I don't understand your concern. A lot of tech we make in the Free and Open Source software world is based on models from commercial software and services.

The Facebook Platform (early years) was a way for third-party developers to build interesting applications on top of Facebook, integrating content into the feed, the user's home page, and others. It allowed creating all kinds of interesting content types.

I think the Mastodon API is a great counter-example. It's just for microblogging -- nothing else. You can't build a group server or a geosocial checkin application using it; you can't submit different content types, activity types, or create new actor types.

Those are all things the ActivityPub API lets you do.

@evan (I didn't receive a notification for your reply and only saw it by accident. Maybe an AP interop issue?) I think I mentioned it already, but the Mastodon API is the current de facto Social API for the Fediverse and it's used by millions of people and thousands of servers. Like ActivityPub S2S (which is far from perfect), it has been a clear success in terms of adoption. I'm concerned you are disregarding it rather than being inspired by that success and looking for ways to evolve it.

@evan And Facebook? I don't want a Fedi inspired by Facebook. What about Solid or the client aspects of ATProto as open and more general inspirations for Fedi client evolution?

@eyeinthesky@mastodon.social ATProto is already listed! I'll add Solid, though. Good idea!

@eyeinthesky@mastodon.social The Mastodon API is created and controlled by Mastodon. The ActivityPub Social API is an open standard developed by the Social Web Working Group and available to everyone to implement and evolve.

I'm not personally interested in developing custom extensions to the Mastodon API, especially if they're not implemented by Mastodon, and I'm not sure it's within the remit of the SocialCG to do that.

At the very least, we'd need the Mastodon team to submit the API as an input for standardization under the Contributor License Agreement, which provides patent and other protections for implementers.

@evan Which open public APIs and standards from the "Facebook Platform" are inspiring to you? GraphQL? others? Of course, I never suggested simply making custom extensions to the Mastodon API like you never suggested that your Task Force would just create custom extensions to Facebook APIs. But I do think it would be beneficial to be knowledgeable with why the de facto Fediverse Social API has been so successful.

@eyeinthesky@mastodon.social said in The W3C/SocialCG #ActivityPub "API" (AKA Social API or C2S protocol) Task Force states that it is inspired by the Facebook Platform.:
> (I didn't receive a notification for your reply and only saw it by accident. Maybe an AP interop issue?)

Just interjecting quickly — you didn't receive the notification because @evan didn't tag you in his response. Mastodon was sent the response, but did not notify you. It is a limitation of the Mastodon platform that it will not notify unless you are directly mentioned.

Possible solution is for me to just sneak in a mention even if it is not in text, but I don't much like that approach.