way more people are using the fediverse than ever and certain people are personally benefiting from that, but it didn't solve a bunch of the problems we actually had and it caused a bunch of new ones. If it is "successful" or not I am not as concerned with as that it's just definitely not gonna be the path to the good future. My enthusiasm for my own server and community has not waned but now I would rather think about bridging to something different that is another attempt to fix stuff. I think that privacy and anti-censorship and anti-abuse can be done better somewhere else. the part of the protocols that I like continues to be activitystreams and that can be bolted on different transports just fine. While I don't care specifically that our server is blocked by other servers, the depressing fediblock/blocklist stuff has been amplified by people fleeing twitter but now subjecting themselves and others to thousands of elon musks except dumber and more vindictive and reinforced by dark mob energy. maybe things can only be better only if we re-evaluate what compromises we want in the system based on what actually ended up happening. if you can't tell what posts you can even see or interact with, what good is a seamless interface that pretends you can see and interact with everything? it turns out that servers blow up all the time and people just move. it sucks but honestly most people just do it and nobody cares, they just follow the new account. people will shit-talk a more decentralized system for the same problems they still deal with on the Fediverse. the downside, the friction is still there but you also get jannies blocking who can talk to who.

"people don't want cryptographic identity because if you lose your key you lose your identity" people lose access to accounts on here every day and life goes on, you start a new one and make a little effort to try to re-establish your identity and reputation in the new place. (there are other issues with cryptographic identity)

"in a fully decentralized system people won't know if anybody can even see their posts" yeah here too but for all those reasons plus more reasons.