"No bans" mentioned in a little animation at the bottom of the page, and in the FAQ as a "suppression list"
You will ban people. People will post horrible things. Things you are legally required to not host. The "radically free speech" social media site trope misses the fact that social media is only valuable when it's interesting. Screaming into the void, among others that also want to scream into the void because they can't elsewhere, is not fun.
Being completely removed from a platform and being penalized by the community/society for bad-acting are entirely different things. We (staff) generally won't be banning anyone (except where law may require) - penalty systems like suppression lists are entirely governed by policy enacted by the community (which can change if the community wants it to change). A suppression list itself could even be completely removed if that's what the community ultimately decides.
Yes, companies are often required by law/local jurisdictions to remove content violating the law, report to authorities as needed, etc - but as far as we've been advised so far there's presently no laws in our jurisdiction requiring us to completely ban someone for posting such content. If that is or becomes untrue in any given jurisdiction then we'll adjust and all such proceedings will be as public/transparent as possible. Wherever possible, though, violations to community policy are automated and based on requirements set in place by the community itself (and can change as community wants change). As staff, we intend to be as laissez-faire as possible in this regard.
I have a hard time believing their transparency promises if I can't even easily figure out who is in charge of the company behind their social product. adieuu.com doesn't work.
> Your individual data is never sold, and all of your created content can be removed or exported at any time.
Oh nice, so they're just selling aggregated data.
> While we are registered as a for-profit company, we intend to operate closer to a "B-Corp": our goal is to encourage positive social change and be accountable to all stakeholders (our users), not just shareholders, and set an example for radical transparency in our business operations.
So they're not a non-profit but you will attempt to be somewhat non-profit while being for-profit. Sounds... dubious at best.
Hi, Jason - I'm Andrew, one of Adieuu's cofounders. Totally valid point re:transparency. We've been in stealth for a bit and just launched our waitlist a couple days ago, shared it with a few friends, etc. We weren't expecting to start blasting things out for a few weeks, we're still setting up our company's site, LI, etc. Was definitely not expecting it to end up on HN this quick before we had our stuff up, this is a total surprise to me. What you said about transparency is exactly what I was thinking when we published the waitlist (horrible irony in preaching tranparency and not having a web presence yet), but figured we had a bit more time to get things up before people started seeing it. Lesson learned.
I'm adding some info about Adieuu below in the meantime - happy to answer other questions you might have. There's a couple things we're still a little quiet on til we get close to launch, but as much as possible I'm happy to be an open book.
re: selling data: We worded it this way because we haven't run the copy by any attorneys and I wasn't sure what all fell under "selling data". To be clear on the spirit/intent of the wording - we have no intention of selling any user data, period.
Non-Profit/For-Profit:
Our founding team has never run non-profits before, so for-profit is more of our wheelhouse. It seems to us (naive as we are about Non-Profits) like handling monetization and what we can do, sell, etc (payments vs donations, etc) is more straightforward in for-profit. Strong opinions loosely held - it's on our list of todos to research this more; this isn't something any of our current mentors know much about, so if you happen to know anyone you think might be open to educating me I'm all ears. We're early enough we can certainly swap our structure around to whatever is best.
---
Sorry for the long post, hope the above is helpful - if not, please say so and I'm happy to discuss more. Until we get more about Adieuu live on the web, LI, etc, here's some quick details (ask away if you have specific q's, I'm happy to answer):
Interesting that there doesn't seem to be any information about the actual platform itself, just its governance. What is the product? My assumption is it will be a twitter clone, but I don't see anything about that.
While the idea is nice in theory, I don't see any way that this could expand beyond a highly niche platform. But it doesn't seem like a very monetizable niche, so as a for-profit endeavor the prospects don't seem great.
Regardless, it is nice to see people working on people-focused software.
Good luck with that. Like, do you actually believe you'll block all bots? It's simply ridiculous to claim this. Everything you do to block bots will be circumvented. Hell, no social network wants bots: bots aren't a feature anywhere. You're not going to be more effective than Meta or Twitter.
We can guarantee that all accounts are Humans, actually - it's part of what makes us special :) Also, FB/Tw have a vested interest in allowing bots. When I run an ad on FB (no ads on Equal, btw!) I'm paying for impressions, many of which are bots. FB is making money off of bot and botted content, I'd argue they have a conflict of interest in removing bots. We have no such issues :)
graypegg|1 year ago
You will ban people. People will post horrible things. Things you are legally required to not host. The "radically free speech" social media site trope misses the fact that social media is only valuable when it's interesting. Screaming into the void, among others that also want to scream into the void because they can't elsewhere, is not fun.
adefee|1 year ago
Yes, companies are often required by law/local jurisdictions to remove content violating the law, report to authorities as needed, etc - but as far as we've been advised so far there's presently no laws in our jurisdiction requiring us to completely ban someone for posting such content. If that is or becomes untrue in any given jurisdiction then we'll adjust and all such proceedings will be as public/transparent as possible. Wherever possible, though, violations to community policy are automated and based on requirements set in place by the community itself (and can change as community wants change). As staff, we intend to be as laissez-faire as possible in this regard.
- Andrew, cofounder
jasonvorhe|1 year ago
> Your individual data is never sold, and all of your created content can be removed or exported at any time.
Oh nice, so they're just selling aggregated data.
> While we are registered as a for-profit company, we intend to operate closer to a "B-Corp": our goal is to encourage positive social change and be accountable to all stakeholders (our users), not just shareholders, and set an example for radical transparency in our business operations.
So they're not a non-profit but you will attempt to be somewhat non-profit while being for-profit. Sounds... dubious at best.
inhumantsar|1 year ago
sounds they want all the benefits of looking like a transparent and ethical business without having to be accountable
adefee|1 year ago
I'm adding some info about Adieuu below in the meantime - happy to answer other questions you might have. There's a couple things we're still a little quiet on til we get close to launch, but as much as possible I'm happy to be an open book.
re: selling data: We worded it this way because we haven't run the copy by any attorneys and I wasn't sure what all fell under "selling data". To be clear on the spirit/intent of the wording - we have no intention of selling any user data, period.
Non-Profit/For-Profit: Our founding team has never run non-profits before, so for-profit is more of our wheelhouse. It seems to us (naive as we are about Non-Profits) like handling monetization and what we can do, sell, etc (payments vs donations, etc) is more straightforward in for-profit. Strong opinions loosely held - it's on our list of todos to research this more; this isn't something any of our current mentors know much about, so if you happen to know anyone you think might be open to educating me I'm all ears. We're early enough we can certainly swap our structure around to whatever is best.
---
Sorry for the long post, hope the above is helpful - if not, please say so and I'm happy to discuss more. Until we get more about Adieuu live on the web, LI, etc, here's some quick details (ask away if you have specific q's, I'm happy to answer):
- Two cofounders: myself (https://www.linkedin.com/in/adefee/), Lexi Sprague (https://www.linkedin.com/in/lexisprague/). Not our first co, and much of our careers have been in/around privacy & security (something we're passionate about).
- Team size < 5.
- Based in US.
- No funding raised to-date (no present need or rush to do so).
- No revenue from Equal yet (product not yet launched).
[edited typo, wording for clarity]
dinkleberg|1 year ago
While the idea is nice in theory, I don't see any way that this could expand beyond a highly niche platform. But it doesn't seem like a very monetizable niche, so as a for-profit endeavor the prospects don't seem great.
Regardless, it is nice to see people working on people-focused software.
warpspin|1 year ago
bastawhiz|1 year ago
Good luck with that. Like, do you actually believe you'll block all bots? It's simply ridiculous to claim this. Everything you do to block bots will be circumvented. Hell, no social network wants bots: bots aren't a feature anywhere. You're not going to be more effective than Meta or Twitter.
adefee|1 year ago