sure this is all very bad for activitypub but this is truly amazing content

[jenniferplusplus@hachyderm.io]

@laurenshof @seachanger
Yes, that. But also, he created a problem that is hard for computers and harmful for humans. And his proposed solution is to make it more harmful to humans in order to make it easier for the computers.

[seachanger@alaskan.social]

@jenniferplusplus @laurenshof hard to find a single person more embarrassingly to blame for the failures of mastodon to meet the moment

[jdp23@neuromatch.social]

Yeah so true. Hmm weren't there five co-authors of the AP spec?

@jenniferplusplus @laurenshof @seachanger

[jdp23@neuromatch.social]

Specifically for Mastodon's failures ... I can think of another candidate (everything is gender, implementation edition). But for AP and "the Fediverse" as a whole, I completely agree. And yet for some inexplicable reason people still listen to him!

@seachanger @jenniferplusplus @laurenshof

[dgodon@mastodon.online]

@seachanger @laurenshof ick!

[jenniferplusplus@hachyderm.io]

@jdp23 @seachanger @laurenshof I assume you mean Eugen, and I want to give him all due credit for trying to do better. I wish he'd started earlier, and I wish it was going faster, but he's been doing the right kinds of things for some time

[jdp23@neuromatch.social]

My main point is that Eugen's had light-years more impact on Mastodon than Evan. Even with respect to AP's less-than-completely-positive (cough) impact on Mastodon, Eugen could have supported LitePub et al back in 2019ish -- or some other protocol change. And Eugen could have prioritized support for AP C2S. AP was in fact an improvement on OStatus when Mastodon adopted it in 2017, but it was Eugen's choice to do an EEE strategy and let it turn into a millstone.

I agree that Eugen 2026 has grown a lot in some ways from Eugen 2017 and even Eugen 2022 ... it's really hard for a founder to step away and pass the torch and he deserves a huge amount of credit for that. On the other hand local-only posts still aren't in Mastodon, admins still can't easily change the maximum post length, the documentation still talks about how allow-list federation is contrary to Mastodon's mission, I don't think he's ever changed his position on Meta's adoption of AP being "a huge victory for our cause" ... so I disagree on "he's been doing the right kinds of things".

@jenniferplusplus @seachanger @laurenshof

[jenniferplusplus@hachyderm.io]

@jdp23 @seachanger @laurenshof
Ok, well, I'd rather reinforce good behavior

[seachanger@alaskan.social]

@jenniferplusplus @jdp23 @laurenshof no doubt eugen has has an enormous practical impact on mastodon but Evan is just such a sparkling poster boy for the absolutely shittiest and most offputting part of this whole world

[jenniferplusplus@hachyderm.io]

@seachanger @jdp23 @laurenshof
If I was forced to choose between all Evans or all Eugens, I'd choose Eugen in a heartbeat

[knova@lostcreek.social]

@laurenshof I thought I was in a fever dream watching this play out yesterday.

[j0ebaldw1n@mastodonapp.uk]

@jenniferplusplus @laurenshof @seachanger OK I feel like I am missing out on hilarious lore here. Who is this guy (aside from someone who felt the need to lecture Christine Lemmer-Webber about ActivityPub, which, well, lmao)

[jdp23@neuromatch.social]

Fair! @jenniferplusplus @seachanger @laurenshof

[fromjason@mastodon.social]

@laurenshof people inquiring about privacy/security considerations seems like a real trigger point.

[laurenshof@indieweb.social]

@j0ebaldw1n Evan is one of the 5 coauthors of ActivityPub, together with Christine. He's also part of the Social Web Foundation, and is an active contributor to the current maintenance of AP at the w3c. the other 4 have largely left the work on AP (2 of them work on another protocol now), and Evan does most of the current work on AP

[promovicz@chaos.social]

@laurenshof @cwebber @evan what I really like is the openness of it all.

On the signing issue, I'm with Christine. I like Evan's viewpoint for social systems, but not for digital systems with "complex system" mechanics and active intelligent threat actors.