• people want to be able to post things that can only be read by their friends (do I really have control over my data if anyone spidering the network can read this? Isn't this still data mineable?)

[...]
As for data mining, I think that as public "free-for-all" pubs go away as alternatives are available, it will be a lot harder to get into a network in the first place to start spidering.

I wouldn't count on this too much, and not on limiting gossip either. If you want something private, make it private. That means either ensuring there's a technical way to tell everyone you publish to to never-ever send this to a peer/pub outside the "in-group" or actually encrypting it. Personally, I'd prefer both. Kind of "what happens in pub.vegas, stays on pub.vegas."

My idea: why not have a "dynamic" list of "Friends" in the client. So if I post something and share it only with "Friends", patchwork could post it as a private post to everyone who's friends with me at the moment.
That would also mean that new friends don't retroactively get access to all my previous stuff. Like in, you know, real life :P

• implementation of ssb in other languages is difficult because of its assumptions based on javascript's json implementation

After reading this discussion with Vendan (who's ssb identity I don't know) I tend to agree. I was toying with a python implementation, just to get a bit acquainted with the ssb protocol, but this reads to me like it'd be a bit of a nightmare to emulate JS/node/ssb logic in how to encode the json, with character encodings and all that.
Is there any ongoing discussion on this? It seems like a relatively simple change, but a very backwards-incompatible one...?

• standard growth assumptions, assuming we want more randoms on the network (it's just another app on the pile trying to get my attention, go away!)

Somewhat related: the name. It came up in a the main thread on reddit (reddit being reddit after all) and also with friends. It's definitely off-putting for many "normies". All the butt-jokes make me chuckle day in day out, but I don't see a non-technical parent being okay with their kids signing up for something that has butt in the name and that sounds completely strange to them.
So, if we do want more "randoms" or "normies" here, the name might need to change.
Or, the other way around: If ssb fails to draw in some good people just because of the name, wouldn't that just be a shame?

I saw the point being made that the name doesn't matter, because what you really use it patchwork/patchbay/patchfoo or whatever comes next.
That's not really true though, is it? Because each of these applications is clearly and visibly just a window into a larger network, as evidenced by the fact that they largely show the same content.
So the users definitely have an idea of using a client software to connect to a network, and that network clearly is called scuttlebutt (emphasis by Any Brain Ever)