Harpo Roeder Breaks Down FUTO's Polycentric Protocol

This was recorded on March 16, 2024 during our Don't Be Evil Summit during SXSW.
Reuploaded due to an encoding error in the previous upload.
Our website: futo.org/
Polycentric: polycentric.io/

[@enb3810]

Yah, sound!

[@Henk717]

So far I dislike how Polycentric is used, when I am leaving a comment on a CZcams video I don't want that to be public because then people can see everything I watch. I prefer CZcams's system where you have to be on the same video first to see my comment. As a result I no longer use it. I'd be open to using it directly, but its spam (CrownedWarLord) and CZcams comments only. So there is no point for me to do that either.

[@jacobscrackers98]

I think Polycentric has potential as a universal comment section for the whole web (and potentially beyond).
Kind of like Gab's old 'Dissenter' plugin.
The advantage of this over just using the site-provided comments section is that sometimes it doesn't exist or it's moderated poorly. This could be moderated to the user's choice using filter lists, subscribing to moderators, etc. See the Zulip chat for details.

[@zyansheep]

It seems to me that Polycentric represents the next practicable step in the journey to decentalize all the things, improving on protocols like Lemmy and Mastodon by separating the user from the server with cryptography. While I imagine there are many details to work out (i.e. how to do recommendation and moderation, especially of illegal content) it seems like a promising start. The question is, how to get people to switch? Mastodon was released in 2016 which means it took ~8 years to reach the popularity that it has now. I think Polycentric could shorten that time by integrating with Mastodon and other federated protocols and showing Polycentric users content from Mastodon instances. This makes Polycentric the ideal choice for any refugees from defunct instances as they can resubscribe to everyone they consumed in the past while never having to create a new profile again. What do people think of this idea?

[@Pro4TLZZ]

Thanks Harpo

[@trstensvold]

What about NOSTR

[@nativeabuse]

Nostr is cryptocurrency integrated nonsense. i tried using it and the whole feed was just flooded with lightning transactions. How does anyone even use it?

[@praveenperera]

why not nostr?

[@ConciseCabbage]

I really appreciate that you’re trying something new, but since we have Nostr, it would be worthwhile to at least discuss differences. Like are you using a PKI? Is it a DHT to find all the keys? Nostr also has caching servers that can counts “likes” etc. Bluesky also has custom feeds and moderation too.
Let’s get to the advanced stuff, because decentralized tech isn’t new. There are famous problems with it that need overcoming. Why use this over the other solutions?