Today was a huge milestone in our quest to federate #Flipboard and tear down the walls around our own walled garden.
First, we launched a new version of Flipboard for iOS and Android which brings the promise of two way federation to life. Now when a federated Flipboard user curates, people in the fediverse can reply, favorite, boost or follow those Flipboard users who will in turn see that activity in their usual notifications tab. Even better, Flipboard users can directly reply to people in the fediverse -- and very soon they will also be able to follow each other.
Second, we federated some of our best curators today who are actively curating more than 10,000 magazines about everything from climate change to kale smoothie recipes. I'm grateful to our many curators and the service they provide to so many others who want to find the best content about a shared interest. I know our curators are excited to have millions more people who could potentially benefit from their curation. I also know that people in the fediverse will give a warm welcome to these curators. Especially now that everyone can hear and talk to each other over what was once two totally separate networks but now increasingly are in one and the same #fediverse.
Now that for-profit tech companies are beginning to implement #ActivityPub, I think it's important to establish what we want with the #fediverse and whether federation with #Threads, #Flipboard, Tumblr, and the like bring us closer to or further from those goals.
With that in mind, I've come up with a few statements (in no particular order) that describe what I think is an "ideal fediverse" — a fediverse that's not necessarily realistic but that we should aim for:
No actor controls a large portion of visible activity.
Users can move between instances without penalty.
Creating and running an instance requires minimal effort.
People on or entering the fediverse understand the variety of available options.
There is no downside to using free and open-source platforms over proprietary ones.
These definitely aren't comprehensive, and if you have anything you'd add, let's discuss that! They're currently helping me reassess my stance on Threads now that Flipboard is also entering the stage, and I hope they're helpful for others as well.
I'll elaborate on these five statements in the comments.