[simonsarris]

> but because "everyone is there." That ubiquity is the only "genuine utilty" they are offering you.

Sure. So what? You nonetheless cannot deny the utility. The friends that I have made from social networks are no less real. I am very grateful they (the means to discover these people now in my life) exist.

[jonahx]

We are probably coming at this from different angles. I don't deny those things but they're also not a counter-argument to the point I'm intending to make.

As an overly dramatic example, a slave might fall in love with the wife he met on a plantation, and the family he has, and even be grateful for them. Nevertheless, you probably don't want to use those facts to be a booster for slave plantations.

My argument is that all the good things you like about social networks, from a technical pov, could be had quite easily without the ads, political propoganda, and other ill-effects of the current popular social networks. Indeed, there are many open source projects that already provide the features you'd want. It's just that none has achieved the network you want.

This situation is unlike that of a large, complex physical infrastructure project, where you really do need to "put up" with a governement (or something like it) in order to get the thing built and maintained.

[Barbing]

Less dramatic off top of head: proud poverty built your work ethic but no motivation to pull any social safety net ladders.

Or maybe happy punch card programming developed your 1337 skills but glad IDEs are there for the current generation.

[simonsarris]

I think you are missing the point of talking about utility in the first place. I have no interest in lamentations. If you told someone to stay away from social networks because of their flaws, you would be doing them a cultural and professional disservice.

As a more moderate metaphor it's like someone saying they like living in one city, for all its flaws, and someone else comes along and extolls the virtues of several imaginary cities. It's fun to imagine those places, but its silly to mention them when someone is speaking of utility. This rush to examples not beholden to reality seems more common among technical types than any other, and likely prevents you from benefitting from what exists today.

[kelnos]

The hole in that analogy is that in some cases these other platforms aren't imaginary. The open, ad-free, privacy-protecting, you-own-your-data alternative to Twitter actually exists: Mastodon.

The problem, of course, is that the utility of a social network is right in the name: the network of users it connects. If the people you want to interact with aren't on Mastodon, then you have to use Twitter.

But ethically-good (for lack of a better term) Twitter alternatives isn't a list of imaginary cities.

I'm not the others participating in this subthread, so I can't speak to their motivations, but for me, it's possible to recognize that Facebook, Twitter, etc. have utility for many people, but also lament that otherwise-better platforms exist that haven't gained traction.

(And it's funny in this specific case, because often the reason they haven't gained traction is because of actual problems with the product: the UI is unpolished, the UX is bad, important feature XYZ is missing, etc. But in the case of Mastodon it actually is as good [or better] product-wise as Twitter. It just doesn't have the same mass appeal because of existing network effects, marketing, and first/early-mover advantages.)

[globalnode]

choosing utility over ethics is a value judgement, thats all.

[kridsdale1]

Yes the thing is valuable because of the network and the network is there because of the network.

We don’t really rely too much on the navigability of the Hudson River anymore. But being next to it is still the most expensive land in the nation.

[cpill]

the point is that they are not mutually exclusive. you can have both. just don't put all your eggs in the corporate basket