Post #211403

https://asterisk.lol/blog/atproto-is-a-lie In tech circles a lot of people have been talking about ATProto as the future of social media or building their latest flashy social network built with it, alongside companies trying to get in as well. The whole thing looked owned by one company with venture capital, but its technically decentralized layer wasn't a huge problem in and of itself. It didn't really make sense until I read Ploum's two posts about interoperability and I finally understood what the real problem was. Alongside that, I fell into a rabbit hole of other issues with Bluesky's moderation and the did:web protocol. It clearly wasn't the future, but I was so pissed at how people were talking about it as the future and "billionaire-proof social media" and how all of its problems could be solved that I wrote one big long blog post about it that I left abandoned for two years and eventually refactored and finished today. I wanted to compile all of my personal grievances with ATProto and the Silicon Valley grift culture surrounding it. I'm really happy that there are migration services to the Fediverse as fire exits are important, but I just think a lot of people don't realize how bad ATProto really is. This goes beyond the space limits needed to host a Relay (which were fixed), or some other small comment. It's a core flaw with the protocol's design that cannot be fixed. This flaw (the interface problem) means Bluesky's control is absolute and inescapable. Any other AppView is just as centralized. Bluesky's investors did not invest into an open network, they invested into a charade, decentralization theater. #bluesky