W Social and the European Commission

Elena Rossini on GoToSocial ⁂ (@elena@aseachange.com)

[2 media attachments] Another day, another opportunity to roast #WSocial. Grab your 🍿 W Social had been hyping up the live broadcast of Ursula von der Leyen's State of the Union address for weeks. "Watch it on W!" (You'd think they had an exclusive). Nah, it was also shown live on YouTube and X and other places. The funniest thing is that co-founder Ingmar Rentzhog bragged in the live chat: "we are doing our best. The boradcast (sic) is truly Made in Europe." You'd think they had built their own live streaming service. Think again: they used stream.place by Eli Mallon, an ATproto developer based in Seattle. Last time I checked, Seattle is in Washington state? U.S.A.? W, the social network of European digital sovereignty! So I put Rentzhog on the spot and he became all defensive: 🔗 : https://mu.social/profile/elenarossini.com/post/3mvmmu5gua225 But it gets better! W Social had been bragging that only verified W users could comment in the live chat. Yesterday I found out that people with a blue checkmark by Bluesky could also comment. And I have one! It all went by really fast... At the end of the event I made sure to credit Eli Mallon and stream.place for powering the live stream. If W Social wouldn't do it, well, I would. I find it incredible that their modus operandi is to exploit open source infrastructure, giving the impression they built everything from scratch, without ever crediting anyone. #LSocial = Leech Social. The open social web is a highly collaborative space and it pains me to see the parasitic behavior of certain players who just take, take, take without ever giving anything back. The @EUCommission was in the live chat. Von der Leyen took time out from G7 meetings in June to publicize the W Social launch. I strongly believe they picked the wrong platform, which is openwashing and sovereignwashing. I typically do not tag the EC Mastodon account in posts about W, but this time it's important. (Apologies in advance to their social med…

Europäische Alternative W Social: Ist das die ersehnte Lösung?

Mit W Social geht eine neue europäische Alternative zu Elon Musks Netzwerk X an den Start. Ist das die langersehnte Lösung?

Decision to join W social network - a Freedom of Information request to Communication

https://bsky.app/profile/vonderleyen.ec.europa.eu/post/3moiosz24yk2j I wish to obtain any document that explains this decision, such as internal communication explaining the advantages of W, or contact with communications advisors who recommended this action. Yours faithfully, Alexander Fanta Follow the Money Rue Auguste Orts 2 1000 Bruxelles

Europe's W Social Bet Tests its Vision of Digital Sovereignty

The European Commission has joined W Social, a closed-source platform. Megan Kirkwood asks what that reveals about Europe's digital sovereignty agenda.

W-Social: What does sovereignty mean for social media? – Open Future

The European Commission’s move to W-Social frames it as a European alternative to X, but its closed-source code and reliance on Bluesky’s infrastructure show that sovereign social media requires open infrastructure—not European ownership alone.

EU praises open source for tech sovereignty — then backs W, a private for-profit microblogging platform

To fundamentally understand why it's strange the EU Commission is throwing its weight behind this new for-profit social platform, you need to understand what lies beneath.

LeafPlaza filed a complaint against the European Commission. Here is why. - The LeafPlaza Blog

The high level EU leadership has endorsed W Social publicly. It is also replacing Bluesky as provider in the ATProto space. The choice came without any transparency. LeafPlaza is immediately and directly affected by this decision.