I keep hearing about Scuttlebutt for a long time but haven't seen anyone actually using it? Why?
edit: hm, the recommended application on the website itself is ... from 2021, and the github of the app itself is archived now. And there is "bleeding edge" one ... from 2019.
Scuttlebutt had the Bitcoin like problem of requiring everybody to have a local copy of the entire database, with a confusing / glitchy "syncing" process to download the latest posts. I tried to use it for a few days on my Android, but it never showed any new posts and the syncing process took like 30 seconds every time I opened the app.
Social networks are strongly dependent on network effects. For a time SSB was actually used by some of my friends, but it required a desktop app, had a confusing onboarding process, IIRC had some rough edges around syncing content, and was just not smooth enough to compete against highly funded centralized companies in the cuthroat social networking space.
Everyone here is focused on the tech and I'm here wondering how I'm supposed to convince my friends and family to join me on something called Scuttlebutt.
It had a major technical flaw in that it depends on some weird, Javascript-only JSON-serialisation bugs (iirc), and these basically had to be reimplemented in other languages so nobody really ended up writing any other clients for it.
Oh Scuttlebot. Such a great idea, and for a time it actually worked. I haven't been actively developing with the codebase for years, but I believe the current status of the project is that there were too many code rewrites that simply broke things that previously worked at one point or another.
I tell people sometimes that I'd put together a team to do a retro Scuttlebot revival with a Patchwork-style app and of course git-ssb! If you're interested in this kind of project email or call me. Contacts are in my bio.
I'm mostly looking for devs who want to dive into an old Node.js codebase, who want to recapture the magic of the original protocol, and then upgrade all of the modules to modern standards. Maybe Deno or Bun even.
https://www.manyver.se/ is one of the leading implementations of Scuttlebutt. They're currently working on a protocol replacement called PPPPP which addresses some of the shortcomings they identified, the leading one being storage requirements and growth.
SSB was designed by an ocean sailor to be a social network that was infrequently synchronized and then only by local connection. The idea being, when sailors went ashore or rafted up for a gam to catch up on the scuttlebutt, they could synch their databases and have something to read on the next leg of their journey.
Blockchain tech was used to assure that messages created by others had not been altered in transit.
SSB ran into design limitations when the more recent developers tried to imitate something like Mastodon. It can work, but it's definitely idiosyncratic. It does tend to grow a large db, but space is rather cheap these days.
The last 3 times I tried to use it the ~5 projects you had to run/put together to get any higher-level usable application were always in some way incompatible with each other, as they always seem to be in a constant mode of refactoring. Figuring out a set of compatible versions looked like more like a dark ritual than anything else.
Scuettlebutt is an incredibly important data structure.
Its horribly under rated and horribly under invested in.
Its core data structure is a personal blockchain whose consensus scheme is a proof of signature and a proof of history (through chained hashes). There is no global consensus, identity is fiat as it is in the real world.
This makes the data structure gossipable and verifiable.
It has scaling challenges.
It needs to be turned into a blocktree to support multi-device support.
The content needs to be moved out of the tree.
But most of this is solvable with very little effort.
Scuttlebutt is an overlay network for the internet that enables us to build a truly open web.
Its one step away from making humans, their devices, and their content, addressable for the web in a meaningful way.
That small data structure removes the need for a central server.
The future will remember what dtarr did on a sailboat.
My favorite social network! Took quite a bit of problem solving to get in, and a shift in expectations to handle the wait times for p2p data transfer, but the high walls make for a chill community.
I really don't see why decentralised social networks are any better privacy-wise than centralised. If big corp has financial incentives to gather and use your data, then smaller servers do, too. At least big corp is a legal entity that you can sue.
Scuttlebot users encrypted messages onto their append-only log towards recipients using their ed25519 private signing key converted to an ed25519curve encryption key.
This made it possible to send private messages that you could open if you had the private signing key that the messages were directed towards.
Back in the day you could actually send messages using "Private Box" to up to 7 recipients! by appending them to your feed of course.
I recall reading somewhere that it was created by someone who lived offline and had to take a boat to get connectivity, so that's why the thing has this "sync to local device" structure. Can anyone corroborate?
> Today, Tarr lives on a sailboat—another Kiwi staple, alongside sheep and distance. Connectivity is worse on the boat than on the farm, and even less reliable. But that’s by design rather than by misfortune. Tarr started living on the boat after burning out at a previous job and discovering that the peripatetic lifestyle suited him. Unreliable and sporadic internet connectivity became an interesting engineering challenge. What if isolation and disconnection could actually be desirable conditions for a computer network?
Kinda too late, it's a 10 year old project. Besides, scuttlebutt is the name of the water barrel on a ship, and is synonymous with gossip. As a gossip protocol originally written by someone who lives on a ship, I think it's pretty fitting.
Why? If someone will not use an app because it has a silly sounding name, or because they're so immature that "butt" is objectionable to them, I'm happy not to have them bring that attitude into a social space I'm part of.
Scuttlebutt in america is a very common word used to describe gossip.
I love the parallelism between 'scuttlebutt' and 'water cooler talk' .. they both describe gossip and they are both named for people standing around a source of drinking water telling stories.
[+] [-] shp0ngle|2 years ago|reply
edit: hm, the recommended application on the website itself is ... from 2021, and the github of the app itself is archived now. And there is "bleeding edge" one ... from 2019.
OK I can see that there might be problems
[+] [-] nightpool|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] woah|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Solvency|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Hamuko|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tazjin|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] evbogue|2 years ago|reply
I tell people sometimes that I'd put together a team to do a retro Scuttlebot revival with a Patchwork-style app and of course git-ssb! If you're interested in this kind of project email or call me. Contacts are in my bio.
I'm mostly looking for devs who want to dive into an old Node.js codebase, who want to recapture the magic of the original protocol, and then upgrade all of the modules to modern standards. Maybe Deno or Bun even.
[+] [-] earthwalker99|2 years ago|reply
It's called Scuttlebutt, meaning it can never be remotely popular enough to function as a worthwhile social network.
[+] [-] unknown|2 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] linuxandrew|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] evbogue|2 years ago|reply
https://www.manyver.se/blog/2024-02-05
[+] [-] _Marak_|2 years ago|reply
ssb/ssbc is a fun and cool project built on solid code by smart people.
[+] [-] wrycoder|2 years ago|reply
Blockchain tech was used to assure that messages created by others had not been altered in transit.
SSB ran into design limitations when the more recent developers tried to imitate something like Mastodon. It can work, but it's definitely idiosyncratic. It does tend to grow a large db, but space is rather cheap these days.
[+] [-] hobofan|2 years ago|reply
The last 3 times I tried to use it the ~5 projects you had to run/put together to get any higher-level usable application were always in some way incompatible with each other, as they always seem to be in a constant mode of refactoring. Figuring out a set of compatible versions looked like more like a dark ritual than anything else.
[+] [-] r3trohack3r|2 years ago|reply
Its horribly under rated and horribly under invested in.
Its core data structure is a personal blockchain whose consensus scheme is a proof of signature and a proof of history (through chained hashes). There is no global consensus, identity is fiat as it is in the real world.
This makes the data structure gossipable and verifiable.
It has scaling challenges. It needs to be turned into a blocktree to support multi-device support. The content needs to be moved out of the tree.
But most of this is solvable with very little effort.
Scuttlebutt is an overlay network for the internet that enables us to build a truly open web.
Its one step away from making humans, their devices, and their content, addressable for the web in a meaningful way.
That small data structure removes the need for a central server.
The future will remember what dtarr did on a sailboat.
[+] [-] pcloadletter_|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] r3trohack3r|2 years ago|reply
Take an RSS feed and do the following:
* Hash each entry in your RSS feed including the hash from the previous entry in the feed
* Sign that hash with your private key
You now have the original SSB data structure!
It has overhead. It adds 64bytes for the signature and 32bytes for the hash.
But that overhead is pretty small for most RSS feeds I've seen.
[+] [-] hot_gril|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] techpriest2055|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kouru225|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dang|2 years ago|reply
Secure Scuttlebutt - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34480864 - Jan 2023 (82 comments)
Ask HN: Anyone got experience using Scuttlebutt? Thoughts? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29974051 - Jan 2022 (4 comments)
Scuttlebutt Protocol Guide - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29672518 - Dec 2021 (35 comments)
Scuttlebutt: Decentralised, off-grid, mesh network and self-hosted social media - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28612591 - Sept 2021 (3 comments)
Scuttlebutt – A decentralized secure gossip platform - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25713830 - Jan 2021 (164 comments)
What Is Scuttlebutt? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22915460 - April 2020 (40 comments)
Scuttlebot: Peer-to-peer database, identity provider, and messaging system - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22909984 - April 2020 (116 comments)
Planetary: a VC backed social network built on Scuttlebutt, out of stealth - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22123238 - Jan 2020 (5 comments)
SSB Rooms: a new server type for Scuttlebutt - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20828356 - Aug 2019 (32 comments)
Scuttlebutt, a Decentralized Alternative to Facebook - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16877603 - April 2018 (342 comments)
Patchwork – Decentralized messaging and sharing app built on Secure Scuttlebutt - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16273096 - Jan 2018 (64 comments)
Scuttlebutt – A decentralised secure gossip platform - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15890911 - Dec 2017 (5 comments)
Extending Scuttlebutt with Annah - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15502924 - Oct 2017 (1 comment)
Scuttlebot peer-to-peer log store - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14409187 - May 2017 (10 comments)
An off-grid social network - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14050049 - April 2017 (366 comments)
[+] [-] givemeethekeys|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rTX5CMRXIfFG|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] evbogue|2 years ago|reply
https://web.archive.org/web/20230416142631/https://scuttlebo...
Scuttlebot users encrypted messages onto their append-only log towards recipients using their ed25519 private signing key converted to an ed25519curve encryption key.
This made it possible to send private messages that you could open if you had the private signing key that the messages were directed towards.
Back in the day you could actually send messages using "Private Box" to up to 7 recipients! by appending them to your feed of course.
https://web.archive.org/web/20230322134617/https://scuttlebo...
[+] [-] r3trohack3r|2 years ago|reply
You login to Netflix and they deliver you a video file. Millions of people have access to Netflix's video files.
But access is The Pirate Bay. Rights are Netflix.
Just because you have access to a car doesn't mean you have a right to your car.
Just because you have access to a house doesn't mean you have a right to the house.
Just because you have access to a video doesn't mean you have a right to the video.
Just because Big Corp has access to your data doesn't mean they have a right to your data.
Your data is your data. It's time we remember that and build equity back into the web.
And then we need to work back from equity to access control to enforce equity.
[+] [-] sriku|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] evbogue|2 years ago|reply
https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/05/meet-...
Mr Tarr still lives on a boat!
https://www.youtube.com/@dominictarrsailing
[+] [-] INTPenis|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cha42|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rojoroboto|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|2 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] gardenhedge|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] astro1|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] evbogue|2 years ago|reply
But Nostr was launched as a response to SSB: https://fiatjaf.com/nostr.html (scroll down to 'the problem with SSB' section)
[+] [-] d--b|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] thx|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pizzafeelsright|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cutler|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nanomonkey|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ssgodderidge|2 years ago|reply
Personally, I respect the effort to stand out in the sea (get it?) of social platforms.
[0] https://scuttlebutt.nz/about/
[+] [-] ang_cire|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rrix2|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sleepybrett|2 years ago|reply
I love the parallelism between 'scuttlebutt' and 'water cooler talk' .. they both describe gossip and they are both named for people standing around a source of drinking water telling stories.
[+] [-] therealfiona|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] riquisimo|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] beardedwizard|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] blisstonia|2 years ago|reply
Fortunately scuttlebutt is the protocol, which I guess is fine.
[+] [-] thebeardisred|2 years ago|reply