Myths About W Social, Explained in Simple Words. Vol 1. | Developer Notes

"part of a series debunking myths and clarifying misconceptions about W Social" - quite a good post, despite the faint air of desperation inevitable to any such post.

Key points:

"Identity verification isn’t about sacrificing privacy...

The key is user control - ensuring that your data stays in your hands, not the platform’s."

Here I have a problem as W's PR hack in Brussels assured me that "the data never leaves your device" when in fact it's stored on their servers for up to 2 weeks according to their own documentation. Couple that with the documented security flaws in their identity service discovered upon launch, and not fixed for 24 hours, and Houston I think we do have a problem.

But he's perhaps not wrong that identity verification, if done correctly, might be able to play a useful role. I'm reading and Hubbing several resources on #age verification, and while the tone of what I've read so far is unremittingly hostile, I personally would love to see teenage girls offered social spaces free of sexual predators in their 50s, so I'm still figuring this out.

Ghost town & account types

He also offers some useful perspectives clarity on why WSocial looks like a ghost town:

• "W Social has two account types: Verified users: Can ... fully engage; Unverified users: Can only view... Many users start as unverified to test the platform before committing to verification ... [and are] invisible to researchers"
• it's in closed beta, with a waiting list

Closed source, closed network?

He reiterates their line that their closure of their open source Bluesky fork is nothing to be alarmed about (his emphases): "W Social’s temporary privatization of its client apps is a development phase, not a rejection of open-source values.".

A paragraph or two later, however, he admits (my emphases) "the platform may open these applications to researchers for public review in the future - excluding proprietary systems".

Closing thoughts

I guess time will tell. As in all things WSocial, I hope for the best, but they've done everything to make me fear the worst.

My key concern, fwiw, is that they might enclose their users in a private platform once they've used the Atmosphere to grow sufficiently - it's the only believable reason I can see why they insist all their users be hosted on their PDS. Their Chair guaranteed to me after their launchday in Brussels that credible exit was guaranteed, but that doesn't change the fact that if they do take this step, most people on WSocial will have the same difficulty leaving it as X users currently face leaving X.