I’ve thought about it a bit and the Fediverse has been around for a while now. There are some really cool applications being made to replace the mainstream ones, but they just aren’t taking off.
Why do you guys think that might be? Ease of use? Addiction to the mainstream platforms? Lack of marketing?
The inertia of using the ‘mainstream’ platforms will be one of the hardest things to overcome… If all your friends and family are on platform X, and they’re not coming to platform Y with you… well, it could be a rather boring experience… at least at first…
I think it depends on the definition of taking off. I see the Fediverse as a huge success with millions of people using it every day. At this point it’s proven itself to be both viable and sustainable. I only see it growing going forward.
The Fediverse hasn’t gone mainstream, but I think that’s a different discussion. Fediverse primarily attracts people who are dissatisfied with the status quo for one reason or another. The existing mainstream platforms obviously work well enough, so there is no reason to expect average users to start migrating from them.
IRC is also sustainable and still being hosted today, but I don’t think most people want the fediverse to be just sustainable. They want it to be a fully capable alternative to the big platforms.
The existing mainstream platforms obviously work well enough, so there is no reason to expect average users to start migrating from them.
I half agree and half disagree with that. Obviously, you’re right that they’re good enough that most people won’t migrate away. But I also think most people are dissatisfied with them and want alternatives. It’s just that the fediverse isn’t providing what people want in an alternative. On Facebook/Twitter it’s a combination of family/friends and news sites, but the fediverse is pretty vehemently against news publishers posting here. People want to follow content creators, but the fediverse has chased away multiple large personalities.
I completely agree that it would be good for Fediverse to keep growing. I’m just noting that sustainability is an important milestone.
I do agree that network effects play a role as well. People go where their friends are and where there’s more content. That said, I don’t think the Fediverse lacks content creators, there are plenty of people producing content all the time including some well known personalities.
The reason Fediverse got popular in the first place is because people got sick of commercialization and were looking for alternatives. So I don’t think it makes sense to chase commercial content to attract users because getting away from that was the whole point.
