Back when the Internet Phone Book came out, I ordered a copy and subscribed to the Metalabel newsletter. They’ve had some interesting things since then, and I’ve enjoyed checking in when they do send one out (though it’s not that often). Lately they’ve been pushing an idea that they call “Dark Forest OS,” which seems to be a social site that is only viewable to members who have joined.
It’s a little bit difficult to see what it’s like, since there’s nothing publicly available, and that’s by design. Whereas we’re trying to work to create an alternative space on the web where everyone is welcome (except AI), Metalabel is really embracing the “Dark Forest” idea, saying that the way forward is to have protected, private places where people know that their discussions aren’t available to the public.
I’m not sure how I feel about the idea myself, because it’s essentially just a walled garden that’s owned by one company. The main difference is that the ideas behind it are different and not motivated by profit, for now, but those things can change.
I was wondering if anyone here had joined and had thoughts they’d like to share about the experience, or if others had heard and been hesitant to join.
Conceptually, I dislike the idea of communities having to be closed and somewhat hidden going forward, but practically speaking, I understand why it’s necessary for a community to be sustainable.
This is a problem for any online community, whether it’s owned by a company or not. A small amount of people are in control of the infrastructure for the community space, and if they disappear or make alienating changes, the community at best fractures and finds new spaces, or dissipates entirely. The fediverse is probably the closest thing out there to solving this problem, though introduces a bunch of new ones.
We already have dark forests, though. From the very get-go that term was used to describe actually existing places, like private discord servers or group chats.
I get the appeal of dark forests - no influencers or marketers, and social pressure to prevent assholes - but if that was “all” we needed, this and similar projects wouldn’t be needed.
The something that’s missing is porosity. These closed off dark forest groups don’t allow you to discover new people. We aren’t cold DMing our friends’ friends to find new friends, so we have to resort to leaving the dark forest. And we do! We recognize the need to not just be in a handful of group DMs and never meet new people online.
There are some interesting projects attempting to solve the problem of meeting new like-minded people without connecting to the firehouse of strangers, marketers, and influencers. Things like having different communities share a common channel/chatroom, for example. And of course, forums like these, webrings, newsletters, and many more also try to solve this problem. I’m sure a lot of people here are already very familiar with alternatives to the big web/social media
I’m not sure just recreating big social media but with closed registration is actually enough to stem the fire hose. But I’ll try it ig.
This interferes with being able to tell what the site features are – a problem that could be addressed by having a lot of information on the landing page, which there isn’t. Just some marketing fluff about how things are bad these days, a mysterious mention of “shared treasuries” (what?), and a mention of “curated content” (so is someone going through all the posts and deciding which ones to promote to a featured feed or something? what am I supposed to be picturing here?).
Basic questions that remain unanswered:
What do the posts actually look like? Are there reblogs, comments, tags, user avatars, groups, blocks, blacklisting, an edit button…?
What are the moderation policies or terms of service?
Yeah these are all questions I’ve had as well, and I think the answers to them will determine the longevity and success of the project overall.
Hell, I should just take the plunge along with @brennan and see what it’s like first hand! But like you, I’ll be doing it with a hefty grain of salt, because I’m pretty skeptical.
