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One thing that I have an impression of on the fediverse, one of the things that people _want_ from the fediverse, is this kind of simple mental model of how things Work™ behind the scenes.
I think in part that is what people who aren't implementing it in particular find appealing about AP: I can describe how it works—in theory—all of thirty seconds
This is part of why people like reverse cron algorithms for their feeds. It's not that this is better, it is that it allows for a simpler model
1/
There are some problems with this approach, however
First, how the model works in _practice_ is not how the model works in theory. How the model is _required to work_ in practice in order to behave even somewhat efficiently is nothing like how it works in theory
This is a lot like my impression of how people talk about programming and it doesn't work _there_ either. "I prefer programming languages that don't rely on magic" for prod systems belies a lack of knowledge about modern systems
2/
How mastodon _actually works_ is different from how people _feel_ it should work and I would assert that in general you don't _want_ people to care about the underlying details of how these things work.
Not because it isn't good to know these things, but because your average person should not have to care about what the FLP result says for the affordances granted by their system. They should be able to _just_ care about those affordances.
But the perception here is strongly not that.
3/
Second, this leads to a lot of people distrusting anything that adds superficial complexity to the mental model for the "guts" of the system.
Even if that complexity is necessary for some other goal.
Even if that backend complexity simplifies the interface between the user and the rest of the world. They distrust anything that adds layers or adds sophistication to that mental model
It's like saying that you want to use software where you can understand the implementation class hierarchy
4/
This puts me in mind of something that @thisismissem said about developers in the fediverse awhile back about the difference between "corporate" and "community" developers.
It's this desire for clarity in implementation, irrespective of interface, irrespective of development speed, irrespective of whether it even makes sense.
IMO: This leads to what I can only describe as a parataxic distortion except instead of directed at a person it's directed at software.
Online leftist truthiness.
5/
If you think this isn't fair, I'd say look at these comments on the matter of granting a simple capability:
https://hachyderm.io/@mekkaokereke/113557028979107961
Even if you agree that the capability isn't needed, saying that a minor UX affordance is what brought us Trump is not someone who is playing fairly with the truth and who is projecting something onto reality that simply isn't there.
6/
Fundamentally I don't think there's anything wrong with wanting to be able to understand the software you are working with.
But where this gets you to the point of _rejecting reality_ or rejecting any _change_ to that mental model simply because it is change, or requiring that now everything look like the sort of academic project you'd do in school, or promoting falsehoods about how things work, that to me is a far bigger issue and dangerous for the long-term health of the fediverse.
7/7
@hrefna this wasn't about mastodon, but rather how developers work in general: the tech we use in the startup world is different to in enterprise world, which is different to that which a hobbyist might use.
@thisismissem I know and I agree, I'm drawing a parallel.
@hrefna @thisismissem reminds me of http/1.1 fans
@hrefna @thisismissem who always fail to understand how annoying that actually was in practice
@hrefna "i prefer programming languages that don't rely on magic"
"so anyways, i found myself writing powerisa because most modern cpus turn out to be shockingly full of appalling micro-architecture"