Is Dorsey Serious About Decentralized Social Media?
This got a lot of headlines of late. We all know Jack Dorsey is a huge fan of cryptocurrency. He is one of the biggest Bitcoin advocates there is. On this front, we cannot deny his loyalty and dedication.
However, when it comes to the discussion of decentralized social media, we embark upon grounds that are not so solid with good Ole Jack. He is the man behind both Twitter and Square. Obviously, both platforms are highly successful, thus we cannot attack Jack for his ability to build a successful platform.
Here, too, he showed himself to be exceptional.
The challenge arises when we try to wrap our minds around his conversion from a Web 2.0 titan to someone who is truly interested in Web 3.0.
Decentralization From Centralization?
Dorsey announced the idea of a decentralized social media platform more than a year ago. Actually, now it might be closer to two years. In that time, what was accomplished?
Certainly, we all know development can take time. There are setbacks and nothing ever goes as planned. Nevertheless, projects that succeed tend to move in a forward direction.
That does not appear to the case with Jack's idea. Also, there is an interesting approach to trying to arrive at a decentralized outcome.
It appears that Twitter is forming a new unit to shape the future of decentralized social media.
Right there, that just sounds odd. Twitter is forming a unit to share the future of decentralized social media? If a centralized unit is behind it, where is the decentralization? Isn't that centralized?
The new unit, Twitter Crypto, will explore how the company can support the growing interest among creators to use decentralized apps.
At least that sounds rosy.
What does not sound so rosy is this next bit that reveals Dorsey's vision.
Twitter is forming a team focused on crypto, blockchains, and other decentralized technologies after the social media company’s CEO, Jack Dorsey, has said the cryptocurrency would be a significant part of Twitter’s growth.
So he is going to use crypto, blockchain, and other decentralized technologies to grow a centralized entity? While that would not upset me if I was a shareholder in Twitter, the fact that this appears to be nothing more than a money grab. Sorry but I question the validity of Dorsey's intention with this one.
Hive Shadow-Banned On Twitter
If Dorsey was serious about decentralizing social media, you would think he would support the efforts of Hive. Yet, anyone who has been active on Twitter discussing Hive knows that it is shadow-banned.
Any upvotes given to Tweets about Hive tend to quickly be removed. Hence, the idea of getting Hive to trending is removed.
Granted, Dorsey is not likely in charge of this. Or is he? There is no way of knowing. Whatever the situation is, we can surmise that he is not an advocate of Web 3.0. Instead, he wants to create a hybrid that allows Twitter to maintain control while providing the illusion of Web 3.0.
After all, this is the buzzword right now.
Will he succeed? In the medium term, if he ever develops anything, he might. There are a lot of people who, quite frankly, could care less about decentralization. Of course, that is until their stuff is taken down or their accounts closed.
Hive is building a serious alternative to all this. It is slow going but we are seeing some of the pieces falling into place. Over the next couple months, important developments are set to roll off that can aid greatly in our question forward. One of them is the Hive Authentication Services being developed by @arcange. This allows for sign into to any site that integrates the middleware simply by entering your Hive username (along with it being tied to your Keychain).
This is how decentralized development truly takes place. There is no need for a central entity to be named to decide on the direction. Someone with the skills sees the need and fills it.
Perhaps Dorsey utilizes a different definition of "decentralized".
Article by @taskmaster4450le
Posted Using LeoFinance Beta
