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Centralisation of communications media is an extremely powerful force.
The typical remediation for centralization is regulated public utilities is breaking up a monopoly into a cartel of 3-5 local monopolies.
Also not great.
We are participating here at a very rare occurrence of decentralisation.
For everyone who thinks this is important for our lives and for the world, it is incumbent on all of us to build structures now that hold this ground as the federation grows.
I highly recommend the excellent book "The Master Switch" by Tim Wu.
It details the initial decentralization, followed by centralization and monopoly, of various media from telegrams to film, radio, tv, telephones, cable TV, and the Internet.
It's a fascinating read, and well worth your time.
One of the big mistakes people make, over and over again, is relying on technological determinism.
That is, thinking the architecture of the technology will preserve the topology of the network.
Mastodon is Open Source. It's built with open standards.
This is necessary but not sufficient to keep the network decentralized.
We're going to need social and legal structures, plus cultural norms, that counterbalance Metcalfe's law, which pushes the network towards centralization.
@evan so, pro coop?
@evan unfortunately in germany the process to establish a coop is very bureaucratic and costs aroud 8000€
@igorette well, fuck that.
Is there a system like https://opencollective.com/ for German cooperatives to work in before establishing their own legal coop?
@evan @igorette (we met once at FS marriage in Hamburg :)
It depends what you would name a coop.
E.g. https://iconet-foundation.org is a gUG which is easy and there is the “Stiftung in Gründung”.
@sl007 hey i'm old but not senile. Ok, GuG is interesting, but G.i.G ist not a solution but a problem procrastinated
no doubt that you are not senile.
Just wanted to avoid the feeling that I'm trolling Evan. ;)