Early on, my computer exposed timelines through a calendar, 1:1 chat (ICQ, AIM), chatrooms (IRC), E-mail (including my beloved threaded mailing lists). I had desktop notifications for the first three, only on keywords for chatrooms. It already felt overwhelming at times, but manageable.
RSS was a nice addition, and captured most everything else for years.
Already then, I dreamt of unifying those disparate systems into the One App Of Prioritized Events. It was a vague dream, with a lot of complexities I barely understood, and a few wacky ideas I still wish I had pursued. Looking back, it might have a Golden Age of potential.
Today the number of timelines I follow exploded. I started listing them all here, only to quickly give up on the unpleasantness. They've caused a lot of disruptions, which often turn into doomscrolling.
Turning most notifications off, unsubscribing from most everything, avoiding reentry, closing the tab or even logging off when I faltered, blocking through /etc/hostsā¦ Whatever I do, I'm never quite satisfied. I don't want to give up on the value, I just want more control over it, notably a better signal to noise ratio.
Today more than ever, I long for an application unifying all those systems. Lots of features immediately come to mind:
- Private, fully persistent archival;
- Offline search and retrieval;
- Tracking of what has been consumed and skipped;
- Bookmarking, tagging, scoring;
- Routing of content into my own channels, based on media type, source (which platform, channel, contact), keywords and topics;
- Opt-in social sharing of the last 3 points, enabling discovery from my network, weighted by distance and/or trust;
- Finely tuned observability: very few mobile or desktop notifications, some unread counters; most channels, I'd open when I feel like it, with no indication that anything is waiting.
Unfortunately the interests of platforms are misaligned with many of those goals. They want as much of my attention as possible, to observe and control my experience. Largely to better sell ads or preferential treatment, directly and not.
I'm lucky enough that I could easily afford to pay for lost ad revenue, but the option often isn't there.
And companies have reasons to avoid interoperability besides the advertisement plague. They want to compete in the marketplace through innovation, evolving their product as often as they want, adding and changing features without the restraints of compatibility with third-party applications. I must also mention silly attempts at preventing redistribution (DRMs š).
When data is unshackled from its presentation, when access is negotiated solely by producers and consumers without the meddling of intermediates, decentralization brings about the commoditization of communication and distribution channels, and enables the rise of more humane products and experiences for communicators, creators, and audiences.
I won't pretend I have a clear vision for what the best products would be in that world. I don't know that I'd be able to build much of what I'm hoping for, should that vision cristalize. But I'm convinced our collective intelligence could achieve greater results than the silos we all too often confine ourselves to.
Who pays for what how, I don't know either. But I'd happily give a lot of my resources, time included, to see meaningful progress in that direction. And should the opportunity arise, I could easily bet I'm far from alone.