The worker cooperative states:
We’re excited to announce NorthSky Social Cooperative where we are building a new ATproto platform for the benefit of marginalized communities that prioritizes the 2SLGBTQIA+ community. After increasing hostility toward these communities we are taking action to provide a platform built by and for us.
They go on to say:
A shift towards federation has enabled the survival of marginalized communities and @bsky.app which developed the AT Protocol has created a foundation for us to build Northsky Social on top of. As such we will be fully compatible with @bsky.app where users will be able to communicate across the federated ATproto space.
Looking at the site just raises alarm bells tbh. A generic (nice looking though) landing page with a sign up form targeting queer folks and the only share links are for platforms that have policies in place to explicitly allow harassment for queer folks?
Meanwhile the faq mentions that theres no “meet the team” page for privacy reasons?
Idk folks, there’s just a lot of weird choices here. The lack of member transparency is a major one.
The ATproto is still tied to the main bluesky instance. They should just use activity pub.
They seem to know something about marketing, and specifically about how to sell a website to the public, which would put them ad odds with everyone else running AP-based websites.
They should just use activity pub.
Well, they’ve already stated that they are going to be using ATproto.
Yeah… I think that’s bad.
Why?
Because it isn’t decentralized.
There are no third party relays and probably will never exist, and the pm system is only available on the bs servers and you can’t host it yourself.
Thanks for sharing that article. ATproto and ActivityPub are very different indeed. I can understand why someone would be hesitant to join if they preferred the way ActivityPub is structured.
are they going to run their own router, or are they still beholden to the bluesky board? ie, is this just another pds stuck in the bluesky walled garden?
They will run their own server, yes.
Their own server, or their own router? They’re different.
pds != router though.
theres only a single router in existence run by bluesky, so this would make the official first non-bluesky controlled router?
Nope, FAQ says it’s only PDServers they host. The Relay and AppView, DMs stays in bsky control.
…this would make the official first non-bluesky controlled router?
Yes.
