Overview: Social Web

Newsletter as I head off to Berlin to talk about digital sovereignty, social media and ATprotocol.

"blogging and long-form writing on atproto is rapidly developing, and it gives some interesting insight in what decentralisation on atproto looks like".Decentralisation describes two different things at once: a technical architecture for how networks are structured, and the actual behaviour of people using those networks" - so while ATproto looks …

"trolls seek negative attention and ignoring them removes their reward... When someone posts inflammatory content, makes personal attacks, or tries to derail conversations with bad-faith arguments, they're fishing for reactions ... trolls derive pleasure specifically from "negative social potency", aka knowing that others are annoyed... non-enga…

"A journalist gets blocked by Bluesky, but her Bluesky posts can still be seen via Blacksky. This apparent contradiction goes to the heart of resilient social media, where businesses must support their users to stay in business"

"Congressman Clay Higgins (R-LA) delivered a letter to social media leaders demanding the immediate removal of posts and accounts that celebrated the assassination of Charlie Kirk" is a good example of why social media conversations must NOT be concentrated in one legal jurisdiction (particularly, let's face it, Trump's US).The letter was sent to …

Further progress by Bluesky on "improving the quality of replies and making conversations feel more personal, constructive, and in your control":identifying social neighbourhoods "the people you already interact with or would likely enjoy knowing" and prioritising conversations in thema dislike option to help personalise Discover & other feeds. "D…

"European sovereignty hangs in the balance. As long as 80 percent of European digital products and services originate in the United States, blackmail will thrive. Europe needs independent European infrastructure now—especially home-grown social networks that preserve a level playing field for information, safeguard media freedom and guarantee gen…

"When infrastructure is too centralized, gatekeepers gain new powers to capture, enshittify, and censor."Short, link-rich piece on the many ways science is being undermined by gatekeeping scientific publishers and "Large intermediary platforms... inserting themselves between researchers and between the researchers and these published works—through…

"For a while, social media tried to be politically neutral. Moderation is difficult as a practical task, and fighting over the decisions ... is bad business. But it was somewhat obvious to everyone that social platform neutrality was a performative fiction, even before Musk discarded the norm."Whatever you do, social media can't be neutral: "Even …

"publications can now have nested pages — illustrated here with pages about embeds, comments, and more... great for collections, project wikis or documentation, essays with branching tangents, and more", like hubs for ex., with a different skin. "nest them as deep as you like"

Another ATproto app in the linkedin space, "ProtoPro is the future of businesses and professionals connecting online. With AT Protocol, your identity, graph, and content are portable, secure, and under your control."

"log in to your existing accounts on the supported networks. Afterward, you’ll instantly be following all your friends in a combined timeline. The app also features a combined trending section and cross-posting support.... will later introduce a subscription plan to generate revenue."

"at://work is a modern job board that leverages decentralized identity and social networking. We believe in empowering professionals to own their digital identity while connecting with meaningful career opportunities... ensures that your professional profile and job postings remain under your control. "

Another ATproto longform app, "an entire blogging platform that fits in your pocket... a place to jot down and share your ideas, opinions, hobbies, and anything else you’d like to share with the world, quickly and easily.

"Middleware, third-party software intermediaries between users and platforms, has been broached as a means to decentralize the power of social media platforms and enhance user agency... widespread adoption of open middleware has long hinged on the cooperation of established major platforms; however... Mastodon and Bluesky, has led to increased off…

"the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace conducted a workshop with eighteen experts to explore governance challenges to defederation... on decentralized social media [which] offers new possibilities for online governance. Experts consider how it can be used responsibly, in a way that balances speech and safety".A good example of how the dis…

Misinformation is "a problem, but not the most important one. The fundamental problem... is not that social media misinforms individuals about what is true or untrue but that it creates publics with malformed collective understandings".while democracy "is a profoundly collective enterprise", we see it as the sum of individuals' knowledge and decis…

The always good Laurens on the ActivityPub-ATproto open letter: "There is a large group of people who are actively moving the space forward, and who have signed the open letter that calls for mutual respect and working together for a better open social web. The number of people who voiced objections and concerns is minimal, but by focusing on proc…

"The first thing I noticed is how strange it felt to use... strange and empty, every interaction felt like it took an eternity... any interaction with others to require multiple levels of intentional actions".After acclimatising, however, "I began to feel comfortable ... very calming... [then] I ran out of stamina" - the site ceased 'working', so …

When this was written there were 23m Bluesky users: "Some publishers report traffic and conversion rates three to four times higher compared with platforms like Threads and X, despite Bluesky’s smaller user base.... EUobserver received 3,800 unique visitors from Bluesky (with 3,300 followers) compared to 1,320 from X (with 203,000 followers)...Fo…

"decentralized approaches come with their own trade-offs, and therefore multiple architectures exist... we conduct the first large-scale analysis of Bluesky... [which] decomposes and opens the key functions of the platform into subcomponents that can be provided by third party stakeholders".The intros of Fediverse and Nostr provide a useful spectr…

This study examines:"the shift in the scientific community from X to Bluesky, its impact on scientific communication, and consequently on social metrics", following the Academic Twitter migration. Is there "evidence of a community shift", and if so "examine the differences in values and indicators..."? "provide valuable insights into whether Blue…

This preprint "looks at the dynamics of this migration" from X to Mastodon of academics: using "publicly available user account data, we track the posting activity of academics on Mastodon over a one year period... gathered follower-followee relationships ... finding that the subset of academics ... were well-connected. However, this strong intern…

"the online world seem so toxic ... [because of] a small number of divisive accounts", according to a researcher in "topics such as intergroup conflict, misinformation, technology and climate change", who found that "what we’re seeing online is a warped image created by a very small group of highly active users".SOcial media is "a funhouse mirror.…

"Europe’s systemic dependency on Big Tech’s social-media platforms threatens the continent’s digital sovereignty" - perhaps nothing new, but well argued nevertheless:"Just as the European Union seeks to reduce its reliance on external providers for semiconductors... it must do the same for social media. dominant platforms extract value from Europe…

Saw this presented at the Ahoy conference. It starts with a well argued outline of surveillance capitalism: "a few predominantly US and Chinese tech companies control information and public debate... users must disclose their most personal data to access ... [while] algorithms opaquely filter what users see ... freeing us from the common good and …

"Let's build a tool to help large organisations coordinate their Bluesky footprint, helping them get the most out of the platform" - One of my suggested conversation topics at the Ahoy conference, April, 2025.

Renée DiResta, "Invisible Rulers" author, on why "user exodus to smaller platforms has become increasingly common... What ultimately splintered social media wasn’t a killer app or the Federal Trade Commission — it was content moderation. Partisan users clashed with “referees”; ... Principles like “freedom of speech, not freedom of reach” ... attem…

Last month I published a couple of posts on X and Bluesky. They make a nice pair, so I'm including both, below, and taking this opportunity to ask for your perspective. I'd really value getting you and your organisation's views on both platforms in 2025, and I'd be happy to answer any questions in return.

I know: you've spent probably ~15 years diligently developing your following there. At the beginning Twitter was fun, particularly when you didn't have so many followers that you couldn't interact with at least some of them. But now, you may have a problem.