An Alternate History of Social Media (with Ben Werdmuller)

Ben Werdmuller is the Senior Director of Technology at ProPublica and a seasoned technologist who has spent his career building platforms that prioritize social impact and integrity. In 2004, he co-founded the open-source social networking software Elgg, which for more than 20 years has served as an alternative to Facebook for governments, schools, and political movements around the world.

"They are very similar," Ben says of Elgg and Facebook. "PHP-based social network[s], both heavily inspired by LiveJournal ... They took different paths and now Mark has a private Hawaiian island, and I don't. And also, Mark has undermined democracies and been culpable in a genocide."

Today on Revolution.Social, Ben and Rabble talk about his career transitions from technologist to venture capitalist to his current technical leadership at ProPublica. They also discuss how the sensitivities with which journalists approach new technologies like AI; the ebbs and flows of the Indie Web movement; and how builders in tech, including vibe-coders, can choose to lean into ethics, community, and social good.

Chapters: 0:00 Introduction 3:08 Investigating Power at ProPublica 7:32 Media and Venture Capital Don't Mix 13:53 Why Newsrooms Struggle with Innovation 17:15 AI Can't Do Journalism 22:15 Subpoenas and Data Privacy 25:09 The Rise of the IndieWeb 32:11 Vibe Coding and Agentic Programming 42:45 Human Intent in an AI-Built Web 45:32 Open-Source Social with Elgg 51:26 Mark Zuckerberg's Divergent Path 56:31 Co-Designing the Future of Work and AI

Follow Rabble on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/rabble.nz Follow the podcast: https://episodes.fm/1824528874

This episode was produced and edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm, and executive produced by Alice Chan from Flock Marketing.

To learn more about Rabble’s Social Media Bill of Rights, and sign up for our newsletter, visit https://revolution.social/