73.0K
CBIf you recently downloaded Meta’s Threads app, you may have noticed it plans to join the fediverse.
The fediverse is a federated social network running free open software on computer servers around the world. It allows users to connect and communicate with people on other servers as they would with micro-blogging service Mastodon and Friendica.
Proponents of the fediverse say it’s similar to the early days of the internet, when Big Tech hadn’t yet created social media sites that rely on advertising and use algorithms to keep you scrolling only on their platforms.
“So it's a great way for organizations to take back some of the control. They're not kind of living inside someone else's social network,” said Evan Prodromou, an entrepreneur and technologist based in Montreal who co-created ActivityPub, the protocol that the fediverse is largely developed on.
In its Help Center, Meta said its vision for Threads is to enable users to communicate with people on other fediverse platforms it doesn’t own or control, and it will rely on the ActivityPub protocol.
However some already using the fediverse are concerned about what might happen if a major company like Meta joins.
“I think people see Meta coming in and potentially this risk of them bringing this really poor track record and destroying or deteriorating this really interesting and exciting space that's really been built from the bottom up by a lot of diverse, different kinds of communities,” said Brian Keegan, a computational social scientist with the University of Colorado Boulder.
Meta hasn’t responded to CBC’s request for comment or said when Threads will join the fediverse.
(Reporting & video: Ashley Fraser, Roxanna Woloshyn/CBC News) #fediverse #SocialNetworks #Threads #Meta #Mastodon #federated #App #CBCNews #CBC
@cbcnews
