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Replied to a tweet (Twitter)
I send Webmentions for reads and listens to notify authors, but I’m waiting for reading/podcast apps that will allow me to authenticate and make read/listen posts via micropub automatically, or versions that will send even generic notifications via webmention.

The nice part is that this sort of model allows the user to collect this data and send these notifications on an as-desired basis to the publisher.

Replied to @-mention when posting to Twitter · Issue #527 · snarfed/bridgy by Stephen Paul WeberStephen Paul Weber (GitHub)

Twitter interprets microsyntax whenever you post. There's no way around it. So if you have a post whose plain text says "Blah blah with @singpolyma" there is no way to tell twitter that "@singpolyma" is not the user named "singpolyma" and it will notify said user no matter what. In a silo this works, but when bridging to a federated environment it can cause issues (and especially annoyance of Twitter users).

One way to deal with this is to have my local implementation detect any such cases and not bridge them to Twitter, but this is not ideal. What should brid.gy do if it is asked to post something with the text @singpolyma in it? Here is my proposal:

  1. For the source HTML @singpolyma I would suggest changing it to "@ singpolyma", however I could see an argument to also leave it as-is, since some users might be writing plain-text microsyntax and expecting it is always going to Twitter? Hmm.
  2. For the source HTML @<a href="https://twitter.com/singpolyma">anything</a> put "@singpolyma" into the tweet.
  3. For the source HTML @<a href="https://singpolyma.net">anything</a> put "@ singpolyma.net" into the tweet.

Thoughts?

Not necessarily a permanent solution for all platforms and microsyntaxes depending on the number of syndicated copies, but potentially a clever stopgap for those who may need it. 

One can use a zero-width space (using something like &#8203;in their HTML) between the @ and a twitter user name on the original post and the syndicated copy will not have the traditional @mention link or notification functionality. 

Here’s an example

This reply can also serve as a test for the functionality within Github where I’ll “tag” both @kylewm and @​snarfed, but if it works, Ryan shouldn’t be auto-linked or notified.

Replied to Process for updating a proposed h-entry property · Issue #25 · microformats/h-entry by Tantek ÇelikTantek Çelik (GitHub)

The current h-entry change control process does not specify how to update the definition of a proposed feature, which means it falls back to being as strict as updating a stable feature which is more strict that desired for proposals. This issue is for considering a proposal for updating the definition of a proposed feature, as discussed during the recent Microformats Issue Resolution pop-up.

Proposal: the definition of a proposed feature may be updated to be more consistent with one or more real world public web sites publishing and or consuming the feature, by citing URLs for those examples in an edit summary. New proposed property or value definitions may also be added for consideration per the existing requirements for adding a proposed feature. If you’re not sure whether to update an existing definition or add a new definition, try to work with the proposer(s) of an existing definition to come to a consensus to update it. Lacking consensus, add a new definition for consideration, retaining any previous definition(s).

This proposal also adds a convergence requirement for moving a feature from proposed to draft. If there are multiple definitions for a proposed feature, an issue must be opened to discuss how to converge the definitions by consensus agreement among those with real world public web sites publishing and or implementations consuming the feature.

This is a rough first draft, feel free to propose alternatives, simplifications, editorial suggestions.

(Originally published at: https://tantek.com/2020/259/b2/)

This is acceptable to me. No further ideas or revisions at this time.
Replied to Social Interactions on the Web by James Gallagher (jamesg.blog)
I am using the Quill client to send data to my site. I have not tried out any other micropub clients but I could if I wanted to. They all support the same standard. ❧
Given the way you’ve described your uses, you might appreciate the browser extension Omnibear as a micropub client.

Replied to Social Interactions on the Web by James Gallagher (jamesg.blog)
When I think about it, likes and bookmarks are somewhat difficult to distinguish for my purpose. A bookmark inherently implies that I liked a post because I usually only bookmark posts on Pocket that I like and want to save for later. I use Firefox bookmarks to track the articles that I have not yet read and want to come back to later. There is a distinction. A like is clearer. It’s my way of saying that I did like your content. Not everybody will know my policy on bookmarks, so having a like feature is useful. ❧
My general heirarchy is that bookmarks are things I want to come back to (and usually read) later, reads are things that I’ve read, like are things I’ve read and want to send appreciation for, and replies are things that usually are both read, liked, and needed even a bit more.
Here’s more on how I’ve thought about it before: https://boffosocko.com/2018/03/10/thoughts-on-linkblogs-bookmarks-reads-likes-favorites-follows-and-related-links/
Replied to a conversation thead by @helenhousandi @boogah @jasontucker @courtneyengle (Twitter)
I think Post Formats didn’t go far enough. I love Post Kinds Plugin for extending the idea, particularly into some of the UI one sees in the social space. It also has extensibility to allow new formats as well as customize-able display, so if you want an annotation display or a “chicken feed” (just to demonstrate the point) on your site, a few modifications and you’re off to the races.

The UI part that often bogs down the posting process is the complexity of Gutenberg or the myriad of meta-boxes. To remedy this I try to pair one of the many Micropub clients (I like Quill or Omnibear as flexible examples) for posting to my website and then allowing Post Kinds to handle the rest for creating reply contexts and posting the minimum necessary metadata.

Replied to a tweet by @Chronotope (Twitter)
I’m guessing it may have been because I took your recommendation?

Thanks, by the way!

Replied to a tweet by @fourierfiend (Twitter)
Hello fellow mathematician!

There are lots of ways to syndicate content, some dependent on which platform(s) you’re using and where you’re syndicating to/from. Your best bet is to swing by the IndieWeb Dev chat and ask that very question.

Theorem: Syndication is easy.

Proof: “It’s easy to show” (I’m waving my hands here) that there are a lot of assumptions and baggage that go with the word “easiest.”   ∎

I’ve personally found there’s generally an inverse relationship between ease/simplicity of syndication and control over exact display for most platforms. You could go low-fi and pipe your feed into something like IFTTT/Zapier  for cross-posting all the way up to customized integration with available APIs for each platform. Many take a middle-of-the-road approach that I notice Jeremy recommended as I’m writing this.

The cross-posting wiki page will give you some useful terminology and definitions which may help you decide on how to syndicate what/where. Based on the context of the URL in your Twitter profile, the IndieWeb wiki pages for static site generator and syndication will give you some ideas and options to think about and explore. 

Some of the pages about specific static site generators will give you some code and ideas for how to implement syndication. For example Max Böck has an article Indieweb pt1: Syndicating Content to Twitter, which is Eleventy and Twitter specific, but which could likely be modified for your purposes. SSGs may have some specific peculiarities for syndication that I’m not as familiar with coming from the more dynamic side of the fence.

Since you indicate a language preference for your current site, there’s also a page for Flask with a few users noted there. You might ask Fluffy (usually around in chat) for some advice as I know she syndicates to a few platforms and may have some ideas or even tools/code to share from the Flask perspective.

Q.E.D., right!?

(p.s.: Great Twitter handle!)

Replied to a thread by @KerrieDoodles (Twitter)
If people are depressed by this minimal loss since the 60’s, they’re going to explode when they read research like that of Lynne Kelly on what we’ve actually lost from indigenous cultures. Here’s a good place to start: Knowledge and Power in Prehistoric Societies: Orality, Memory and the Transmission of Culture though her TED talk gives a bit of the flavor without the heavier, but worthwhile, reading–in part, because it will give us some ideas about how to turn back the clock and recover some of what we’ve lost.

Replied to a thread by @helenhousandi @daljo628 @topher1kenobe @elibud (Twitter)
This is a great use case for Micropub clients and there are a few that will do this already. Try the Micropub plugin along with Quill: https://quill.p3k.io for a minimal UI photo post using note (it should default to use the last photo you took too.)

For more details look at Micropub and WordPress: Custom Posting Applications. It uses the W3C Micropub recommended spec and most of the current clients are open source if anyone wants to build their own web or mobile interfaces.

Sunlit for iOS is a Micropub compatible app that supports photos. PhotoPostr looks promising too for photos and collections.

If you want to go crazy to support some of the other niceties on your site, add Simple Location plugin for showing GPS location and weather conditions and Post Kinds plugin for custom (and customizable) photo display (meant to be compatible with Micropub, but doesn’t have Gutenberg support).

Here’s an example photo from this morning: https://boffosocko.com/2020/09/09/55776473/

Naturally it’d be awesome to see Micropub support in core. 

Replied to a tweet (Twitter)
I’m sure there was a similar peak in 2009 for the Station Fire. I remember seeing the pyrocumulus cloud in Glendale/Pasadena all the way down to San Diego.

It’s also the last time that Mt. Wilson was threatened, though tonight it’s from the East side of the mountain. I’m watching closely because I’m 8 miles from the Bobcat Fire to the East and we’re under an evacuation warning. Fortunately the live cam has some reasonably clear footage of the immediate danger as the observatory is 4 miles up the hill above us.

Night photo of flames burning near the Mt. Wilson Observatory.
Mount Wilson Observatory live cam facing east toward the Bobcat Fire at 12:40 AM PST
Replied to 5 Year Blogging Anniversary by Nick GrantNick Grant (Nick Grant)
This is a story about writing...
To date, I have written and published 1,357,076 words on this blog. Today is the 5 year anniversary of me starting this blog. I have published 1,086 blog posts, which is an average of 4 per week. I think many writers would be pleased to write and publis...
I love WithKnown too! Congratulations on the anniversary! Hang in there. We need your voice.
Replied to Structured data for book reviews by Jeremy CherfasJeremy Cherfas (jeremycherfas.net)
Almost a week ago, I noted a blog post by Ana Ulin: Adding Structured Book Data to My Blog Posts. Ana added a section to the front matter of her book posts that contains information about the book in question, including her rating. She was kind enough to share ...
This is exactly the sort of thing that makes me happy about the IndieWeb!

One person tinkers around with an idea and posts about how they did it. Someone else sees it and thinks it’s cool and wants it for themselves. They then modify it for their system, maybe with some changes or even improvements, and post the details on their site.

They’ve both syndicated copies to IndieWeb news or to the IndieWeb wiki, so that in the future, others looking for that sort of UI research or examples can find them and potentially modify them for their own personal use.

And the cycle begins anew…

Replied to Walled gardens in disguise by Felix PleşoianuFelix Pleşoianu (Felix Rambles)
At the end of June, I subscribed to micro.blog with some amount of hope. Nine weeks later, I canceled my account. Yeah, isn't that public timeline gorgeous? All pretty photos and thoughtful posts. Surprise! It's heavily curated. To the point of being suffocating in fact. You'll never going to see th...
Wow! I feel like Felix somehow missed and misunderstands a lot of the value of micro.blog and how it really works. Perhaps they haven’t read the documentation or explored it enough? 

This reads like Felix thinks the discover feed is the entire point of the platform and not simply a tangential discovery mechanism for new users. It feels like they didn’t realize they could subscribe to anyone they wanted and that feed is the one that most people find more valuable and use regularly.

It also reads like they weren’t getting any interaction at all in terms of replies/comments. Not sure if they had a paid account (and were just using micro.blog) or if they’re using their own site and just don’t have webmentions which means they have to manually go to find interactions.

On the other hand, micro.blog is doing a tremendous amount compared to simple silos like Twitter, Facebook, and Mastodon, so I’m not surprised that some people can misconstrue what is going on or even why. A lot of how you use it depends on what resources you have when you come to it. If anything though, micro.blog is the last thing out there that’s a walled garden in the social space.

Replied to a tweet by Olu Olu (Twitter)
Some of us in the IndieWeb space have been posting events and details on our own websites while others are posting RSVP replies on our  personal websites and sending webmentions to the event posts.

Here’s an example of an event: https://2019.indieweb.org/summit and my RSVP to it: https://boffosocko.com/2019/05/30/55753006/ using this sort of set up.

There’s also a self-hostable service called Meetable that is IndieWeb friendly and accepts RSVP webmentions as well. If you’d like to test it out with your new webmention functionality, you can RSVP to one of the upcoming events at https://events.indieweb.org/. We’d love to have you join us if your schedule allows.

Other Meetup.com alternatives we’ve documented: https://indieweb.org/meetup.com#Alternatives