The structure of an organization does matter. There's a reason that @spritely@social.coop is a 501(c)(3) in the US. Any money we take in is a donation: we aren't "delivering on an investment" (though we must deliver on results)
Bluesky is a Public Benefit Corporation, also interesting
A Public Benefit Corporation has a mission for the public good, but can take investments in the way a nonprofit cannot. This also means it can move much faster. Given the influx of users to Bluesky, taking investments this way may have been the only load handling route available this fast.
Again, this is all tuned to "What is Bluesky trying to build?"
Bluesky might not be a good "decentralized Twitter replacement", but it is a good "Twitter replacement" with the possibility of "credible exit"
That Bluesky is providing needs for many users who are looking for refuge from a white supremacist site today is something to pause and acknowledge the difficulty and scope of doing so quickly and in the moment. I'm glad Bluesky is here at this stressful geopolitical moment in history.
There will be a lot of pressure soon from investors: run ads, make premium accounts that do not actually make sense in a decentralized way, so on and so on.
In this way, "credible exit" is the most important thing for Bluesky the organization and its community to push on today
What I will not accept is the goalposts being moved on decentralization and federation. Bluesky is neither decentralized nor federated.
If Bluesky wants to become so, it has an enormous amount of work to do, particularly in terms of architectural design.
Blogs are decentralized, Google is not.
Bluesky will face every pressure to be enshittified. Bluesky has even, correctly, acknowledged this. It is up to Bluesky and its community to rise to the challenge of "credible exit" knowing that this is a likely, perhaps inevitable, risk.
The org is indeed a future adversary. So what now?
And here it is. We have reached the final part.
I am not even going to take a tea break. I am not even going to go to the bathroom. I kinda have to, but we are powering through.
We have reached the conclusion of this megathread, and "summary" of an equally long article.
I laid out definitions of "decentralization" and "federation", and Bluesky meets neither, without major rearchitecting or moving the goalposts on those terms, which I cannot accept.
However, "credible exit" is a good goal for Bluesky. Bluesky created that term and it's a good and feasible goal.
I laid out a strong critique, but let me end on a call to empathy.
Bluesky is built by good people, and the fediverse is built by good people. Neither reflect the designs I presently would like to see today, but ultimately these are built by humans trying their absolute hardest.
The infrastructure we build reflects our social dynamics, and our social dynamics are made possible by our infrastructure.
This thread has been long, and I have said everything I have to say. Thanks for listening. I hope we can build a good future for each other. 💜
Christine Lemmer-Webber