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samalex
August 27th, 2010, 04:26 PM
I have a Facebook account, but I don't use it much. I've been following Diaspora (http://www.joindiaspora.com/) though and really hope it takes off as a viable, FOSS alternative to Facebook.

They announced today (http://www.joindiaspora.com/2010/08/26/overdue-update.html) that they're planning on launching Diaspora on September 15th, so another few weeks to go before we'll see what they've built. Interestingly enough they've written it in Ruby, but they said it could be hosted with virtual hosts, but do many virtual hosts support Ruby? I have either a home server I'd run it on plus possibly a VPS I subscribe to, so hopefully those will suffice.

Anyone else watching this???

Update: Here's an article from Wired about this - http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/08/diaspora-luanch (yes 'Launch' is misspelled on the URL -- error on Wired site)

Sam

Delvien
August 27th, 2010, 04:44 PM
I have a Facebook account, but I don't use it much. I've been following Diaspora (http://www.joindiaspora.com/) though and really hope it takes off as a viable, FOSS alternative to Facebook.

They announced today (http://www.joindiaspora.com/2010/08/26/overdue-update.html) that they're planning on launching Diaspora on September 15th, so another few weeks to go before we'll see what they've built. Interestingly enough they've written it in Ruby, but they said it could be hosted with virtual hosts, but do many virtual hosts support Ruby? I have either a home server I'd run it on plus possibly a VPS I subscribe to, so hopefully those will suffice.

Anyone else watching this???

Sam

I'll try it out and see if I like it, but it will never be as widely and as easily accepted from the masses as facebook.

The name alone doesn't cry "social network". A lot of weight is carried in a name. Think about it, facebook, fun to say, and you get the picture that it has something to do with pictures or maybe a yearbook? It's quite a clever/catchy name that facebook is.

I was watching their video, as I understand it, people have to install diaspora to their computer to be able to use it? Right there is a problem. No dedicated servers? meh. I foresee little companies charging for hosting your node. This is bad.

samalex
August 27th, 2010, 04:50 PM
I'll try it out and see if I like it, but it will never be as widely and as easily accepted from the masses as facebook.

The name alone doesn't cry "social network". A lot of weight is carried in a name. Think about it, facebook, fun to say, and you get the picture that it has something to do with pictures or maybe a yearbook? It's quite a clever/catchy name that facebook is.

I was watching their video, as I understand it, people have to install diaspora to their computer to be able to use it? Right there is a problem. No dedicated servers? meh. I foresee little companies charging for hosting your node. This is bad.

Per the name I agree, but I could see this becoming more of a protocol or standard where people setup their own customized sites for friends, family, community, etc and doing this they can link to other sites via Diaspora. For example I could see Linux User Groups in various cities using Diaspora as the driving force behind their online communities, then via the web connect portion they could share content and info with other groups.

So as long as a 'Diaspora site' was completely customizable yet compatible with other sites running Diaspora, I can see this taking off.

As for the average user, they offer a solution where people can setup their own hosted Diaspora site similar to what Wordpress is doing, so non-tech users could setup a site with no technical background. I like this idea...

So I see lots of promise in it, but thus far it's just vaporware until they show a demo or release code to the public to use.

Sam

chrisinspace
August 27th, 2010, 04:54 PM
I'll give it a shot. I'm on Twitter and ,for work purposes, LinkedIn, but I never signed up for Facebook. Something about it has always repelled me. I was on Friendster and MySpace, but when everyone make the leap to Facebook, I took a break from posting my life online and re-evaluated the concept. I'm ready to give it another shot, but I'll think I'll take a much more cautious, calculated approach this time around.

pookiebear
August 27th, 2010, 05:04 PM
The beauty of it could be that you could construct your site like a wordpress blog. But you don't have to host it anywhere. And you don't have to give the adsense/advertising weight of your posts to a "free" host (like blogger, facebook or associated content).

It is your content, with "loose-cloud" based hosting. (came up with that on my own)

Then go a step further with add-ins like PBX's, games, and other possible money generators then you got something special. IF you get users.

At its minimum you got Twitter without any hosting costs. That is cool enough. Think of how much Twitter and Facebook pay for hosting each month in servers and employees.

DeadSuperHero
August 27th, 2010, 07:03 PM
I'll definitely be trying it out.

But as stated above, I'm seeing this as a more federated type of thing, like email. Better yet, it would be awesome to have local Diaspora setups similar to the BBS'es of the early 90's. It'd force people in neighborhoods to get to know each other a little better, without dumping everything in a social silo!

forrestcupp
August 27th, 2010, 07:41 PM
I'd say most people would probably just start using both instead of dumping Facebook for Diaspora.

gnomeuser
August 27th, 2010, 07:51 PM
I funded their original kickstarter project (and also thank you to them for turning me on to ks), I definitely intend to move to Diaspora* as soon as humanly possible.

I also hope to see distributions use Diaspora as a point of integration.

Denis Krajnc
August 27th, 2010, 08:00 PM
Nonsense, why would I go from Facebook which got "everything", most of my friends... to this one all from beggining?

samalex
August 27th, 2010, 08:07 PM
I'll definitely be trying it out.

But as stated above, I'm seeing this as a more federated type of thing, like email. Better yet, it would be awesome to have local Diaspora setups similar to the BBS'es of the early 90's. It'd force people in neighborhoods to get to know each other a little better, without dumping everything in a social silo!

Being a BBS user (yes they're still alive) I have thought the same thing. I'd love to see content reside more within the community with connectivity bringing the communities together via the Internet/Diaspora. Whenever it's available I'll host a site to test with and for any friends/family who want to play with it, but it really depends on how much flexibility is there to customize the site.

Also using the BBS analogy, I'd love to see them push community-based sites. Facebook tries to do this, but with all content being consolidated in a central location it's just too big. Instead I could see unofficial networks (Nets/Nodes -- sound familiar?) where people run their own Diaspora server and others can feed from them, yet the head node of the net then feeds into the larger cloud. If these systems are always on and there was some redundancy at the head of each node, you could build a truly amazing network -- and a true cloud of content.


I'd say most people would probably just start using both instead of dumping Facebook for Diaspora.


Nonsense, why would I go from Facebook which got "everything", most of my friends... to this one all from beggining?

I can see some dropping Facebook for Diaspora, but others (like me) will keep a basic Facebook account as a foot in the door, and feed it from Diaspora, which I'm sure someone will have a way to update Facebook from it. This way Diaspora could contain all the info but post some of it to Facebook for those who are still using it. They could work together...


Sam

bunburya
August 27th, 2010, 08:12 PM
It's a great idea but unfortunately I can't see any reason to set up an account. All my friends are on Facebook, and they're very unlikely to move to Diaspora en masse (for the simple fact that all their friends are on Facebook too, as well as the fact that FB is what they are comfortable with).

bunburya
August 27th, 2010, 08:18 PM
double post

chrisinspace
August 27th, 2010, 08:40 PM
Nonsense, why would I go from Facebook which got "everything", most of my friends... to this one all from beggining?

For the same reasons that everyone bailed out of Friendster and then MySpace and started from the beginning. There are many...new features/functionality, better interface, society's short attention span...pick one. The fact that it's open could also be a big draw. We'll just have to wait and see...

samalex
August 27th, 2010, 08:53 PM
For the same reasons that everyone bailed out of Friendster and then MySpace and started from the beginning. There are many...new features/functionality, better interface, society's short attention span...pick one. The fact that it's open could also be a big draw. We'll just have to wait and see...

Even if it just draws in the geek culture, that encompasses most of my friends anyway :) Honestly I post to Facebook maybe once or twice a month if that, so having a better forum to share information with colleagues and friends would be nice.

Facebook has surpassed anything Friendster, MySpace, or any of the other social networking sites have done, so I don't see it disappearing anytime soon. As to how many people jump ship to Diaspora, it really depends on what it offers. I don't care about games or those stupid trivia things people pass around, I want to share comments, content, articles, etc with people without all the commercialism.

Sam

kamaboko
August 27th, 2010, 08:57 PM
Just another flavor of the month social networking site. A year from now it'll probably be something called "Twinkle Toes" or some other ridiculous name.

samalex
August 27th, 2010, 09:02 PM
Just another flavor of the month social networking site. A year from now it'll probably be something called "Twinkle Toes" or some other ridiculous name.

If it doesn't impress right outta the gate, I agree. It needs to be very impressive and attractive to the tech savvy, or it won't even get a first glance from most.

Sam

redfox1160
August 27th, 2010, 09:10 PM
I have a Facebook account, but I don't use it much. I've been following Diaspora (http://www.joindiaspora.com/) though and really hope it takes off as a viable, FOSS alternative to Facebook.

They announced today (http://www.joindiaspora.com/2010/08/26/overdue-update.html) that they're planning on launching Diaspora on September 15th, so another few weeks to go before we'll see what they've built. Interestingly enough they've written it in Ruby, but they said it could be hosted with virtual hosts, but do many virtual hosts support Ruby? I have either a home server I'd run it on plus possibly a VPS I subscribe to, so hopefully those will suffice.

Anyone else watching this???

Update: Here's an article from Wired about this - http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/08/diaspora-luanch (yes 'Launch' is misspelled on the URL -- error on Wired site)

Sam

I plan on using both.

Brunellus
August 27th, 2010, 09:21 PM
in a word: no. Most of my friends don't care about FOSS. Nobody wants to join ANOTHER network to which they see no advantage.

Cam!
August 27th, 2010, 09:29 PM
I won't. I'll stick with Facebook and Twitter. In fact, I'm pretty sure this will be a failed concept. The name is uninviting, it looks too much like Facebook for people to want to change, and the idea of Free, Open Source software isn't that amazing to most casual users.

Brunellus
August 27th, 2010, 09:32 PM
I won't. I'll stick with Facebook and Twitter. In fact, I'm pretty sure this will be a failed concept. The name is uninviting, it looks too much like Facebook for people to want to change, and the idea of Free, Open Source software isn't that amazing to most casual users.
It will be like Myspace--EVERYBODY will be Stallman's friend, and then the servers will crash from the load, because they'll all be running GNU-HURD.

chrisinspace
August 27th, 2010, 09:35 PM
in a word: no. Most of my friends don't care about FOSS. Nobody wants to join ANOTHER network to which they see no advantage.

But social networks have been rapidly developing entities. Of course no one wants to switch if there is no advantage. That means Diaspora must create something new in order to survive. Succeed or fail, I'm excited to see what they do.

Brunellus
August 27th, 2010, 09:39 PM
If running Linux since 2004 has taught me anything, it's that there is often no instantly obvious, inherent advantage to FOSS. It's a good thing, yes, and it means a lot in terms of development. But it is not something that ordinary people discuss, think about, or care about.

Hauling this back on-topic: "Diaspora" is a terrible name. Historically, it has been applied to the emigration of a people away from a historic homeland--the Jews out of Israel after the sack of Jerusalem in A.D. 70, for instance, or the spread of sub-Saharan African people to the Americas in the transatlantic slave trade. Not exactly cool, hip, or catchy.

bunburya
August 27th, 2010, 09:43 PM
If running Linux since 2004 has taught me anything, it's that there is often no instantly obvious, inherent advantage to FOSS. It's a good thing, yes, and it means a lot in terms of development. But it is not something that ordinary people discuss, think about, or care about.

Hauling this back on-topic: "Diaspora" is a terrible name. Historically, it has been applied to the emigration of a people away from a historic homeland--the Jews out of Israel after the sack of Jerusalem in A.D. 70, for instance, or the spread of sub-Saharan African people to the Americas in the transatlantic slave trade. Not exactly cool, hip, or catchy.
I wondered why they called it Diaspora. I presumed it was because old friends/relatives could use it to catch up with each other from around the world. To me (being Irish) it brings to mind the Irish diaspora. So:

- something that is taught in history class, and
- associated with poverty, emigration, families being torn apart.

Just from an Irish perspective.

chrisinspace
August 27th, 2010, 09:59 PM
Yeah...I think the idea is that the data is migrating from a centralized server farm to a distributed network, but I totally agree. The term has a lot of negative connotations. They should probably reconsider it.

jcd29
August 27th, 2010, 10:02 PM
I was watching their video, as I understand it, people have to install diaspora to their computer to be able to use it? Right there is a problem. No dedicated servers? meh. I foresee little companies charging for hosting your node. This is bad.

Hmm, installing is a pretty big turnoff.

fatality_uk
August 27th, 2010, 10:09 PM
I have no friends so have no need to "stay in touch" with anyone online!

Dustin2128
August 27th, 2010, 10:09 PM
looks awesome! I had a facebook account for a few months, but I quit a while back due to privacy concerns. Diaspora looks like it could be great, but it all depends on how the proceed in the days ahead.

libssd
August 27th, 2010, 10:17 PM
in a word: no. Most of my friends don't care about FOSS. Nobody wants to join ANOTHER network to which they see no advantage.
Arguably, this is what killed Google Buzz. I love gmail, but the first thing I did when Buzz came along was disable it. As to the name, call me cynical, but I would be surprised if even half the U.S. population knows what the word "diaspora" means.

I'm grudgingly on Facebook mainly to keep up with one family member who uses FB as her main means of communication; other than that, I find (as did an earlier poster) the whole concept repellent. I am a private person who doesn't like sharing my private life, which is why there is a bag over my head in my Facebook profile photo.

Denis Krajnc
August 27th, 2010, 10:29 PM
So many people don't like privacy on Facebook.
Why?
You can make profile available only to your friends, you can even block particular person to acess to your profile.
It's internet. If you don't want to share something with people don't put it on internet... Only uneducated people quitted Facebook, because of privacy. Believe me you're giving much more information only with surfing on google. That's how it is.
Keep important data on safe place with no acess to internet.

pwnst*r
August 27th, 2010, 10:36 PM
in a word: no. Most of my friends don't care about FOSS. Nobody wants to join ANOTHER network to which they see no advantage.

^This. Although I use FB, I use it once a week maybe. If there are any users that would actually dump FB for this, it'll be in minute percentiles.

pwnst*r
August 27th, 2010, 10:40 PM
So many people don't like privacy on Facebook.
Why?


Because FB in the past has made it a pain in the *** to even find these settings. Also, during their "updates" sometimes it will default your settings, leaving you wide open.

Dixon Bainbridge
August 27th, 2010, 10:49 PM
I'm waiting for FacePalm to be made. Then I'll join a social networking site.

DeadSuperHero
August 28th, 2010, 01:04 AM
I'm personally really looking forward to seeing identi.ca users move over to Diaspora.

Forget everyone else, I want to do social networking with a bunch of geeks. I could really use some more geek friends...

Ric_NYC
August 28th, 2010, 01:17 AM
I hope a lot of people stop showing personal information on the web.

Dustin2128
August 28th, 2010, 01:52 AM
So many people don't like privacy on Facebook.
Why?
You can make profile available only to your friends, you can even block particular person to acess to your profile.
It's internet. If you don't want to share something with people don't put it on internet... Only uneducated people quitted Facebook, because of privacy.
Last line (that I quoted) was hilarious because of the 'quitted' (should be quit if you're not a native speaker) and describing other people as 'uneducated'. Anyway.. in addition to your settings being defaulted with some updates, people who aren't concerned with privacy will tag you in their photo albums (available to everyone) because, now, you have an account and can be tagged. The threat isn't so much from you as it is from other people.

EDIT: Ok, quick search shows that 'quitted' is acceptable in some areas, sorry if I offended you; it's kinda like that word funner, proper English but it sounds so wrong.

Brunellus
August 28th, 2010, 03:05 AM
Please keep the tone civil, or I will be forced to close this thread.

fontis
August 28th, 2010, 05:47 AM
I'm waiting for FacePalm to be made. Then I'll join a social networking site.

hahaha!
Consider the term shotgunned till further notice.
:p

Austin25
August 28th, 2010, 05:52 AM
Jumping ship? I never joined!

Pardon the html, but
<sarcasm> What is this facebook of which you speak?</sarcasm>

juancarlospaco
August 28th, 2010, 07:48 AM
Not again... no one remember AppleSeed (http://opensource.appleseedproject.org/) on 2005...?

2010=Diaspora

2015=???

Denis Krajnc
August 28th, 2010, 10:52 AM
Dustin2128, I am native English speaker so I apologise if I say something differently as I should.
Like I said don't put information which you don't want people to know on the internet. I really don't care if someone can see my pictures, my name and my birth date. I agree that some would disagree with me.

Dustin2128
August 30th, 2010, 02:23 AM
For those of you who don't know, diaspora (http://www.joindiaspora.com/) is a new FOSS cross-platform social networking thing with the goal of decentralization, coming out on the 15th. Basically, all your data is hosted on your computer and information is sent directly (and encrypted) to other users, no man-in-the-middle central hub that they go through. I personally love the idea, the only disadvantage of this is that, for some reason, people think of downloading and browsing as two totally different things; your typical windows security freak won't join. So my question to you is: do you think it will kill diaspora before it gains critical mass?

Brunellus
August 30th, 2010, 04:39 AM
Thread merged with existing thread on the diaspora project.

juancarlospaco
August 30th, 2010, 06:12 AM
Not again... no one remember AppleSeed (http://opensource.appleseedproject.org/) on 2005...?

2010=Diaspora

2015=???

I think this guy is correct :D

Lets think of names for the same project on 2015,
i say "OpenNet Social" or "SocialPoint"

gnomeuser
August 30th, 2010, 10:18 AM
The Diaspora guys stated from the beginning that they aimed to provide a Wordpress style deployment model. You can run your own seed any way you please without loss of functionality, but they will also at some point provide their own seed (like wordpress.com).

Naiki Muliaina
August 30th, 2010, 10:40 AM
Will I be able to use it from my mobile? Seems the main way for me to access the interwebs and do posting on forums now is from my little Samsung. :)

Dustin2128
August 30th, 2010, 10:44 PM
Thread merged with existing thread on the diaspora project.
sorry, but did you really have to? My thread was on a more specific topic.

Austin25
August 30th, 2010, 10:46 PM
You had to download an irc client.

Dustin2128
August 31st, 2010, 12:20 AM
You had to download an irc client.
true enough; I have a pretty cool mental image of what the downloadable diaspora client will look like. Anyone know if the extensions will have to be coded in ruby? Cause I've got a million and one ideas to make the experience awesome.

DogMatix
August 31st, 2010, 01:32 AM
I will definately try Diaspora. I would expect to see turnkey options for it. Perhaps we would start to see Fantastico autoinstallers in hosts control panels as you get with Wordpress. I don't know how many people would be willing to pay for someone to host their 'seed'. Main issue I see is how many Facebook users will even know about Diaspora when it launches or be willing to swap. Some kind of genius marketing blitz may be required to kick start it.

I like the concept of Diaspora and will follow its fledgling steps with interest. But, I will still be keeping my Facebook account for now.

CarpKing
August 31st, 2010, 03:44 AM
If you have to install it, it probably won't ever replace facebook for anyone who doesn't care about FLOSS. That said, it could be interesting for some.

Other posters talk of local BBSs got me thinking that Diaspora could become popular with the coffee shop crowd if promoted through the right channels. If they are hipster enough they have probably already decided they hate facebook, whether they still use it or not.

Cam!
August 31st, 2010, 03:46 AM
What's going to kill Disapora is the fact that it looks and feels too much like Facebook. The average end user will say "Woah, that looks like an unsafe ripoff of Facebook!". The only thing that's going to replace Facebook is Twitter.

Naiki Muliaina
August 31st, 2010, 07:37 AM
It will be killed even quicker if it has no mobile client... :)

pookiebear
August 31st, 2010, 03:09 PM
I thought you did not have to use the download unless you wanted to be a "node"? correct me if I am wrong.
Maybe the un-node users download will just be a plugin/add-in for your fav browser? That would make it easier for those of you who did not want to download something. Maybe we just founded an idea for them to run with.