This is basically what I think of as the "fundamental problem of conservation ecology", ie. that 'conserving' an ecosystem inherently changes it. The pre-human state definitionally could never be recreated (or maintained) by human hands, it will always reflect the contributions of its human stewards. So if conservation is fundamentally impossible, what's the real goal of conservation ecology? Is it doomed to simply create "theme parks"? Or can we be said to meaningfully preserve something (even if it's a changed or debased form of the original). Conservation ecology is what happens when these stupid philosophical musings bump into actual engineers willing to try to do it.

Human communities (even digital ones) ultimately have the character of an ecological system IMO (albeit in a more allegorical sense). What the author calls fungibility I might call conservation; weird Twitter accounts "migrating" to Bluesky is sort of like pandas surviving primarily in zoos. Some element of the original system is kept, but ultimately the "conservation" is more like "recreation" or "homage" rather than truly freezing the system in amber. Does that mean that it's futile to try? Or is there some sense in which we can have meaningful translation of the relationship web from one medium to the next? Maybe we don't even care about maintaining the system; if it's just the biodiversity we prize then maybe pandas in zoos forever is enough.

I don't think this is adding anything new to what the author is saying per se, but I find the parallels interesting to muse about.