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Of course you should do everything you can to prevent fires - and also, you should build fire exits, because no matter how hard to you try, stuff *burns*. That includes social media sites.

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If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

pluralistic.net/2024/12/14/fir

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@zetabeta @pluralistic I honestly do not understand what problem PeerTube is trying to solve. "PeerTube is a tool that you install on a web server. It allows you to create a video hosting website." That's called... a web site. With an MP4 file on it. I already had that.

@jwz @zetabeta @pluralistic
Two things.
Since it's build on activitypub, Peertube instances can be federated to allow content from one instance to appear on another, much like Mastodon instances do.

It also allows posts to peertube to interop with (some) other federated services, like Mastodon. If there is value in that is probably dependent on purpose and scope of the project.

@jwz @pluralistic
if you have video files on your website, good for you. it is a some kind of alternate for youtube.

basically is youtube's and alphabet inc's data collection and other policies. youtube has become hostile to small creators. and arbitrary policies and enforcement make things more annoying. ads also starting to be invasive and too much.

@zetabeta @pluralistic "YouTube sucks" is not an answer to the question "why is PeerTube useful".

Since step 1 of using PeerTube is "first have a website that is already capable of hosting video" I still don't know the answer to that.

There are many reasons that YouTube, Instagram and TikTok are popular, but the gating reasons on which all other reasons depend are: trivial signup, and "free" hosting.