Nodestar: Building Blacksky w/ Rudy Fraser

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28d ago 41:46

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Social media isn’t really social anymore. But that might be changing. Rudy Fraser over at Blacksky Algorithms has built something new. He has built the infrastructure to provide a safe online space for the black community, and in the process challenges the ideas of hierarchical, centralised networks. His work — even outside the very cool development of Blacksky — is an amazing, concrete example of how the abstract ambitions of decentralisation can provide real value for people, and sets us up for a new kind of tech politics.

More like this: How to (actually) Keep Kids Safe Online w/ Kate Sim

This is part two of Nodestar, our three-part series on decentralisation. Blacksky is a community built using the AT Protocol by Rudy Fraser. Rudy built this both out of a creative drive to make something new using protocol thinking, and out of frustration over a lack of safe community spaces for black folks where they could be themselves, and not have to experience anti-black racism or misogynoir as a price of entry.

Rudy and Alix discuss curation as moderation, the future of community stewardship, freeing ourselves from centralised content decision-making, how technology might connect with mutual aid, and the beauty of what he refers to as ‘dotted-line communities’.

Further reading:

Blacksky Algorithms
Blacksky the app — if you want an alternative to Bluesky
More about Rudy Fraser
Open Collective — a fiscal host for communities and non-profits
Paper Tree — community food bank
The Implicit Feudalism of Online Communities by Nathan Schneider
Flashes — a 3rd party Bluesky app for viewing photos
The Tyranny of Struturelessness by Joreen

Rudy is a technologist, community organizer, and founder of Blacksky Algorithms, where he builds decentralized social media infrastructure that prioritizes community-driven safety, data ownership, and interoperability. As a Fellow at the Applied Social Media Lab at Harvard’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society, he advances research and development on technology that empowers marginalized communities, particularly Black users

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#Tech #Society #Alix Dunn