Which is most important?

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@mmasnick wrote "Protocols Not Platforms":

https://www.techdirt.com/2019/08/28/protocols-not-platforms-technological-approach-to-free-speech/

Our friends at @anewsocial have merch that says "People not Platforms":

https://store.anew.social/

This poll is finally determining once and for all what should be on top.

I threw in "Products" because it's a techy P-word and I figured it would fit in well with the rest.

[quillmatiq@mastodon.social]

@evan There is no utility in protocols, platforms, or products without the people

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@quillmatiq does that make people the most important part of the system?

[quillmatiq@mastodon.social]

@evan yes 🙂‍↕️! why would we be here if it weren't for the people we build communities with? When social platforms change for the worse, isn't our first reaction "but I don't want to leave my people"?

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@quillmatiq I tend to agree, but I'm disputing for the enjoyment of the question.

Without the products, platforms, and protocols, the people would be distant and isolated. Most communications devices are products. I think you could make a case that spoken language is a protocol.

Without communications, people are isolated. We're barely people in a meaningful sense.

[quillmatiq@mastodon.social]

@evan my assumption was that the context is online social networks rather than something broader! But, I think the point still stands that without people, the other P's hold no value, but people hold value regardless of all the other P's.

What is the value of a language if no one ever exists to speak it?

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@quillmatiq emergent phenomena arise from networks of communicating, connected humans. Like cultures, religions, political movements, nation states. One term I've seen is intersubjectivity, the things that only exist between people:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersubjectivity

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@quillmatiq yeah, it's a bit of rug pull to zoom out on other pre-Internet networks, like telephones, writing, and local newspapers.

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@quillmatiq I think it takes some extreme individualism, which definitely isn't universal, to say that a person is more important than their city, religion, or country.

(I think this is an extreme over-extension of my point, though. Even if emergent entities arise from Internet communications networks in the same way they did from pre-Internet communications networks, we're not at a point (yet?) where people are willing to put the good of their Subreddit above their own needs.)

[quillmatiq@mastodon.social]

@evan I specifically didn't say "person", I said "people" 🙂

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@quillmatiq touché!