I have seen a lot of people burn out on Open Source thanks (at least in part) to GitHub's model of collaboration. The platform seems to encourage users to be entitled. Due to its success, that same model has been implemented in almost every other git platform.

While it's not a perfect parallel, I think of the Zizek quotation:

it is easier to imagine the end of life on Earth than it is to imagine the end of capitalism 1

Most developers cannot imagine anything significantly different from how GitHub works at this point.

I've used the follow feature just to keep track of whether I've interacted with someone before. I never look at the activity timelines.

With the exception of CryptPad, which I am paid to develop, most of my other projects that are on GitHub are in a zombie state. They carry on because of work I did when I was younger, and I occasionally merge a PR or respond to an issue if the person who opened it was polite.

I'm not sure of git-ssb's model of collaboration, but I greatly appreciate that @cel is able to imagine something different than the status quo. I'm of the opinion that it's still early days for computing, and I'm still very hopeful for the future.