Vertigo #$FF on Nostr: npub1m299s…hkhl9 npub1ep0jm…n8t62 It actually can be under some circumstances. ...
npub1m299scpk0n8gqnjkmftjzr56mqa4zqlxkwha7p43c7y6zusw5deslhkhl9 (npub1m29…khl9) npub1ep0jmx5pmkgrzuq35844pj4ql2cytjjzfsfrpkyrjkenmkx5l0lq8n8t62 (npub1ep0…8t62) It actually can be under some circumstances. It's the same thing as the Walmart Effect.
When Walmart stores come into an otherwise thriving community, the local shops atrophy and frequently close up. The result is a disastrous blow to the local economy. As more and more local citizens become dependent upon Walmart, they might realize it is becoming too expensive to operate, so they end up closing the Walmart, forcing people to travel further to a Walmart distribution store instead. Meanwhile, the original community is left with an economy in total shambles and unable to fix itself because it's so far in debt that it can't even attract outside investment.
This happened to my home-town of Utica, NY years ago. There is no downtown anymore. No more local electronics stores. The streets are crumbling, the infrastructure deteriorating.
Unless you take a car and head to New Hartford, an adjacent suburb, where you'll find several malls thoroughly gutted with big-box stores like Best Buy and the like. Those are really the only places you can go to get anything anymore.
It took Utica almost 30 years (!!!!) to recover from that happening, and they're still only now just beginning to get back onto their feet. Utica used to be a thriving small, but nonetheless industrially important city. Ever heard of Oneida Cutlery? Ever heard of PAR Electronics? GE? Raytheon? They all used to have a home in Utica. Not anymore. They're all gone (some out of business, some relocated elsewhere) now. To this day, Utica is but a shadow of its former self.
The same effects can potentially be at play here. Funny you mention GMail, because Google is at fault for applying similar tactics to their original online chat protocol. It used to be XMPP. Then it became more and more proprietary. And as more and more users jumped onto their ship, they closed the protocol down even more. Eventually, they killed the app all-together, and now their online chat services are entirely a closed garden.
This has actually been discussed before on fedi. The threat that Meta provides is not their obedience to the spec. Given the documented history of the behavior of the company, it is the propensity for them executing a strategy of embrace, extend, extinguish, exploit.
This is why you see significantly less uproar over Wordpress' stated plans for a Fedi plugin; Wordpress hasn't exactly demonstrated an irreparable behavior for destroying communities the way Facebook and Meta have.
So that's why we should. Reputation matters.
When Walmart stores come into an otherwise thriving community, the local shops atrophy and frequently close up. The result is a disastrous blow to the local economy. As more and more local citizens become dependent upon Walmart, they might realize it is becoming too expensive to operate, so they end up closing the Walmart, forcing people to travel further to a Walmart distribution store instead. Meanwhile, the original community is left with an economy in total shambles and unable to fix itself because it's so far in debt that it can't even attract outside investment.
This happened to my home-town of Utica, NY years ago. There is no downtown anymore. No more local electronics stores. The streets are crumbling, the infrastructure deteriorating.
Unless you take a car and head to New Hartford, an adjacent suburb, where you'll find several malls thoroughly gutted with big-box stores like Best Buy and the like. Those are really the only places you can go to get anything anymore.
It took Utica almost 30 years (!!!!) to recover from that happening, and they're still only now just beginning to get back onto their feet. Utica used to be a thriving small, but nonetheless industrially important city. Ever heard of Oneida Cutlery? Ever heard of PAR Electronics? GE? Raytheon? They all used to have a home in Utica. Not anymore. They're all gone (some out of business, some relocated elsewhere) now. To this day, Utica is but a shadow of its former self.
The same effects can potentially be at play here. Funny you mention GMail, because Google is at fault for applying similar tactics to their original online chat protocol. It used to be XMPP. Then it became more and more proprietary. And as more and more users jumped onto their ship, they closed the protocol down even more. Eventually, they killed the app all-together, and now their online chat services are entirely a closed garden.
This has actually been discussed before on fedi. The threat that Meta provides is not their obedience to the spec. Given the documented history of the behavior of the company, it is the propensity for them executing a strategy of embrace, extend, extinguish, exploit.
This is why you see significantly less uproar over Wordpress' stated plans for a Fedi plugin; Wordpress hasn't exactly demonstrated an irreparable behavior for destroying communities the way Facebook and Meta have.
So that's why we should. Reputation matters.