Diaspora: An Overdue Update

[jlgbecom]

Appleseed is a lot farther along, and has been releasing steadily this whole summer. It's years ahead of Diaspora, they've been putting out a new release every month, and they already have a bunch of nodes already running their software.

http://opensource.appleseedproject.org

I think by the time Sep 15th rolls around, Appleseed will be on it's fourth release this summer.

[viraptor]

I hope they handle releases better than Appleseed. Sure - technically they might be ahead, but look at the page you linked from the user's perspective. It already exists, there's no buzz about it, you cannot register without an invite (also, there is no "register" link - there's strange "local" and "remote").

So when they "open to public": 1. who's going to notice? 2. with the current user-friendliness, who's going to care?

[postfuturist]

A quick glance at Appleseed's SVN repo and I see the code base is PHP, like GNU social. It's maybe not a terrible decision, but it deters me (as a developer who sometimes deals with PHP at my day job) from any interest in looking any closer or wanting to risk installing it on my server.

[patrickaljord]

Does it implement Ostatus? Is it compatible with more than just other appleseed? Diaspora will be compatible with any app that implements Ostatus such as status.net and google buzz.

[pvg]

So, took some UI classes, ate some bagels, gave some talks, met some interesting people, off to Burning Man. All wonderful things but none of them actually say or show much about what they have got implemented and working.

[sumeetjain]

A relevant bit of information missing from your summary:

We have Diaspora working, we like it, and it will be open-sourced on September 15th.

I don't know if everyone knew that already, but it was news to me.

[thaumaturgy]

That's a pretty horrible way to summarize someone's efforts. I'll resist the urge to describe pinboard.in the same way.

[wolfrom]

I really hope their API will come soon; I think the best chance they have of user adoption will be based on the creativity of API developers bridging the gaps between Diaspora and other services. If users can communicate between Diaspora nodes and other social networks, at least on a basic level, they could see enough migration to make their efforts worthwhile.

[patrickaljord]

Their API will be OStatus, same as status.net and google buzz, to be more specific: pubsubhubbub, salmon, activity streams and webfinger.

[icarus_drowning]

I too think this will be key. If I can "remote control" Facebook through Diaspora, I will switch in a heartbeat. If I can't experience the same level of interaction as Facebook with the same number of people, I'll still probably switch, but gradually stop using it, I'm sure.

[starnix17]

I know most people always comment on how the Diaspora project is destined to fail, and they're probably right.

However, there's no denying how awesome it is that a few college kids can raise over $100,000 like this to build their project.

Even if the project fails like most people say, I imagine it will be a positive experience for the four guys that worked on it.

[jlgosse]

If Diaspora fails, it will have less to do with the awesomeness of the project, and more to do with the lack of everyone's friends actually using Diaspora.

I figure it will be a huge hit among geeks like us, but then will fall out of usage due to the lack of updates from people that matter, like friends and family.

I use Facebook for staying in touch with the mostly non-technical people in my life who actually use Facebook, and that's what will end up swaying most users (like myself) back towards Facebook in a relatively short period of time.

[peterbraden]

They don't seem to get open source. Open source is having code available so people can contribute and review, not simply dumping some files at a specified date.

[boucher]

Sometimes that's true. Sometimes the right approach for a project still just getting off the ground is not letting people in for a while.

It's easier to realize a vision when you've already got something concrete to point to. Otherwise you often waste time arguing over what color to paint the shed.

[there]

you should tell that to the android team at google.

[quizbiz]

Why is their logo an asterisk when it seems their whole idea is that they are the social network without a catch? The asterick at the end of their name instantly makes me want to scroll down to read the fine print.

[3pt14159]

I always thought it was intended as a "all" symbol. All your privacy, all the control, all these different apps plugging in.

SELECT * FROM user_preferences; -- type thing

[techiferous]

I wouldn't call it a logo as much as a placeholder for one.

[pkulak]

I still choose to be optimistic. Not getting my hopes up, but I'm still excited to see what they come up with.

[tswicegood]

It's sad that they didn't just tack onto an existing project like Pinax and add functionality to it to handle the federated system. There was no need to reinvent the wheel, the existing ones just needed a little truing.

[jacquesm]

Anything but pinax, please...

I had a really good look at that and I did not like much what I saw (that was a while ago, but still). Do you have a specific reason for suggesting that over appleseed (mentioned elsewhere in this thread), which I think would be a far better fit?

[pclark]

Wow, spending $10k on UX this early seems like an interesting move

[SoftwareMaven]

That, IMO, is one of the best things they could spend the money on. This project is going to suffer from being a technologists dream toy. By bringing in outside help to focus on who the end-user is, they have a hope of overcoming this and making it usable for mortals.

UX should be the first dollars spent on a consumer product, not the last.

[jacquesm]

I'm actually really happy to hear they did that, even though I can't see any of the results (they're far too secretive about what's going on behind the scenes, besides these blog postings).

It means they have a clear idea of what they can do, and more importantly about what they can't do. So blowing some money on an expert in a field for which they don't have expertise is actually a really good sign.

[vegashacker]

What do they mean by, "Since the 1st of August is nearly over..."?

[naner]

Sarcasm. They probably promised an update on the 1st of August.

[pepijndevos]

One might argue that all those other OStatus network are way ahead, but I never read _their_ updates on HN, so Diaspora has at least a lot of buzz around it and thus the potential to get a user base faster than all the others.

[paulnelligan]

Personally, I'd really like to see a way of giving people the ability to share eachothers posts on diaspora (with posters consent of course). Metrics for posts could then be measured and displayed, and a whole new golden age of blogging/microblogging/online-publishing could be born out of this.

Also, there's got to be a better way of connecting people of similar interests via groups than the current model.

Also also, please consider musicians in the melée!!

god speed diaspora. I for one will be joining asap.

[vzmind]

I just clearly support you guys. impatient to read your code and share the good parole in my countries (Farnce-Chile-India).. Your tools, partners and tech choices rock !! Ruby, MongoDB; Github, Pivotal. They give a clear view on what you do and how you work. I am also impatient to see what is that wonderful bot and how do you guys will handle propagation of seeds. Let's work !!.

[GBKS]

Great to hear that they have a solid team of advisors and that they are putting the user experience first. With open-source I am always a bit concerned that design and experience are secondary. Diaspora has a great story going on right now, I hope the product will continue that with the same spirit and capture people's imaginations.

[thisorthat]

Sadly I don't think this will take off. So many people rallied over Diaspora calling it the Facebook killer not understanding the true implications. Maybe I am wrong about this but wouldn't the people that want to use this have to download it and host it themselves?

[famousactress]

I worry. The whole update reminded me of when I move out of an apartment and think I've got one more load to go at 9pm... Just a few lamps and the vacuum. Three loads and four hours later and I'm still almost done.

[lotusleaf1987]

Why don't they use a sans serif font? Sans serif fonts are just more legible and easier to read.

[reneherse]

Careful youngin, don't equate conformity with professionalism. The text is quite legible and the serif font makes a nice counterpoint to the rest of the page.

[natep]

I totally did not notice it was a serif font, and I didn't turn on Readability, either (which I do for most things, especially if some designer tried to make it look cool)