This is what they stole from you

[flancian@social.coop]

@evan can we still make it happen?

[scottjenson@social.coop]

@evan I'm afraid to ask. Who is "they"?

[mayintoronto@beige.party]

@evan took me a hot minute to understand this one.

Translation, any user can interact with the social media stream via an API, which means you're not locked into the platform's servers or apps or payment systems.

(Is this correct?)

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@scottjenson It's a meme making fun of right wing nostalgia. The original had dark conspiratorial overtones -- a spooky unnamed "they" -- but the mocking memes are more silly, with old videogame screenshots or 70s tv commercials for appliances. I saw at least one white supremacist video by searching for the phrase on X, though, so I guess it's still used by right wing creeps, too.

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@scottjenson I don't think I want to summon up that vibe, though, even in the form of a common meme. It sounds creepy to people who don't know it. I'm going to change the text.

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@flancian yes

https://github.com/swicg/activitypub-api/

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@scottjenson

I changed it to one I like better

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@scottjenson @tsyesika talked about the ActivityPub API on stage during her talk at FOSDEM yesterday. It got a lot of applause. We were talking about it at supper later and the feeling around the table was that we should really give it a go.

[scottjenson@social.coop]

@evan @tsyesika Great that you're getting such good reaction. But pardon my naivite but aren't we "giving it a go" already? There are so many new apps on the fediverse, I'm clearly missing something. Is this an ActivityPub vs Mastodon issue?

[scottjenson@social.coop]

@rimu @evan @tsyesika
Ah that makes more sense I'm still coming up to speed on these deeper issues.

Thank you!

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@scottjenson not at all!

I think the Readme for the API task force covers it pretty well.

https://github.com/swicg/activitypub-api?tab=readme-ov-file#introduction

tl;dr is that social applications on ActivityPub are often built as an integrated client-server stack.

In other ecosystems, like the Facebook Platform, app developers could leave the complicated parts of storage, authentication, social graph, and distribution to the platform, and they'd just concentrate on innovate experiences at the top of the stack.