"I'm pretty sure I'm bipolar..." - Josh

>Josh ranting about Torba again and spreading conspiracy theories like it defederating due to bullying

@colonelj
They probably defederated because they no longer had anything to gain. They federated because they needed a phone app. Once the bigger phone apps domain blocked gab, that was over. All gab was left was wasting resources on federating with just a couple of instances that weren't even that friendly with gab.

@alyx @colonelj >They federated because they needed a phone app.

i've not heard this theory before. you say it with such confidence, can you explain why you are sure this was the reason for them?

@fluffy @colonelj
I think it was even stated by the likes of Torba at some point. They had the issue that their own app was banned from iPhone/Android app stores, and they struggled like that for a while. And when they federated, they were advertising like crazy that you could use any fedi app to log into gab.

@fluffy @colonelj
The lack of an easy accessible app has been the biggest issue they had for a while. Boomers would have problems using gab from their phones, and constantly requested an official gab app. And since they got banned from the official stores, they struggled to teach boomers to sideload apps. So federating was a "solution" for them.

@alyx @colonelj yeah seems reasonable enough. idk why you are so convinced of this theory tho

@fluffy @colonelj
I remember hearing Torba in some interview or something, saying that once they federate, you'd be able to use gab from mobile apps that already exist. Too bad I can't really remember where I've seen/heard this, so at least I'd know where to start searching.

@fluffy @colonelj

At least my memory is still pretty good.

https://wedistribute.org/2019/05/gab-is-forking-mastodon-and-joining-the-fediverse/

@fluffy @colonelj
Too bad the original tweet doesn't exist anymore, but even Eugene's response to the announcement alludes to Gab planning to make use of fedi apps.

@alyx @colonelj honestly it just seems like a bunch of speculation

i mean it's reasonable enough speculation, but there's no smoking gun

@fluffy @alyx it's more believable than fse bullying being the reason

@colonelj @alyx hm, both are reasonable i'd say. remember their target audience is boomers who hate porn and anime. i'd say making the place unpleasant to them could well be seen as a reason for them leaving.

as for which is more reasonable, i think alynx makes a good point about the app store, so i'm inclined to believe it, however consider this theory: they joined the fediverse to siphon new users. they left because a mistake in the code caused them to defederate and they couldn't be bothered to fix it since their users didn't like the content.

@fluffy @alyx many fse people were gablins first so I'd say the opposite occurred when it comes to poaching users from one platform to another

@colonelj @alyx yeah they probably had the blood drain from their face when they realized what a massive mistake they made.

they could probably have poached a good amount of users from fedi if they hadn't absolutely botched the PR and branding strategy. I don't like them, but, the truth is that while they were here they were pretty much the only instance on fedi with full time devs on staff plus additional contractors. They remain the only instance with groups, and the put that together in a matter of days. If they hadn't botched the PR they could have poached loads of guys from FSE, shitposter, mastodon.social, etc. But it was a total hack job and they got hack job results.

@fluffy @colonelj
Unless some of those instances closed down, or became really tyrannical beyond what it's users were ok with, I don't really see any alternative universe in which Gab would have stolen users from fedi.

@alyx @colonelj that's okay. i don't mind that other people don't see everything the way i see it. let's leave this here

@fluffy @colonelj
Don't get me wrong, I find it interesting that you think gab had a shot of taking away users from fedi, but even back then I didn't think it was likely. I saw their federation as a way to compensate for their lack of user diversity and numbers by allowing their users to interact with a slightly bigger audience. It was in my view a temporary fix, while they continued trying to get Twitter normies to come over.