It can be bought by a billionaire. I think we need to be careful thinking this risk doesn’t exist.
“We can just make another instance” - this won’t happen like people think it will. If all the content is on Lemmy.world and it gets bought, then people are going to be hesitant to move somewhere else, just like people are hesitant to leave Reddit now.
people are going to be hesitant to move somewhere else
It is however much easier to move between fediverse instances than it is to move from commercial social media to the fediverse. Once you’re on the fediverse, moving is easier.
Instances can be bought by billionaires. The software can’t. And I don’t think many billionaires would buy a website running a software that they cant control tbh
Why won’t it? I think user accounts need federation as well, but switching hosts isn’t hard. Lemmy.ca went down a little while ago due to a power supply breaking. The admin has been great about it, moving away from the provider that took a day to fix the issue. But during the downtime I was able to use an account I has already set up on a different instance.
When reddit is down, it was really down. When a lemmy instance is down you can just use another. Don’t get tied into just one host.
Even if people running instances are saints, a lot of money can not only buy, but bully them into submission. Bullshit lawsuits is one way to do so before they are financially crippled. We are safeguarded only by our irrelevance.
“We are safeguarded only by our irrelevance” it’s not just Lemmy. I’m thinking about the trans movement that progressed quietly without fanfare and the moment it was no longer “irrelevant “ for the majority it started getting massive pushback. Shocking how little it took to go from irrelevant to a danger to society.
It can be bought by a billionaire. I think we need to be careful thinking this risk doesn’t exist.
“We can just make another instance” - this won’t happen like people think it will. If all the content is on Lemmy.world and it gets bought, then people are going to be hesitant to move somewhere else, just like people are hesitant to leave Reddit now.
It is however much easier to move between fediverse instances than it is to move from commercial social media to the fediverse. Once you’re on the fediverse, moving is easier.
Another reason to spread the content across instances
Instances can be bought by billionaires. The software can’t. And I don’t think many billionaires would buy a website running a software that they cant control tbh
Why won’t it? I think user accounts need federation as well, but switching hosts isn’t hard. Lemmy.ca went down a little while ago due to a power supply breaking. The admin has been great about it, moving away from the provider that took a day to fix the issue. But during the downtime I was able to use an account I has already set up on a different instance.
When reddit is down, it was really down. When a lemmy instance is down you can just use another. Don’t get tied into just one host.
I have blocked content from lemmy.world altogether and have so much fun. Go try it, leave the bubble.
Even if people running instances are saints, a lot of money can not only buy, but bully them into submission. Bullshit lawsuits is one way to do so before they are financially crippled. We are safeguarded only by our irrelevance.
“We are safeguarded only by our irrelevance” it’s not just Lemmy. I’m thinking about the trans movement that progressed quietly without fanfare and the moment it was no longer “irrelevant “ for the majority it started getting massive pushback. Shocking how little it took to go from irrelevant to a danger to society.