnują z potrzeby dobrych mediów (korzystania z nich lub ich robienia). Oraz o sytuacji ludzi, którzy chcieliby, żeby w Polsce istniało jakieś rzetelne medium na lewo od centrum.
You seldom see strong fashion stories on @medium (a shame IMO, because we all wear clothes and they say so much about us). But the young Medium writer Jee Young Park show how well they can work in this story that defends the controversial 2024 MetGala by showing how much she valued the museum as a Korean-American growing up in New Jersey:
[News] Pro-China influence campaign pushed talking points across more than 50 websites (www.nbcnews.com)
Facebook said Tuesday it has identified a sprawling online propaganda effort: a pro-China campaign that had a presence on more than 50 websites....