Relay (aggregates posts from all PDSs, responsible for federation of PDSs)
App views (generates feeds from the relay)
Bluesky hosts the only relay I’m aware of, because relays are very expensive to host. But afaict anyone can host a relay.
So if we’re to describe it:
PDSs are nations states
Relays are the federation of those nation states
App views are like the ambassadors of the federation.
Except that PDSs can be part of multiple federations, and app views can be ambassadors for multiple federations. Ok not a great analogy.
It’s not Fediverse™ because it’s not activitypub.
But that doesn’t make it not federated
Just because it uses a different mechanism to achieve federation you’re going to say that it doesn’t count as federation? That’s wild.
PDSs get federated by relays.
You can have multiple relays which means you have multiple federations. This is similar to how the Fediverse ends up with pockets completely defederated from each other.
Except that a PDS can be in multiple relays (federations) which the Fediverse can’t do.
You’re right that currently there is no meaningful federation because there is only one relay, and it’s a problem that the cost is so prohibitive. But to say that it isn’t a Fediverse is kinda disingenuous.
Just because it uses a different mechanism to achieve federation you’re going to say that it doesn’t count as federation? That’s wild.
No. I’m going to say it doesn’t count as federation because it doesn’t achieve federation.
Actually, we need some new language to describe what Bluesky is. Federations are geopolitical alliances between equals. But Bluesky instances are centralised, with one relay acting as a truth source for many PDS servers. So to extend the analogy with a hierarchical geopolitical alliance… well that’s an empire. Bluesky is an empire. Bluesky is designed with an imperial mechanism. Bluesky is imperialised. That’s the new word for what Bluesky is.
You’re being intentionally obstinate. You keep implying that you can’t host your own relay, to which many PDSs (that also link to other relays) can’t link.
With bluesky, people choose what federations to join by selecting which relays their PDSs will join.
The analogy of geopolitical federation is cute, but that’s an analogy, it’s not actually what federation is when talking about technology. You seem upset that bluesky achieves federation with a different architecture, and idk why you’d be upset about that, or even care
You can spin up your own Bluesky instance
…which is still managed by the Bluesky central server and can’t connect to peer instances without that server.
That’s not quite true afact.
There are 3 types of servers:
Bluesky hosts the only relay I’m aware of, because relays are very expensive to host. But afaict anyone can host a relay.
So if we’re to describe it:
PDSs are nations states
Relays are the federation of those nation states App views are like the ambassadors of the federation.
Except that PDSs can be part of multiple federations, and app views can be ambassadors for multiple federations. Ok not a great analogy.
Can two relays communicate with each other?
I don’t think so?
But a single PDSs can talk to multiple relays.
And I think an app view can talk to multiple relays (or at least switch between them)
So Bluesky doesn’t have any federated servers, and couldn’t federate with itself even if there were other servers.
It’s not fediverse.
It’s not Fediverse™ because it’s not activitypub.
But that doesn’t make it not federated
Just because it uses a different mechanism to achieve federation you’re going to say that it doesn’t count as federation? That’s wild.
PDSs get federated by relays.
You can have multiple relays which means you have multiple federations. This is similar to how the Fediverse ends up with pockets completely defederated from each other.
Except that a PDS can be in multiple relays (federations) which the Fediverse can’t do.
You’re right that currently there is no meaningful federation because there is only one relay, and it’s a problem that the cost is so prohibitive. But to say that it isn’t a Fediverse is kinda disingenuous.
No. I’m going to say it doesn’t count as federation because it doesn’t achieve federation.
Actually, we need some new language to describe what Bluesky is. Federations are geopolitical alliances between equals. But Bluesky instances are centralised, with one relay acting as a truth source for many PDS servers. So to extend the analogy with a hierarchical geopolitical alliance… well that’s an empire. Bluesky is an empire. Bluesky is designed with an imperial mechanism. Bluesky is imperialised. That’s the new word for what Bluesky is.
You’re being intentionally obstinate. You keep implying that you can’t host your own relay, to which many PDSs (that also link to other relays) can’t link.
With bluesky, people choose what federations to join by selecting which relays their PDSs will join.
The analogy of geopolitical federation is cute, but that’s an analogy, it’s not actually what federation is when talking about technology. You seem upset that bluesky achieves federation with a different architecture, and idk why you’d be upset about that, or even care
Ah, okay, didn’t know that.