
Thousands flock to Wikipedia founder's 'Facebook rival' - tooba
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-50460243
======
emptybottle
To all the people poking fun at "thousands"... You have to start somewhere,
and I'm sure you'd be tickled pink to see thousands of new users signing up
for your app...

~~~
filmgirlcw
If I was the co-founder of one of the top websites in the world that had to
pivot from my shitty news organization into what looks like a shitty version
of Diaspora, I’m not so sure I’d be thrilled with “thousands.”

You need network effects for social network rivals to take off. That isn’t to
say there won’t be a Facebook successor (there almost certainly will be one —
the big challenge for Facebook is if it has a piece of that or not), but just
as Diaspora, Google+, Peach, Ello, App.net, Gab, Mastadon, and any other
number of attempts at this have failed (calling Mastadon a failure is unfair,
but its not Twitter and won’t ever be), so will this.

Snap was a threat to Facebook’s core messaging properties (WhatsApp,
Messenger, Instagram), so Instagram had to blatantly copy Snap to win back
momentum. Snap is still a thing, but unless it leans into the fact that it
isn’t owned by Facebook (which is ultimately what hurts WA and Instagram), it
isn’t ever going to catch-up, especially on a global level. TikTok has the
sort of network effect Vine never had, and could be a real contender for the
next generation, even with its ownership questions. Twitch and YouTube still
have opportunities for growth — and there is still lots of room for innovation
in the live video space.

And look, maybe this will be a really nice niche community for a small group
of people. I hope it is. I hope the people that signup and pay for it enjoy
it. I hope Wales doesn’t get bored when it doesn’t have tons of users and make
tons of money.

There is a market for small community social networks. Not everything has to
be the scale of Facebook — I’d argue it’s better when things aren’t that size
— but let’s not pretend we’re not talking about this because it’s being
positioned as something that is “taking on” the giant — when it would be more
helpful - but make for a poorer headline/narrative - to say, “rich dude wants
to recreate The Well for a generation of users who doesn’t know what The Well
was.”

~~~
iamnothere
> Mastadon, and any other number of attempts at this have failed (calling
> Mastadon a failure is unfair, but its not Twitter and won’t ever be), so
> will this.

Who says that success should be measured by Twitter? It may be that no other
social network approaches Twitter and Facebook in size given their dominance,
but that doesn't mean that there can be no other social networks.

In my opinion, one-size-fits-all social was a mistake to begin with. Smaller
niche spaces (like HN) are much more interesting.

To think of it another way: did your favorite local bistro "fail" as a
restaurant because it didn't become as large as McDonald's? Which one would
you rather eat at?

~~~
filmgirlcw
Mastodon is successful for sure, but it isn't successful enough to overcome
the incumbent in the space, which is what we're talking about. That isn't a
bad thing, but it's important to add that context when looking at anything
else that is being heralded as "the next X."

That's literally why I added the caveat of saying "Mastodon isn't a failure"
\-- but it hasn't overcome the incumbent and it won't and that may not have
been the goal, but that is certainly the story that was told/sold "this OSS
de-centralized app is going to replace Twitter," if not by the founders, than
by the press/people excited by the idea.

~~~
apatters
To think in terms of there even being a next "incumbent in the space" implies
a misunderstanding of what is driving Mastodon adoption.

The differentiator behind Mastodon is federation via the ActivityPub protocol.
And Mastodon is just one implementation of ActivityPub. More are being built
every day.

It's likely that a world with ubiquitous ActivityPub would look very different
from the social media landscape of today -- Mastodon is a little like Twitter,
Pixelfed is a little like Instagram, Peertube is a little like Youtube, but
they all syndicate their content to each other. So as ActivityPub grows the
conventional categories blur. What happens if WordPress decides to add
ActivityPub support to the Core?

I can't read the future but I think the real metric to look at is ActivityPub
adoption. No one is tracking it very well right now to my knowledge. And if it
hits a certain critical mass I think it will start to reconfigure the current
categories of social media. It will also bring down barriers to entry which
may discourage the rise of incumbents similar to today's crop.

~~~
thosakwe
I love the idea of ActivityPub, but in practice, I think the very complex
protocol, which is built on top of JSON-LD (I still don't understand why) of
all things, and accepts variable structures for many, if not most fields,
which makes it cumbersome to (de)serialize in languages with static typing,
will hurt adoption by new projects.

My main gripe with it is that potentially writing a spec-compliant server in
an enterprise-y language like Java almost feels like a fool's errand (I tried
it in Dart, which is very Java-esque).

On that note, I don't even think that the main focus should be on which
protocol is used, but rather the features of platforms in the "fediverse," and
reasons other than the blanket term "privacy" that the average person would
consider switching.

~~~
mehhh
There are tons of differing implementations like PeerTube, PixelFed
(Instagram-esque), Lemmy (Federated Reddit/HN), Write.as (great for blogging
on the fediverse and closed platforms at the same time), Pleroma, etc

~~~
thosakwe
Yet out of those, which actually implement the full spec (server-to-server,
not to mention client-to-server, though I do think I remember reading that
Pleroma has it), or even if they implement parts of it, do it in a compliant
way? I would imagine the number is small because of the sheer complexity of
the spec, and the many ways the same data can appear in different requests. I
remember reading one of the Pleroma authors saying that they don't support
JSON-LD in their implementation because no library for it existed in Elixir.

Like I said, I'm a fan of ActivityPub and its concept, but I think it's fair
to say that spec is more complex than what it needs to be, and would have been
better off strictly defining the shape of data it can handle.

------
falcor84
While 160,000 is a very small number compared to Facebook's user base, it's
two orders of magnitude more than what the "thousands"in the title made me
imagine. A more generous title would have used something like "a sixth of a
million".

~~~
hinkley
Someone else in the thread is implying it’s closer to 190k. At any rate we are
now into “hundreds of thousands”.

~~~
epx
241693 right now.

------
hcarvalhoalves
Good, but I think the "Facebook" model is dead by now.

I've listened to a podcast recently about how the younger generation (00's
onwards) don't even use social networks the way they're designed anymore. They
keep multiple accounts/personas, they post ephemeral content, delete content,
etc. It's a lot more about self-expression (Snapchat, TikTok) than having an
online presence of your real-life self (Facebook, LinkedIn, etc). In a sense,
they're undermining the monopolising network effects by creating many
disconnected sub-graphs. It's been eye opening.

~~~
seizeheures
I’d be interested in listening to that podcast, what’s it called?

~~~
hcarvalhoalves
It's a famous Brazilian podcast, unfortunately there's no transcript, but
here's the link:
[https://www.b9.com.br/shows/braincast/geracao-z/](https://www.b9.com.br/shows/braincast/geracao-z/)

They had a teenager as guest and the talk dynamic was good, with a lot of Q&A.
Since I don't usually interact w/ teenagers I was completely blind to how they
were using the web today.

~~~
mportela
Wow, I didn't know B9 had released an episode on this matter. Thanks for
pointing it out!

------
jermaustin1
I can't see this as a Facebook rival. From my understanding, this is a social
news site with fact checking.

I use Facebook to post pictures of my vacations for my family, and get updates
on my nieces and nephews since I moved from Houston, TX to NYC 5 years ago.

Until someone replaces that aspect in a way that works while still enabling my
family to do their memes and quizzes, and all that crap I avoid, there will be
no "rival". I HATE Facebook, but I can't get rid of it without losing access
to my family.

~~~
psweber
I fantasize about a product like that sometimes. A private, pay social site
geared towards families. Your family pays a yearly subscription. Photo/video
sharing. Event planning. Family news timeline. Everything purely linear. No
manipulation to maximize engagement. No ads. Just real information about your
family that you care about.

One side of my family has about 30 people that are all willing to travel to
meet somewhere every few years. Compared to that expense, it would be trivial
for us to share the cost of such a service, even if it were a few hundreds
dollars a year.

~~~
danfang
I'm building _exactly_ this! It's a very early product, but please try out
Thread - [https://get.thread-app.com](https://get.thread-app.com)

~~~
pfundstein
I know it's probably one of the most difficult features to add -- especially
for group messaging, but e2ee is a feature that will get you an instant user-
base, who will then help network in more users. Just don't make it the main
selling point (like Signal).

------
jandrese
Is that headline damning with faint praise? Mere "thousands" doesn't seem like
enough to get critical mass on a social network. For comparison Google+ had
something on the order of 300 million users and failed to get traction.

~~~
organsnyder
Google+ only had that many users because many other Google properties (YouTube
being the biggest) were lumped in together. I bet the majority of Google+
"users" weren't even aware that the platform existed.

~~~
varjag
Right, it would grab you by YT and wouldn't take 'no' for an answer.
Effectively it was also world's largest deanonymization effort. Must have been
some hefty internal incentives program at Google, they tried as if their bonus
depended on it.

~~~
dbuder
I remember fighting it and failing, I was like what! I said no a dozen
different ways and here is my full name.

------
war1025
I just signed up, which it seems hasn't actually granted me access, even
though the initial page it took me to did look like I had access? I don't
really get it.

I think something people maybe aren't taking into account is that this doesn't
need to be a "Facebook killer". People with Facebook also use any number of
social media sites. It could just as easily be something like a Reddit
substitute since it seems to be somewhat "groups" oriented.

Also, from what I can see, it isn't pay-to-play like some people have
suggested. Rather, it seems to be exactly what I've seen multiple people
advocate for: Pay for preferential service.

I'll keep an eye on it at least. Why not.

------
xchaotic
The pricing to me seems horribly expensive especially as they are fighting a
competitor that is ‘free’ and has way better network effects?

~~~
icotyl
I think there’s an uptick at the moment of paid online services. We’re getting
four models:

1\. Free commercial services supported by advertising.

2\. Ad-free commercial services supported by subscriptions.

3\. Open-source distributed services.

Arguably there’s a fourth category: free, ad-free commercial services
supported by VC money to grow until reaches critical mass and pivots into a
paid/advertising model.

The second option caters to a smaller crowd who are willing to pay for a
better experience, but a “smaller crowd” defies conventional wisdom about
social network effects. It’s an interesting experiment though. There are now
dozens of news aggregators, streaming media services, gaming platforms, etc.,
competing for our monthly disposable income, so it may be a tough sell.

The NYT covered the shift towards subscription services recently:
[https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/11/13/magazine/inte...](https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/11/13/magazine/internet-
premium.html)

------
mgbmtl
Not to dive into semantics, I guess it's more of a Reddit rival? Meaning that
I would be happy if it can be a fairly good news aggregator, and it doesn't
need a huge critical mass.

Facebook is for baby pictures of friends, angry old relatives and instant
messenger for people that you want to keep at a certain distance :-)

~~~
hyperbovine
Reddit certainly rivals Facebook for my attention.

~~~
bencollier49
Reddit with Wikipedia-style moderation does not appeal to me.

------
tekkk
Well can't say I'm not curious, but €90 a year is a lot of money.

To pay that for just another service for procrastination? Maybe I'll pass.
Although I definitely support the idea.

~~~
znpy
it's the old saying: "if you're not paying for using a product or you're not
being paid to use a product, that means that you're the product".

Deciding to pass on a service that asks you money to offer you a service is
completely fine, as long as you don't later complain about "privacy issues"
and "massive surveillance".

~~~
Kye
Most Mastodon instances cover bills with a handful of supporters on Patreon.
Centralizing is what racks up the big dollar figures. Even mastodon.social
only cost about $280/month to run as of mid 2018.

[https://github.com/tootsuite/documentation/blob/master/Runni...](https://github.com/tootsuite/documentation/blob/master/Running-
Mastodon/Resources-needed.md)

It's not necessary for everyone to pay if the topology is right. They could
have joined the growing ActivityPub fediverse and set up a managed hosting
thing the way one of the major Mastodon contributors did.

The centralized sites spend much of their money on marketing and making ad
deals. You don't need that if the social network is a standard feature you
bolt your software on to and don't depend on ads.

------
nomight
While I like the idea, there are other, better "alternative" social media
platforms out there. Mastodon[1] being a good example (even if it's more a
Twitter than a Facebook): open, federated, free (as in beer and freedom).

[1] [https://joinmastodon.org/](https://joinmastodon.org/)

------
bamboozled
I’ve learned to live a happy life without social media (mostly), I’d never go
back to anything that resembled Facebook. I moved on and I’m happy for it.

I enjoy some Instagram and Snap, that’s it. I’m bored with them too though.

~~~
LeoPanthera
Two of the largest social networks is not "a life without social media".

~~~
bamboozled
Fair point.

I guess what I was trying to say is that they're different formats and they
encourage different types of engagement.

What I meant is, I don't miss the type of experience that Facebook provided at
all.

Instagram feels more like entertainment and the engagement seems more
"trivial" to me. I can passively consume or participate in if I have nothing
better to do, else I don't miss it.

Facebook started to turn into a boring chore for me.

~~~
MiroF
Yes, but the problem with FB that Wales is trying to solve is the incentive
structure created by advertising and the associated data privacy issues.

Usage of IG leaves that dynamic essentially intact.

~~~
bamboozled
Yup, I don't really have an issue with the advertisement model as is with IG
because it's been a fantastic incentive for me not to look at it :)

However, Wales' mission is noble and I hope he does well!

~~~
MiroF
The insights they glean from your IG activity is then translated into the ads
that you see all over the web - not just restricted to the ones on IG.

------
bonoboTP
What a horrible name. How do I even pronounce it? "Double-u-tee social"?
Doesn't quite roll off the tongue, especially for non-native English speakers.

~~~
kick
"WikiTribune Social" or "W.T. Social."

~~~
pbhjpbhj
They realise that it's a terrible name though, right?

WikiSocial might've done, I guess that's taken. But this is too long, unless
it's supposed to be pronounced "woot-social"?

------
DebtDeflation
I signed up, was waitlisted (number 180-thousand something on the list), sent
out a couple of invites to friends with the url it generates, as soon as one
of them accepted, it gave me access. So I guess if you don't want to pay the
$13/month, you can avoid it by getting a friend to join.

~~~
corobo
I didn’t even share it, just loaded my own share link and it let me in

------
ofrzeta
The name is unfortunate and I wish they would spend more time on thinking
about a proper name. It has to work in spoken conversation such as "are you on
Facebook?", "I am using Whatsapp". "We can connect on WT:Social", not so much.
Is it supposed to be pronounced "double you tee social"?

------
dna_polymerase
> The platform says it will never sell user data and relies on "the generosity
> of individual donors" rather than ads.

Yay, so yearly half-site banners at the top of the page asking for an
individual contribution while sitting on a multi-million dollar stack of
money? Nice. Facebook is done! \s

------
kingkawn
It does not need to beat facebook at its own game. Merely establish a digital
public space that has its own culture, and in time, that culture spreads out
into the world, whether the world joins the site itself or not. Hackernews is
an example of such a place too.

------
zepearl
> _It is positioning itself as a "news focused" place, and says members will
> be able to edit "misleading" headlines._

Upcoming "Battle of Edits"?

And why edit only "headlines", and "misleading" compared to what?

------
neilobremski
> The platform says it will never sell user data and relies on "the generosity
> of individual donors" rather than ads

I'd prefer "The platform says it will never sell user data and relies on
paying customers rather than ads"

------
phkahler
I dont want to see 3rd party stuff my friends share. I want to see my friends
content.

------
ian0
Nov 15th: 80,000 users

Nov 17th: 160,000 users

Nov 18th: 200,000 users

[https://twitter.com/jimmy_wales/status/1196571429099200512](https://twitter.com/jimmy_wales/status/1196571429099200512)

------
fortran77
I tried it. Despite it trying not to spread "misinformation" it really isn't
that much better. And I'm getting barraged by "friend requests" from Russian
Women just like any other social network.

What would be nice is if people paid for Journalism again. They major
newspapers and news magazines should figure out how to have a common payment
system that lets you subscribe in one place to nearly everything, with a
consistent interface between them.

~~~
Kye
Someone sent one as soon as I got in and there's no way to reject. Now there's
a big "pending requests" box on every page and an easy to misclick Accept
button.

------
Kye
I made an account and am on a waiting list. It wants me to invite people to
bump myself up in the queue. Or pay.

The site looks very 2000s PHP CMS. I'm not sure what it _is_. I searched for a
topic I'm interested in, something came up, and I clicked...and it bumped me
back to the main page where it shows my place in the list.

Why would I invite people or pay money for something if I have no idea what
I'm getting?

------
mark_l_watson
I have been using WT.social yesterday and today and I generally like it. I
just read a linked article about a meeting on a train, quite good. My user
name is mark-watson2

I used GNU Social for a long while but when the host of my instance shut it
down I didn’t create an account on another server instance. I liked the
decentralized nature of GNU Social, but I think WT.social has more chance of
getting traction.

------
robbyking
I'm curious if people are sick of Facebook or sick of social media in general.
My only Facebook friends are people I'm actually friends with, and I mute the
more obnoxious members of my family. Because of this my FB experience seemed
to be a lot nicer than what most people experience, but in the end it just
felt like a waste of time.

------
joegahona
Does this mean 160,000 registered? Or 160,000 entered their cc info and are
paying? Way different metrics, obviously.

------
joeblau
This reminds me of "There are dozens of us... DOZENS"[1]. While I am happy
that people are diversifying their social network choice, 160k is a rounding
error to Facebook.

[1] - [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKie-
vgUGdI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKie-vgUGdI)

------
tomaszs
I see there is a bar telling the service is under heavy load. You can join
using this link: [https://wt.social/gi/tomasz-
smykowski/work/buwn](https://wt.social/gi/tomasz-smykowski/work/buwn)

I have created some groups for software developers

------
rightisleft
Unpopular Opinion: the core problem with facebook or any social network is the
people inhabiting it. I dont think simply offering an alternative with X
removed and Y enhanced will solve the problem. Its like the old saying "no
matter where you go, there you are..."

------
gtirloni
I'm really happy to see a social network that makes costs clear and allow me
to pay for its services in exchange for not having my data sold.

It probably won't grow to hundreds of millions of users but that's fine.
Closer connections with people that care are much more interesting.

------
schnable
"Thousands"

~~~
shujito
selects are best

------
NoPicklez
I worry that it doesn't take long at all to question the accuracy of
information on any platform. And given that this platforms value proposition
is accurate information, that proposition can be easily tarnished or
diminished.

------
grezql
Just signed up, I hope this really takes off. I think the design needs a
proper face lift, then again the first version of FB wasnt a really eye candy
either.

I hope in future they implement messaging system and events.

~~~
pfrench42
I'm still considering signing up. I would do it in a heartbeat if, with my
subscription, I could "gift" a subscription to a couple people of my choosing

------
nikolay
This is so far from being a rival, I won't even comment further!

------
Apocryphon
Will they also offer an alternative to Facebook login? Because it’s not just
the social network itself that’s all-pervasive on the internet, and locks you
into its network.

~~~
type0
They need to provide tribute-hailing buttons on other websites otherwise it
won't become pervasive enough.

------
corobo
“Flock to” might be a bit much. I’ve registered there in case it takes off,
but I’ve not used it even half as much as a social network might want

------
upofadown
It doesn't sound like this actually federates with anything else. So how is
this not just another pointless silo?

~~~
mikorym
> It doesn't sound like this actually federates with anything else.

I think it's for the people who consider that a feature.

------
CrankyBear
Jimmy Wales or Mark Zuckerman... this is not exactly a situation where's one
clearly more trust worthy than the other.

~~~
supjeff
Aside from the fact that wales' software is supposed to be free and open
source and thus will not require its users to trust the founder as much as
they are forced to with fb, how is Wales not more trustworthy than Zuck? One
guy has a string of abuses and apologies spanning almost two decades as the
founder, CEO and majority shareholder of a company that helped the Russian
gov't steal the 2016 election and helped bring back eradicated diseases, and
the other created a non-profit encyclopedia and gave away the source code?

~~~
behringer
Not only that, but he managed to navigate his army of editors to weed out
fake/pseudo scientific entries. He's the fake news anti-hero.

------
0xdeadbeefbabe
Do they fact check the hair loss ads or only the news? Can I get in line
earlier for not being from California?

------
buboard
I 'm not sure this is the kind of project that JW should be spending his
social creds/capital on.

------
amelius
Now if only someone would periodically copy all interesting events from
Facebook to that platform ...

------
8bitsrule
Two days after that article it's 275K. Needs work, but the basics are there.
Fly!

------
OrgNet
I signed up but the cost is way too high so I won't be using it... like 10
times too high?

------
anewguy9000
can i just say that the "news" on the wikipedia homepage should be renamed
"disasters and deaths". what is with their weird bent for what makes it to the
homepage?

------
anotheryou
that you _have_ to pay is a misconception, you don't.

I just still don't quite grasp the concept. Ad-free (cool for privacy) and
everybody can edit everything?

------
vikiomega9
Do they talk about why we need to log-in?

------
foobarbecue
How does this relate to wikinews?

------
to-too-two
Haven’t heard a single thing about this social network aside from the name
associated with it.

------
wnevets
I signed up but thats it.

------
a_band
"Thousands flock"...

------
EGreg
Thousands?

This is 2019

~~~
ofrzeta
It's 160.000

------
oarabbus_
Thousands! Thousands of users, I say!

~~~
vcavallo
hundreds of thousands at the moment

------
electricviolet
There are thousands of us! Thousands!

------
DeusExMachina
Even though this specific platform does not appeal to me, I'm glad to see the
market produce alternatives to Facebook and Twitter.

Another notable mention is Thinkspot [1], the platform created by Jordan
Peterson and others.

Sure, as others point these are not "direct" competitors to the existing
platforms, but I don't think they need to be.

You can't beat Facebook at making Facebook. In my opinion, if anything can
chip away at the power of large players are platforms with different ideas and
rules.

[1]: [https://www.ts.today](https://www.ts.today)

------
caiocaiocaio
Another Facebook killer? 4329847328943298th time's the charm!

------
vcavallo
joined! come on in

[https://wt.social/gi/vinney-cavallo/work/yu97](https://wt.social/gi/vinney-
cavallo/work/yu97)

~~~
plibither8
Wow, this just spammed my entire friend list and added a bunch of "friends"
without any prompt.

~~~
vcavallo
I had/have no idea how this works yet.

