👓 Twitter Is Banning Anyone Whose Date of Birth Says They Joined Before They Were 13 | Motherboard

Read Twitter Is Banning Anyone Whose Date of Birth Says They Joined Before They Were 13 (Motherboard)
According to the company, it can't separate content posted before and after the age of 13.
Another solid reason why to be a member of the IndieWeb.

Here’s a reminder to export or back up your social data, or better yet post it to your own site first and syndicate it to social silos you don’t have direct control of second.

🔖 Ten Arguments For Deleting Your Social Media Accounts Right Now by Jaron Lanier

Bookmarked Ten Arguments For Deleting Your Social Media Accounts Right Now by Jaron Lanier (Henry Holt and Co.)

You might have trouble imagining life without your social media accounts, but virtual reality pioneer Jaron Lanier insists that we’re better off without them. In Ten Arguments for Deleting Your Social Media Accounts Right Now, Lanier, who participates in no social media, offers powerful and personal reasons for all of us to leave these dangerous online platforms.

Lanier’s reasons for freeing ourselves from social media’s poisonous grip include its tendency to bring out the worst in us, to make politics terrifying, to trick us with illusions of popularity and success, to twist our relationship with the truth, to disconnect us from other people even as we are more “connected” than ever, to rob us of our free will with relentless targeted ads. How can we remain autonomous in a world where we are under continual surveillance and are constantly being prodded by algorithms run by some of the richest corporations in history that have no way of making money other than being paid to manipulate our behavior? How could the benefits of social media possibly outweigh the catastrophic losses to our personal dignity, happiness, and freedom? Lanier remains a tech optimist, so while demonstrating the evil that rules social media business models today, he also envisions a humanistic setting for social networking that can direct us toward a richer and fuller way of living and connecting with our world.

This looks like an interesting book to read for some related IndieWeb research. Perhaps something Greg McVerry could use in his proposed talk?

🔖 PixelFed

Bookmarked Pixelfed (https://pixelfed.social)
The first post on a new federated photo sharing website.
An interesting new federated service popped up this morning that recreates an Instagram-like photo sharing site. It’s already turned off registrations and the site is generally down because of the large amounts of traffic. Apparently there’s an appetite for the open and federated web again. Who knew?? 😉

👓 Can we #IndieWeb Google Scholar? #HigherEd | Greg McVerry

Read Can we #IndieWeb Google Scholar? #HigherEd by Greg McVerry (jgregorymcverry.com)
So during my (ongoing) microformats crash course I have styled many citations. Writing an APA citation in html with proper markup take time. A lot of time when you write a lot of citations. While I would consider a canonical link back to to a piece listed or displayed on an author’s website as leg...
Nothing warms my heart more than talk of furthering the idea of making academic samizdat easier and more prevalent. Some of the sketched ideas here are a necessary start.

Facepiles not displaying avatars

Filed an Issue pfefferle/wordpress-semantic-linkbacks (GitHub)
More meaningful linkbacks
Apparently the v3.7.7 update seems to break the display of avatar images in facepiles for likes, bookmarks, etc. Instead of showing the expected avatar image, it’s showing the author’s name wrapped with an href for the originating site.

It’s not just my site either as I notice that the facepiles at https://ramblinggit.com/2018/05/241/ (using Sempress) are also displaying the same way.

I’d simultaneously updated the Webmention plugin and tried uninstalling and reinstalling both plugins as well as checking a variety of settings (including the discussion setting for showing Avatars) and uninstalling a variety of potential conflicting plugins, but to no avail.

I know there were recent changes for privacy related pieces, perhaps this is the cause?

Read doesn’t have an option to facepile in discussion settings

Filed an Issue pfefferle/wordpress-semantic-linkbacks (GitHub)
More meaningful linkbacks
It looks like the new “read” functionality for mentions automatically facepiles them anyway, but I’ve noticed that the settings at /wp-admin/options-discussion.php#semantic_linkbacks doesn’t include a checkbox for reads.

This really isn’t an issue (at least for me), but you may want to be aware of it or tweak it for parity’s sake.

Reply to Greg McVerry about Hypothesis

Replied to a post by Greg McVerry (jgregorymcverry.com)
@chrisaldrich Wouldn’t it be neat if @hypothesis was also a micropub client or used the API so I could PESOS each annotation to my blog as a quote post-kind? So cool @xolotl is coming coming to #indieweb summit. Know the markup doesn’t match but that ain’t a hard fix. Has to be somefun ways regardless of tech to make wordpress and open annotation talk.
There is the (abandoned?) Hypothesis Aggregator plugin  which Nate has worked on a bit that allows a relatively easy PESOS workflow from Hypothes.is to WordPress, but you’re right that it would be nice to have a micropub version that would work for all CMSs.

Personally, I’d also love them to support Webmention which I think would be generally useful as well. There are obvious use cases for it in addition to an anti-abuse one which I’ve written about before. Perhaps if it were supported and had better anti-troll or NIPSA (Not In Public Site Areas) features folks like Audrey Watters might not block it.

Reads, Listens, Watches, and Editable Webmention Types and Avatars in the IndieWeb WordPress Suite

I’ve been meaning to write regular updates to highlight some of the useful changes in the functionality of the IndieWeb suite of WordPress plugins, but never gotten around to it. There’s been a few really interesting ones lately, so I thought I’d start. Observant watchers who read through either the code or even the scant change logs before they update their code may catch some of these features, but sometimes interesting tidbits can slip by the most vigilant. Here are some interesting recent ones:

Display of Reads, Listens, and Watches in comments sections

David Shanske’s excellent Post Kinds Plugin allows one to post what they’re reading, listening to, or watching in simple IndieWeb fashion. (Examples of these on my site: read posts, listen posts, watch posts.) These posts types automatically include the appropriate microformats classes so the user doesn’t need to bother doing them manually. For a long time when replying to another’s site, bookmarking it, or even mentioning it when also using the Webmentions plugin would send the site a Webmention that would generally cause it to show up as a native comment, bookmark or mention. With an update late last year, from within the Discussion settings in WordPress, one could set toggles so that many of these webmentions could be displayed as facepiles. Other broadly unsupported post types would typically default to a simple mention.

Recently David Shanske and I started a podcast, and he thought it would be useful if his site could accept listen posts and show them visually within his comments section just like these replies, bookmarks, and mentions. Thus over the past month he’s added code to the Semantic Linkbacks Plugin to add the functionality for these types of posts to properly render showing facepiles for listens, reads, and watches.

This is what webmentions of listen posts  look like on his site in his comments section:

User Interface example of how listen posts on David Shanske’s podcast appear on his site

What’s happening

Listen (or scrobble) posts can send webmentions (or notifications) to the original content potentially with the experimental listen-of microformat. In the case of scrobbles of podcasts, these webmentions could be displayed as “Listens” which would provide the canonical copy of the podcast some indicator of its popularity and actual audience. It is tremendously difficult to obtain data on the actual number of listens within most of the podcast community and typically a fraction of the number of downloads must be used as an indicator of the actual reach. Being able to display listens could potentially be a boon to the podcasting market, particularly with respect to advertising as this type of open social web functionality spreads.

Similarly read posts with the read-of microformat and watches with watch-of will be accepted and show up within the comments section. Like the previous types, they can be set to display as facepiles within the user interface.

From the Discussion options settings page (typically at: /wp-admin/options-discussion.php#semantic_linkbacks) one can choose the mention types one wants to have appear as facepiles within their comments section.

Knowing that this read functionality would be available, this week I helped ColoradoBoulevard.net set up their site to be able to accept and display reads of their articles. Here’s an example from their site:

The display of a read post on ColoradoBoulevard.net

I haven’t yet seen one for watches in the wild yet, but maybe you’ll be either the first  to send or receive one?

The microformats on these posts is generally considered to be experimental, but with the ~500+ users of this suite of tools as well as others who are already using them on other sites, they’ve now taken a dramatic step into the open internet and more widespread use and potential official adoption.

Editable Webmention Types and Avatars

Webmention Types

Just yesterday, I spent a few minutes in the IndieWeb chat helping someone to laboriously delve into their mySQL databaset and find a particular snippet of data so they could manually change a received webmention from being a simple mention to being a reply so that it would display as a native comment on their website. I’ve often done this to take what sometimes seem like simple mentions and change them to replies to reveal the richer content they often contain for the broader conversation. Sadly the process is boring, laborious, and fraught with potential ways to mess things up.

As of this weekend, this process is no longer necessary. One can now go to the admin interface for their comments and webmentions (found at the path /wp-admin/edit-comments.php), click on edit for the particular comment they’re changing and then scroll down to reveal a droplist interface to be able to manually change the webmention type.

Samantic Linkbacks Data metabox within the comment editing interface on WordPress. One can use the dropbox to change the webmention type as well as manually update the commenter’s avatar.

As another example of a use for this functionality, perhaps you’ve received a listen mention on one of your podcast episodes that has a lot of useful notes or commentary germane to your episode? Instead of hiding it as a simple listen, why not change the type to reply to allow a richer conversation around your content? After all, with a reasonable reply it will be implicit that the commenter actually listened to the episode, right?

Avatars

Because there is currently no functionality in WordPress for saving or caching the avatars of commenters via webmention, when users change their profile images on siloed services like Facebook, Twitter, et al. the link to their old avatars quits working and they were displaying blank spaces. This is an unfortunate form of linkrot, but one that can become more visually apparent over time.

Likes and Reposts concatenated on my site now after converting them into facepiles. They still give the social “proof” and indicate the interaction, but don’t interfere in the conversation now–especially when there are hundreds of them.

As one can see in the image for the commenting edit box above, the field for the Avatar is now editable. This means one can update out-of-date or blank avatars. One now also has the ability to moderate/edit or easily remove/switch avatars if users are sending inappropriate photos for one’s site’s audience.​​​​​​​​​

Reply to Your Challenge: Take Back The Open Web

Replied to Your Challenge: Take Back The Open Web by Daniel Bachhuber (WordCamp for Publishers: Chicago)

This year, we’re asking for speaker applications that focus on Taking Back The Open Web. But what does this really mean?

One thought is that the Open Web is inclusive and encourages fair distribution of ideas with no barrier to entry. It exists in opposition to proprietary systems created by companies for the purposes of lock-in, control of user experience, or requiring payment for entry. In 2010, the New York Times pointed out ways in which these platforms trade fair access to ideas for a better-looking web.

It’s 2018 now, and we’ve seen the impact of opaque, tightly-controlled systems. In  “Can We Save the Open Web”, Drupal founder Dries Buytaert asks:

Do we want the experiences of the next billion web users to be defined by open values of transparency and choice, or by the siloed and opaque convenience of the walled-garden giants dominating today?

After helping to implement and post the first “Read posts” within WordPress using the W3C Webmention spec yesterday, I really can’t wait to see what the WordCamp for Publishers: Chicago begins announcing for their upcoming lineup on the topic “Take Back the Open Web.”

Most promising to me is that this WordCamp actively, purposely, and contemporaneously quoted Drupal founder Dries Buytaert in their announcement right after he began contemplating POSSE vs. PESOS and other IndieWeb philosophies.

IndieWeb-ifying ColoradoBoulevard.net

I’ve spent some time over a few days this month to help IndieWeb-ify my local Pasadena online newspaper ColoradoBoulevard.net. They can now send and receive webmentions and can backfeed their comments, likes, and other responses from their Facebook and Twitter accounts.

They can stand to improve their support for microformats v2 and do some more work on their h-cards and other related metadata, but the editor seems thrilled with the initial results–particularly having their conversations in other areas of the internet come back to the original article.

I know that individual journalists have brought their personal websites into the IndieWeb fold, but this may be one of the first online newspapers/magazines I’m aware of to begin using some of these principles and tools. With any luck and some testing, they could be one of the first journalistic enterprises to begin receiving “Read” posts of their articles via webmention! Update: read posts are working! See the first example here.

I’d like to get them to a place where they can automatically syndicate to social silos and display their syndication links properly. In the end it would be really nice if their writers could own their own articles on their personal websites, syndicate them to the newspaper itself (as the rel=”canonical” link), and then both parties to be able to receive the appropriate backfeed, but this is a nice new baby step on the way to bigger and better things.

I did run across one interesting identity related issue that may need some addressing within this particular space. Some of their journalists prefer not to display photos (or even names) so that they’re not easily (or as easily) identified in person for the sake of doing online reviews or other sensitive reporting assignments.

👓 I blew it at THATCamp & it knocked me off my own web | Simulacrumbly

Read I blew it at THATCamp & it knocked me off my own web by Tim Clarke (simulacrumbly.com)

I’m reconsidered ‘where’ and how I wish to be online, and I see new reasons to move away from large social media platforms and toward my own, self-managed and personally maintained strand of the web. More importantly, I feel a need to take accountability for myself online. There are things I believe it is very important to share, precisely because my de-platforming means others may access my shared content without fear of my exploiting or monetizing them as they do so. I see this renewed interest in working and sharing publicly as a way to counter robotized disinformation. Part of the new web I wish to engage is a web of trust, credibility, and accountability.

In future posts, I’ll walk through my sense of ‘right action’ as it pertains to working and being on the web, and why I feel it too important to sit it out as I have been. I’ll share what I discover, particularly when I can accomplish something useful upon the Domain of One’s Own platform. I am prioritizing those things I’ve done online that pertain to scholarly work and digital learning, but there may be other stuff, too.

A beginnings story about thoughtfully bringing one’s online digital presence back online. I can’t wait to read about future explorations from Tim.

👓 What You’re Proud of | Ben Werdmuller

Read What you're proud of by Ben WerdmüllerBen Werdmüller (Ben Werdmüller)
I've always struggled with resumés. The paper, career-orientated version of my life is one-dimensional at best. Here's what it looks like, more or less: Built one of the first local classifieds websites. Graduated with an honors degree in Computer Science. Worked in educational technology at the Un...
Forget the ‘Now‘ page, or even the ‘About’ page, this sounds like the type of thing every personal website should have. Or for folks like Ben, just subscribe to his website and read everything. Over time you’ll get the same effect.