this post was submitted on 20 Sep 2023
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Elon Musk said he will charge all X/Twitter users a fee to be on the platform. He suggested that such a change would be necessary to deal with the problem of bots on the platform.

“It’s the only way I can think of to combat vast armies of bots," said Elon. I can’t believe that this is the only solution he can think of.

Dealing with bots would be Elon Musk’s responsibility, considering he’s the only one profiting significantly from X, not us. Elon Musk steals our data and censors each of our posts, now he even expects us to pay to clean up the mess he created.

Plus, the problems with X go beyond just bots. The algorithm and programming decisions are negatively impacting user experience and manipulating people’s minds.

We want a town square where everyone is free to have & voice an opinion. I do not believe we have to pay ”a small monthly payment” for such a place, especially in a country that should value these freedoms & suppressing ideas.

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (11 children)

For those that are saying "no" because it's Musk: would you be willing to pay to your account on Lemmy, Mastodon, or any other social network that you happen to use?

Let me be specific: I am not asking if you donate or contribute to any server. I am asking if you'd sign up to a social network that required payment from every user as a measure to avoid spammers and to keep the service running.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

No. Not today at any rate. I probably would have supported a subscription for Reddit 5-8 years ago. The community and content was better. Lemmy/Kbin/Mastodon hasn’t caught up to that level yet so I don’t see a point in paying for that. Facebook has gone full stupid - they should pay me for all the data mining they use me and my connections for. I rarely use FB for the social aspect anymore, I belong to many hobby and interest groups on it and use it more like a forum than a “highlight reel of my life” thing.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Lemmy/Kbin/Mastodon hasn’t caught up to that level yet so I don’t see a point in paying for that.

Isn't that a chicken-and-egg problem? If all the other alternatives are crap but can survive because of their deep pockets, how can we ever expect the Fediverse to grow without supporting it regardless of its current size?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That’s above my pay grade. I honestly don’t know. However, I’ll offer that Lemmy instances are somewhat analogous to the hobbyist or special interest forums of yesteryear. A “webring” of sorts. Smaller, cheaper, manageable by dedicated individuals…

They’re not massive and centralized servers requiring all that goes with operating and maintaining them. Ad injection, legal teams, CEOs to pay…the fediverse is a completely different animal compared to big social media. It exists because of lots of little “pockets” and not the deep pockets of centralized social media.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I’ll offer that Lemmy instances are somewhat analogous to the hobbyist or special interest forums of yesteryear. A “webring” of sorts. Smaller, cheaper, manageable by dedicated individuals…

I'd would hope that was the case with Lemmy, but it seems that the majority of people that moved are just going to the largest instances and trying to replicate what they had on Reddit.

For Mastodon, there are indeed a good number of servers run by a small group of friends who simply don't care about its cost, but it's getting pretty clear that any instance with more than 1000 active users is simply not sustainable on donations alone. Every month there is a new instance closing down because the admins realized that the cost per user are growing faster than the donation base.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That’s unfortunate, and doesn’t bode well for the growth of this platform.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yes, and this is why I've been saying for months already that if we really want to have a viable alternative to shit services we get from Big Tech, we need to start putting our money where our collective mouth is.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That’s a tough hill to climb. The internet grew on the largesse of individuals who contributed time and financial support to smaller endeavors, whether it be software or a website. It’s going to be all but impossible to get people to pay for it when even big services like Facebook are free, that’s the conundrum and why ad revenue and personal profile mining is used to fill the hole. Unfortunately costs have risen sharply alongside bandwidth demands, so one can’t run a basement server without bottlenecking on size or costs long before reaching critical mass for a community - and that’s what you mentioned in regards to lemmy.

Like I said…above my pay grade. I hope there’s some way a distributed network like Lemmy can succeed, I really enjoy what it’s becoming. Maybe a hub-and-spoke system will be the final form…big instances supported by more commercial means and smaller instances run by individuals and private funds.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I hope there’s some way a distributed network like Lemmy can succeed, I really enjoy what it’s becoming.

And to go back to your original response: isn't that at least worth of some appreciation? Do you need to wait for the network to grow to start supporting it now by subscribing to a provider that costs $10/year (less than a dollar per month)?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I'm not into supporting alpha or beta versions, and honestly I don't spend enough time here to justify a subscription fee. If it were more fully fleshed out and had a lot more of the niche communities I enjoy, you bet...$10 or even $20/year would be worth paying to support the servers.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Ok, we will start going in circles already, but isn't that a bit of a "self-defeating prophecy"?

You say you like what it's becoming, but you don't want to support bootstrapping it. At the same time, history is showing us that any attempt to make the fediverse more popular is making the instances to crumble under their own weight because there is not strong backing after a certain size.

It's $10/year that we are talking about here, not a life-changing investment. If everyone keeps expecting high-quality content and an already optimized system that is able to be a home of billions of internet users (because the only realistic way for you get all the niche communities here will be when there are so many people here to the point that makes even the long tail a sizable group), then we will never get it.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It's tough because we've had "free" for so long of so many services. But I honestly think yes, as long as it was something very low like $5/month at most.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

What if I tell you that for $5/month you can have a Mastodon account and bring 9 more of your friends?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I already donate to Mastodon development, and to the Mastodon server I'm on. It's a good reminder to donate to the Lemmy server I'm on too.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago

Good for you, but I specifically asked if you would join a server that charged from all users.

Also, if you don't mind me asking: how much are you contributing, and what if I told you that it would cost you a lot less to sign up to a professionally managed instance than whatever it is you are giving away each month?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I would yes. If it was a reasonable price and guaranteed that my data wouldn't be monetised.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Yes, offering a service completely free of ads and tracking is a irrevocable principle on Communick. Can you let me know what you think of the pricing?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (11 children)

I effectively pay to use my IRC, XMPP and email, since I rent a VPS. But that payment earns me much more pleasant usage experience (in case of my IRC bouncer) and a lot of cotrol over my servers in case of the latter two. So while paying a subscription feels a bit bad, I think it's worth it.

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I think I'd pay for Lemmy and Firefish. I like them both a lot. Not like a lot, but a tiny annual subscription fee.

If they had lifetime memberships like Livejournal did that would be cool.

Wouldn't give Elon the lice from my hair though, in the words of the great Maria Callas about her mother.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

tiny annual subscription fee.

I'm not hosting Firefish (yet), but I do have $10/year plans for Lemmy and Mastodon. Is that within your idea of "tiny fee"?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Absolutely. Thanks for replying, please host Firefish, it's awesome.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

To be 100% honest, I think that those that have a very specific server in mind would be better off by running their own instance, which I also do on Communick but still need to add Firefish to the list.

For the "basic" access, what I'd like to have is only one "single" instance that can "speak" Activity Pub, and then just serve different frontends that can provide the different functionality. This would IMNSHO make more sense because then people could have one single account regardless if they want to do microblogging, share pictures or talk on a forum like Lemmy.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

I don't think either are really active enough to justify a cost and a payment restriction would just worsen that. I do think lemmy should be supported because the whole concept is what reddit and twitter should've been to begin with.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

A one time fee? Perhaps. But not an ongoing subscription.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Why? This is not a one-off cost. You wouldn't be paying for a product that you bought once and can be used indefinitely. Software needs to be maintained, data needs to be stored, bits need to transported, mods need to be paid for their ongoing work, etc.

Mind you, I am not talking about price levels of a Netflix or Twitter Blue subscription. I am talking about a much lower price point. $10/year would be more than enough for me to make hosting a large instance a sustainable venture, which would even let me keep my pledge of giving 20% of the profits to the development teams of the upstream projects.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I didn't interpret the question as pertaining to ongoing costs.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Well, the discussion was about Twitter charging a subscription so I thought that was implied.

You are right though that having a system where simply paying to signup would already help alleviate some of the problems with spammers and bots.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

No because it would exclude all the interesting people, I'd much rather donate to keep a door open for all.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (2 children)

it would exclude all the interesting people

Are all "interesting people" so cash strapped that they wouldn't be able to afford a $10/year membership?

Anyway, what if I told you that my instance provides "group-based" billing? You could, e.g, get a 10-account package for $5/month and give access to 9 other people there.

I would still try to come up with some form of vouch or sponsorship-based system, where the paying members get to approve non-paying members if they have a backing sponsor.

donate to keep a door open for all.

Donation-based instances are not sustainable. You can see that already with Mastodon. They used to be able to get enough funds to even support upstream projects, now they are invite-only. Turns out that "keeping the door open for all" makes the operating costs rise faster than the revenue from donations.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

No. With the current model of social media selling advertising space, user data, and now subscription fees. No, I don't think I should have to contribute directly from my pocket to these mega media giants.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I am not talking about the media giants, existing or yet to exist. I am talking about someone providing access to a subscriber-only Lemmy or Mastodon instance, that could be well federated, and professionally managed and moderated.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

No, I don't think a subscriber-only based model would work. Seems so simple that somebody would have tried it already, but what I imagine is the exorbitant cost of running a popular site.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Seems so simple that somebody would have tried it already

Today you are one of the lucky 10 thousand: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/App.net

cost of running a popular site.

I know for a fact that I can run an instance with 15k users and if each one paid $10/year I could make enough to make a living, hire someone to help with moderation and would let me have time to contribute back to the codebase and work on more fediverse projects.

The beauty of this is that I don't need to have a "huge" site or a monopoly in the market. Other developers could do something similar, due to federation there could be space even for collaboration and/or expansion into other segments.

All we need is to get more people to understand that paying $10/year for something they used to have "for free" is a lot better than having your data exploited.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The only thing that would get me to do it is for sports. It would have to have the games, shows, commentary nonsense and be able to live chat with other fans /players. A full experience of sports. Outside of that not a chance.

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