I wrote about Bluesky’s moderation tensions and the White House’s threats and the critical need for open networks that can do broad connection and also care for communities at Tech Policy Press:
Tech Policy Press
Trump Administration's Arrival on Bluesky Highlights Growing Pains for Open Networks | TechPolicy.Press
The administration’s antagonistic entry to the platform is best understood as a game of chicken, writes Erin Kissane.
I think Mastodon's proposal for starter packs is a significant positive evolution of the way Bluesky rolled them out. I wound up on a bunch of packs there and it was…not a great thing for my specific brain and purpose. I do hope the people in Masto's comments saying they must allow opt-out and removal will read the actual post, which features both blanket opt-out and individual removal.
Mastodon Blog
Our ideas about Packs
Sharing our thoughts and plans behind sharing collections of accounts in the Fediverse.
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After some completely predictable stretches of hard slogging, we're getting ourselves sturdied up in the Unbreaking collective (Unbreaking.org), and one of the things on my list for the next month-ish is sorting out where to start offering paths into that project on the fediverse. (1/x)
I don't think it's possible to be where we are in #uspol (and in the global authoritarian slide) without our information ecosystems being such a mess. There's a ton of work to do on the distribution side of the problem, but also on the info-making side: Even great newsrooms aren't built to make the kind of knowledge we need in this moment, bc what they make are endless streams of atomized stories. And we ordinary people are all out here in the feeds trying to piece it together in our heads.
The day I most look forward to the whole year is the day the first Salmonberry bird/Swainson’s thrush arrives in our woods, and this year that day was today. No one’s recording gets them quite right, it’s the most beautiful sound in the world.
BirdNote
Salmonberry Bird | BirdNote
Watching - and listening - for the Swainson's Thrush