alt Hacker NewsThe open web is dead. The open web remains dead. And we have killed it.
I'm actually much less anti-Musk than the average HN commentator but it should be universally agreed here that a small handful of mega-corp websites dominating the majority of content on the web is a bad thing. Nitter was hardly a solution. Federated platforms like Mastodon and Bluesky are "culturally" closed, and "free speech" platforms like X are "technically" closed.
IMO we all need to start vibe coding PHP bulletin boards again. 'RETVRN' etc.
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> IMO we all need to start vibe coding PHP bulletin boards again. 'RETVRN' etc.
The most recent release of phpbb was 2 months ago
They still work just fine, people need to use them instead of the drugs they get force fed by mega corps.
If we reflect on the debate from years ago about whether to nationalize Twitter, all the downsides we were warned about have come true. They censor / promote whoever the state wants anyways, the CEOs was literally in the cabinet for a time, but now they also have to enshittify and degrade the experience for the benefit of an also-ran AI lab.
What does a site stealing content has to do with open web?
> "free speech" platforms like X are "technically" closed.
Musk boots off and/or limits distribution of people he disagrees with. I can't fathom how you think that's 'free speech' - it's the opposite.
> Federated platforms like Mastodon and Bluesky are "culturally" closed
I've heard that - what is your experience? Downvotes and exclusion? Are there more 'open' servers?
> Federated platforms like Mastodon and Bluesky are "culturally" closed
What does the even mean if you can host your own