[blamestross]

It is worth pointing out the distributed systems tend towards centralization over time.

Keeping things decentralized is always going to be an active effort. Fundamentally decentralized vs centralized is also robustness vs efficiency. Anybody with a short returns horizon that hasn't been burned yet prefers efficiency.

[api]

> hasn't been burned yet

The latest basket in which everyone is putting all their eggs is federated login using one of a few giant tech companies (mostly Google) as OIDC providers.

Should I bother saying "I told you so" when these providers start arbitrarily blocking access to peoples' apps for stupid reasons (e.g. policy enforcement bots), abusing login privileges to harvest user data off other platforms (after silently amending their EULAs to give themselves permission to do this), or charging for the right to log into your stuff?

My money is on the last one happening in the next few years. "After January 1st of next year, the use of your Google|Apple|Facebook account to log into third party services will require a subscription..." Why wouldn't they want to collect a tax on every SSO login?

While I doubt major providers are actually abusing login credentials to access third party services (yet?) I'm sure they are gathering all the data they can on who logs into what, from where, and how often. It's a privacy nightmare, but nobody cares about privacy. Nobody will care until they are inconvenienced.

[jedimind]

It is also worth pointing out that centralized systems tend to drive people towards wanting decentralization over time, since it's only a matter of time until individuals get burned by the arbitrary whims of the rulers over centralized systems.

I never took such arguments seriously myself until my bank refused service to me without giving me any reason for it. Treating honest customers like criminals is exactly how people start distrusting centralized systems and their untrustworthy authority. In the dns/icann sphere there are also countless factors[0] that are evidence of this, not even talking about the dns hacks[1] or clear cut corruption of icann or censorship attempts.[2]

So it's not only about robustness vs efficiency, but also about additional factors like ownership and freedom + security et cetera.

[0] https://www.politico.com/news/2022/04/09/website-domain-more...

[1] https://threatpost.com/unprecedented-dns-hijacking-attacks-l...

[2] https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2022/03/ukraine-wants-ru...

[blamestross]

> So it's not only about robustness vs efficiency, but also about additional factors like ownership and freedom + security et cetera.

Id argue those are part of centralization vs decentralization

Plenty of systems that look decentralized at first glance really just have human organization as the central failure point. This is a great example of why most cryptocurrency is centralized (centralized development and management)

[jedimind]

One can always infinitely shift the goal post and nitpick if one has an axe to grind. The point is aiming for as little or as much decentralization possible to realize certain properties, it's not about having decentralization for the sake of decentralization. it's not a goal but a means to an end. we fundamentally want more ownership, freedom & security.

Priorities are also important: Unrealistic levels of decentralization make no sense before securing survival and increased usage. In addition, we don't need absolutely everything to be decentralized, but merely those components that help us manifest those properties we desire.