No, I will not take part in the protocol wars on Hacker News with people who don't want to learn anything new. X is still popular, Threads is still growing, and bad actors are trying to co-opt protocols. There's bigger fish to fry. This is how it always ends anyway:
Anuj Ahooja
Summary of today
Jul 16, 2026 at 2:55 PM
Protocol Reader - Summer of Protocols
In the Fall of 2022, the word protocol was suddenly everywhere. The proximal cause was obvious: fueled, in part, by the highly visible and fractious change of ownership at Twitter, large numbers of people began heading for the exits. Most of them, of course, were just looking for
Protocolly Atmoseed - AT Protocol
News from around the Atmosphere, including a proposal to fix localhost, more webdevs getting into atproto, Mu Social's opinionated news feed, and more.
Protocol Reader - Summer of Protocols
The Protocol Reader The Protocol Reader is an 358-page book (currently only available as an epub) comprising 26 foundational essays by 31 authors from the Summer of Protocols program, carefully edited and sequenced to introduce you to the fascinating new discipline of Protocol Studies. It can serve as
Lets talk about the protocol wars
Listening to the #mainstreaming of the 3 protocol mess, we have a building signal-to-noise issue. We need to push signal, so good to think before you share something that is likely more noise on this subject. As a way out of this, I have been pushing bridges for a while as they are the lowest common denominator and can be built and implemented “permissionless” to allow people to cross #4opens protocols. “Permissionless” is important as the is no way you would get consensus to do this, without...
#protocolsforpublishers #atproto #mcp #webapplets | Chad Kohalyk
Web publishing is facing its next challenge: a new iteration of centralizing platforms. BUT there is also a new wave of open protocols and standards that can help us gain our independence. Next month in NYC we are gathering a group of frontier technologists and popular web publishers to discuss how we can sail into this next platform shift as captains. #ProtocolsForPublishers Learn more and sign up here: https://pfp.unternet.co We will be hosting talks on #atproto #mcp #webapplets and web payments, and give publishers the opportunity to interact directly with developers working on these frontier technologies. Thank you to Unternet, Graze Social, Free our Feeds, and betaworks for their support.
ATProto ideas
If AT Protocol becomes “a meaningful layer of the web” — even if it’s only tens of millions of users — then the winning ideas probably won’t only be futuristic...
Security risks overshadow the debut of Europe’s X rival, W
W, Europe’s answer to X (formerly Twitter), has an unconventional approach to privacy, prompting security researchers to question how safe the platform really is.
The Attention Forum: October 23/24th 2025
The internet was initially sold to us as a force for connection – a borderless, democratizing set of technologies that would amplify voices, allow us to spread ideas, and strengthen civil society.
AT Protocol Development, Tech Talks, and Events
Bryan Newbold: Protocol engineering
A protocol engineer at the social-media platform Bluesky describes building an open protocol around a fast-growing social media platform.
One of my biggest concerns is the rumble(.)com equivalent on AT Protocol taking off. And bad actors understanding the protocol enough to leverage it as a way to never be deplatformed. (I sit with the tension that its purpose is to be ‘the new web’ and you can’t be deplatformed from the net)
kottke.org
Hey, look at Substack promoting Andrew Tate as the #1 new bestseller. The company's amoral leadership & backers will platform anyone, even ludicrously toxic rapists & human traffickers.
I don't deal in protocol wars, I place lots of bets on open tech. But there's a reason I don't typically expect durable open protocols to come from VC backed for-profit. If ATProto succeeds long term — it does show promise — it'll be in spite of Bluesky PBC, and thanks to the rest of the ecosystem.
Another reason why it’s so important that we have open protocols for social media.
Kai Kupferschmidt
One of the issues that has come up again and again in my reporting on misinformation and social media is the massive influence social media companies have on research in the field. Last night a preprint dropped that tries to get at this with some numbers. My piece in @science.org (and 🧪🧵 coming):
Web publishing is facing its next challenge: a new iteration of centralizing platforms. BUT there is also a new wave of open protocols+standards to gain independence. Next month in NYC let's discuss how we can sail into this next platform shift as captains. #ProtocolsForPublishers pfp.unternet.co
Protocols for Publishers
pfp.unternet.coAn interview with @masnick.com (of TechDirt), the author of the influential 2019 paper "Protocols, Not Platforms," reflecting on how his ideas apply to publishers in 2026. protocolsforpublishers.com/mike-masnick-interview/
Mike Masnick on protocols for publishers
protocolsforpublishers.com
