This isn’t necessarily a bad thing though, it removed the complexity behind instances and federation which is primarily the reason mastodon didn’t see mass adoption.
It isn’t federation, since not all nodes in the system have equal power (control). There is still a central authority that controls what the inferior nodes can do.
Contrast that with email servers where you can send a message from one server to another without a more authoritative node as a required middleman.
Is there a list of all the relays and appview servers run by other people for the community to use? I looked for one, but could find no evidence that others have actually hosted instances of these components for real use.
I think the problem is there isn’t much incentive to run a relay in particular, as it all funnels into the same place, but if you’re questioning the tech this guy did it a few days ago with the relay
servers run by other people for the community to use
hosted instances of these components for real use
I’m hoping to see hostnames or IP addresses of existing instances of these components that anyone could connect to, and that aren’t controlled by Bluesky PBC.
There are no matches for the word ‘relay’ on that site’s main page, or via the site search.
there isn’t much incentive to run a relay in particular, as it all funnels into the same place
I disagree with this sentiment, especially since Bluesky “is designed to not be controlled by a single company” and have “many hosts, firehoses, and indexes, all operated by different entities and exchanging data with each other”.
but if you’re questioning the tech this guy did it a few days ago with the relay
I dug through that thread and didn’t see the URL for where it is hosted. Also I now feel the need to volunteer that I don’t use Mastodon and am definitely not some kind of diehard fan of that app.
And stream.place is another appview but it’s not a microblog platform. Also very early stages I believe.
Again, I’m hoping to see alternative server instances of all the Bluesky services available for utilization by the public (whether customized or just reposted), not other apps that use atproto.
I want to see distributed platforms succeed, but as Bluesky notes on their About page, the problem is with centralization of authority. If a necessary part of the system is exclusively managed by a single corporation, it is centralized - whether by intent or just de facto. If that is the case, it would indicate some problem(s) exist that need solutions pursued until the situation is remedied.
Again, I’m hoping to see alternative server instances of all the Bluesky services available for utilization by the public
What purpose does it serve for a dev to recreate a brand new app view right now? Yes there’s getting away from centralization but is that enough to encourage someone to build something from the ground up? Right now it’s only devs tinkering.
If Bluesky introduced 5 ads per post tomorrow. You can bet your ass there’s going to be a new app backfilled with historical data within a month. But right now there’s zero incentive since they’ve already solved the major problems of Twitter and Mastodon.
The relay is probably a bit more important for decentralization, but it’s not particularly hard to load up a relay within a days work as the guy in the above response has shown. The white wind app also pulls directly from PDS’ avoiding the need to use a relay at all.
If you have the data and the code you are in the effectively decentralized since anyone can effectively recreate your platform in a few days. Regardless I’m sure BlueSky will make a decision at some point that will entice someone enough to publish a separate appview. Think about how long Lemmy has been around and it’s barely starting to see separate platforms take off more like mbin and piefed. Yeah kbin was around 2 years ago and piefed was very early but it takes a long time for these platforms to grow and mature, we can’t just expect them to exist overnight when BlueSky has been fully public for what barely a year?
This isn’t necessarily a bad thing though, it removed the complexity behind instances and federation which is primarily the reason mastodon didn’t see mass adoption.
It isn’t federation, since not all nodes in the system have equal power (control). There is still a central authority that controls what the inferior nodes can do.
Contrast that with email servers where you can send a message from one server to another without a more authoritative node as a required middleman.
Claiming it’s a central authority when anyone can run a relay is a little disingenuous.
Is there a list of all the relays and appview servers run by other people for the community to use? I looked for one, but could find no evidence that others have actually hosted instances of these components for real use.
Not sure if an absolute list, but https://atprotocol.dev/ is a good resource.
I think the problem is there isn’t much incentive to run a relay in particular, as it all funnels into the same place, but if you’re questioning the tech this guy did it a few days ago with the relay
https://whtwnd.com/futur.blue/3lkubavdilf2m
It looks like ^ he also has an appview up thats long form blogging here: https://github.com/whtwnd/whitewind-blog
Another guy also built a lightweight app view
https://bsky.app/profile/why.bsky.team/post/3lkwg2djrfk23
And stream.place is another appview but it’s not a microblog platform. Also very early stages I believe.
I think you may have missed the point:
I’m hoping to see hostnames or IP addresses of existing instances of these components that anyone could connect to, and that aren’t controlled by Bluesky PBC.
There are no matches for the word ‘relay’ on that site’s main page, or via the site search.
I disagree with this sentiment, especially since Bluesky “is designed to not be controlled by a single company” and have “many hosts, firehoses, and indexes, all operated by different entities and exchanging data with each other”.
I wasn’t able to find a hostnames or IP for his instance on that page.
That looks cool, but it appears to show different content than BlueSky.
I dug through that thread and didn’t see the URL for where it is hosted. Also I now feel the need to volunteer that I don’t use Mastodon and am definitely not some kind of diehard fan of that app.
Again, I’m hoping to see alternative server instances of all the Bluesky services available for utilization by the public (whether customized or just reposted), not other apps that use atproto.
I want to see distributed platforms succeed, but as Bluesky notes on their About page, the problem is with centralization of authority. If a necessary part of the system is exclusively managed by a single corporation, it is centralized - whether by intent or just de facto. If that is the case, it would indicate some problem(s) exist that need solutions pursued until the situation is remedied.
What purpose does it serve for a dev to recreate a brand new app view right now? Yes there’s getting away from centralization but is that enough to encourage someone to build something from the ground up? Right now it’s only devs tinkering.
If Bluesky introduced 5 ads per post tomorrow. You can bet your ass there’s going to be a new app backfilled with historical data within a month. But right now there’s zero incentive since they’ve already solved the major problems of Twitter and Mastodon.
The relay is probably a bit more important for decentralization, but it’s not particularly hard to load up a relay within a days work as the guy in the above response has shown. The white wind app also pulls directly from PDS’ avoiding the need to use a relay at all.
If you have the data and the code you are in the effectively decentralized since anyone can effectively recreate your platform in a few days. Regardless I’m sure BlueSky will make a decision at some point that will entice someone enough to publish a separate appview. Think about how long Lemmy has been around and it’s barely starting to see separate platforms take off more like mbin and piefed. Yeah kbin was around 2 years ago and piefed was very early but it takes a long time for these platforms to grow and mature, we can’t just expect them to exist overnight when BlueSky has been fully public for what barely a year?