<nettime> Fwd: Diaspora* means a brighter future for all of us.

[Rory Solomon <solomonr@newschool.edu>]

This email arrived in my inbox the other day, and, as it is likely of
general interest to this group but not necessarily otherwise available in a
non-email context, I thought I'd forward it here for the sake of archiving
it on nettime as much as for general discussion. [ok fine, I partly just
want a bookmarkable URL so I can save it after I delete it from my inbox ;)
]

Apropos of this thread from February:
     http://www.nettime.org/Lists-Archives/nettime-l-1102/threads.html#00032
... and countless others about P2P, distributed web, DIY data, etc.

I'll just say that I find it by turns incredibly naive, inspiring,
irrelevant and hopeful ...

cheers,
R

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Dan and the Diaspora* team <team@joindiaspora.com>
Date: Wed, Sep 21, 2011 at 11:54 PM
Subject: Diaspora* means a brighter future for all of us.
To:


     [image: Diaspora] <https://joindiaspora.com>   Dear rory -

Thanks again for your interest in joining the Diaspora* community, and for
your patience. We?re working on getting your invite out to you as quickly as
possible, and we?re still committed to getting it to you by the end of
October. We?re pushing out hundreds of thousands of invitations as quickly
as we can -- thanks for bearing with us.

As promised in our previous message, we want to tell you a little more about
why we believe so strongly in Diaspora*'s mission: to build *a new and
better social web, one that's 100% owned and controlled by you and other
Diasporans.*

*Diaspora*'s distributed design is a huge part of it.* Like the Internet
itself, Diaspora* isn't housed in any one place, and it's not controlled by
any one entity (including us). We've created software that lets you set up
and run your own social network on your own "pod" (or server) and connect
your network to the larger Diaspora* ecosystem. You can have a pod all to
yourself, or one for just you and your friends, or your family, giving you
complete ownership and control over your personal social information
(including your identity, your posts, and your photos) and how it?s all
stored and shared. Or you can simply join one of more than 20 open pods.[1]

This means *you can do what you want.* You can express yourself candidly,
and be your authentic self. You can go by whatever name you like on
Diaspora*. Pseudonyms are fine, and this both protects you (if you want to
say something your boss or your parents disagree with) and *opens the door
to real connection.* Here?s how one blogger and Diasporan put it:
Maybe his kind words mean so much to me because T is someone I've met
through a [pseudo]nym -- he got to know the real me's ideals and beliefs,
and liked that person... A compliment from [him] is based on my own
sincerity, and thus, has a certain purity. It is untainted by perceptions of
how I look, what I'm wearing, and so on. Given that, I value it especially
highly.[2]
This kind of authentic connection brings back the *social freedom* that made
the Internet awesome in the first place. And this is just the beginning.

You can make great connections with anyone in the Diaspora* ecosystem, not
just the people on your own pod, because the pods are linked together.

You can also use Diaspora* as a home base for your outbound posts on
Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr, writing to them all from Diaspora*. In the
future, you?ll be able to monitor your inbound streams from Diaspora* as
well.

Yet our distributed design means *no big corporation will ever control
Diaspora**. Diaspora* will never sell your social life to advertisers, and
you won?t have to conform to someone?s arbitrary rules or look over your
shoulder before you speak.

And because your information is yours, not ours, *you?ll have the ultimate
power* -- the ability to move your profile and all your social data from one
pod to another, without sacrificing your connection to the social web. Over
time, this will bring an end to the indifferent, self-serving behavior that
people can?t stand[3] from the walled gardens that dominate social
networking today. When you can vote with your feet for the environment where
you feel safest, the big guys will have to shape up, or risk losing you.

We?re still building this move-your-profile capability, as well as other key
features. It?s hard work, but *we?re building the future we want to see*,
with incredible community support.

Diaspora* is a genuine community effort. More than 160 people have
contributed to our code, putting us in the top 2% of all open source
projects tracked by Ohloh.[4] Hundreds more volunteers have translated
Diaspora* into 13 of the world?s spoken languages so far, with another 32
translations in progress. Thousands of Diasporans have given us more than
3,000 points of feedback. (We?re listening closely, and building the
features you?re asking for as fast as we can.) And of course, thousands of
donors have helped pay for our development, and hundreds of thousands of
people -- including you -- are patiently waiting for access to try it out.

Thanks again for your patience. We can?t wait to see you here, and to build
a brighter future together.

Sincerely,
- Dan, Max, Ilya, Sarah, Yosem, and Peter
Wednesday, September 21st, 2011

[1]: JoinDiaspora.com is just one of the pods within the Diaspora*
ecosystem. Here?s a directory of some of the others that are open to new
users <http://bit.ly/oa6Gdc> (there are even more out there too, including
many that are private, not open).
[2]: Excerpts from this blog
post<http://fullofsecrets.livejournal.com/105666.html>by Garidin
Winslow.
[3]: "Report: Facebook Is Most Hated Social Media Company", Courtney Rubin,
Inc. Magazine, July 20,
2011.<http://www.inc.com/news/articles/201107/facebook-scores-poorly-on-customer-satisfaction.html>
[4]: http://www.ohloh.net/p/diaspora/factoids/10029264

   For general inquiries or support with your Diaspora account, please email
us at questions@joindiaspora.com.


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