So after wading into the debate yesterday based on an article written by @ploum (and posted by @dangillmor), and the larger #fedipact controversy, I decided to share a slightly more coherent version of my thoughts. I still think unnecessary #gatekeeping and preemptive #bans suck and will cause a helluva lot more damage to the protocol than Meta likely will, but as always, hope others who differ in their thoughts will engage in some healthy debate, and not just resort to calling me a troll for having a different opinion than them.
https://careylening.substack.com/p/the-fediverse-metapocalypse-and-preemptive
https://careylening.substack.com/p/the-fediverse-metapocalypse-and-preemptive
Esther Payne :bisexual_flag:
•I do disagree, but that's mainly because I left Facebook. Which I did giving a full 6 month warning, with my email address and my mastodon handle.
When I first came on the Fediverse, the learning curve was steep. It's better now. My point of view is that I think it depends on what you aim for on this network. For quite a few people on here, blocking for safety has been learned the hard way.
Esther Payne :bisexual_flag:
•At Scale it's a lot harder to on-board.
But I think it will come down to individual choice, including weither folk stay on Mastodon or go elsewhere for their next social network.
For some of us this is like our 3 or 4 network. The first one you were on, always has the emotional punch of leaving.
Esther Payne :bisexual_flag:
•https://onepict.com/consent-fediverse20230627.html
Consent and the fediverse
onepict.comCarey Lening :blobcatverified:
•Some disclosures: I (briefly) worked for Meta in 2018-2019, when they were trying to rehabilitate themselves post CA/pre-GDPR. I naively thought I could change some of the particularly odious bad behaviors and practices, and it only took me a few months to realize that this was about as effective as me trying to sprout wings and fly.
Part of the reason is that Meta isn't a monolith anymore; it's a messy, fragmented clown car of a system, a pile-on of various hacks, experiments, deprecated-but-not-yet-deprecated code, forgotten interconnections, and abandoned promo endeavors and efforts. Nobody at Meta knows what data Meta has (and I mean this very literally - they literally cannot comply with a DSAR effectively because they have _no_ clue about what their code is actually tracking, or at least that was the case in 2019).
It's the equivalent of assuming there's a single world order who controls the "System". This shit is so big that while there might be people who know more, nobody (or no single team) knows everything, or even most things. Assuming that conscious efforts to destroy the AP/Fedi are being made by some shadowy leadership group is ascribing WAY too much intelligence and foresight to a group of people who probably thought it would just be cool if they could get on this AP/fedi bandwagon and siphon away Twitter users.
And like, really, I think that's what the main end-goal is. To siphon away Twitter users by showing that Threads will be more like the social network people had on Twitter, back when everyone was on Twitter. FB knows it can't achieve that on its own, so they're going to coopt whatever system might give them an edge.
You hinted at this in a later comment, and I think it's the most realistic basis for any of the P92 efforts. Or, even more cynically: A few people at Meta thought they could get a promo from this.
On Fractal Complexity
Carey Lening (Chronicles of the Constantly Curious)ploum
•"Meta isn't a monolith anymore; it's a messy, fragmented clown car of a system […] Nobody at Meta knows what data Meta has"
Everybody having worked in the industry knows perfectly well that this is the case for every single company bigger than 50 employees. Entropy always win.
And that’s why we should fight corporations: those are soulless robot that nobody control anymore (It’s not new, Steinbeck already told us about this in The Grapes of Wrath")
Carey Lening :blobcatverified:
•If they're all soulless robots, why aren't you out there living off the land, instead of online? Why support any of them if they're all entities that "nobody control(s) anymore" ?
ploum
•Your argument is a bit like the naive: "You feel the world is bad yet you live in the world, duh!"
Yet you argue than when we manage to create a small space without #Meta, we should welcome their invasion.
Do you see the contradiction?
Carey Lening :blobcatverified:
•Asserting that it's all bad, or that only the right people should join (those that share 'the values behind' the Metaverse' (without any articulation about what those might be!) isn't any more helpful.
ploum
•Is Meta doing more bad than good? I find it hard to not answer "yes". Is meta a systemic problem that should be fought. For most scholars, the answer is yes.
Those are the basic premises on which we seems to disagree
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
•Meta is showing up to a house party with a few busloads of people. Some might be great folk. Some might be terrible. We know what Meta's moderation track record is…
How can anyone be surprised that the people running a small house party are not keen on letting a few buses of people in?
@ploum @onepict
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
•If I hear that somebody is organizing a bunch of buses of party-goers to come to the neighborhood during my house party, is putting up a sign "this is an invite-only house party, sorry" also "gatekeeping"?
@ploum @onepict
pettter reshared this.
Xandra Granade 🏳️⚧️
•Regardless, I disagree categorically that wanting a fediverse that is safe from malicious actors like Facebook is "elitist." It honestly seems really dystopian to describe a call for safety and agency as "elitist."
Carey Lening :blobcatverified:
•As for poisoning the well, if you don't think it's gatekeeping what would you characterise it as if you were in disagreement with that position (I get that if you're pro-blocking Facebook, you assume it's on the side of the angels, but pretend you had to argue my side).
I dont' think I hate safety or agency - it's why I have zero problem with individual admins blocking FB/P92. I am mostly concerned with fallout effects if major instances go further and punish others for not doing the same and pre-emptive banning without any real evidence.
Xandra Granade 🏳️⚧️
•Similarly, I don't know how to reconcile "it's why I have zero problem with individual admins blocking FB/P92" with "Still, I think a block-first-ask-questions-later approach is a bad idea."
Xandra Granade 🏳️⚧️
•Carey Lening :blobcatverified:
•Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
•> Still, I think a block-first-ask-questions-later approach is a bad idea, and I wonder if it will do anything other than drive users away who aren’t interested in wading through these pitched battles.
…is worth asking. But jumping to conclusions like:
> [point of blocking Meta is] To ensure that only the ‘right people’ are part of the community. Screw the unwashed masses.
…is not just unnecessary, but in fact hurtful.
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
•The "gatekeeping" conclusion makes claims about intent of those making that decision. It's similar to how some (few!) on the "defederate Meta" side of this debate jump to a conclusion that any fedi admin that does not sign the Pact has to be "paid off" by Meta.
Jumping to such conclusions only makes reasoned conversation hard.
@ploum @dangillmor
silverwizard
Have you ever heard of Facebook before? They have a pretty serious track record and have been pretty important, and showing up to this debate having never heard of them and thinking they are a brand new startup is very hurtful to a lot of people.
Carey Lening :blobcatverified:
•https://dataprotection.social/@privacat/110621509323840950
Carey Lening :blobcatverified:
2023-06-28 11:04:36
silverwizard
So you approve of Meta's previous actions? And have you thought about their history of abuse, violence, and intentional harm? How does this history inform your desire to engage with their community? How does their history of power abuse and moderation disasters inform that desire?
I am trying to understand your desire to bring a serial abuser into a community, and your desire to frame it as the first mover being community action.
Carey Lening :blobcatverified:
•I have written more negative shit on Meta than I care to recall. I am _painfully_ familiar with how bad Meta has, and continues to be. Here's an example: https://careylening.substack.com/p/welcome-to-the-splinternet
My problem with a 'ban-first' approach is that I worry that in order to be effective, any bans will require secondary banning of any instance who doesn't play along. Now, there may be a technical solution here that wouldn't splinter the Fediverse, as @matthieu_xyz has pointed out (https://calckey.social/notes/9gj7tlydaw0v89bu). I am 100% for that sort of thing, because that gives everyone agency, not just a minority of admins (minority in the sense that there are like 20k servers on Masto) majority power over teh federated network.
This is why the house party examples being floated don't fly, btw.
Welcome to the Splinternet
Carey Lening (Chronicles of the Constantly Curious)silverwizard
But the community is a lot of things. And people are making decisions, for their communities. And so your issue seems to be that you don't want communities, you want one big ball of humanity mashed together? And you think that the best company to bring them in is Meta?
OK - so I am completely unconvinced by two things - and I haven't seen you address them - but I think we have at least terminology.
1) Why do all communities need to interact? We can have massive communities, and small ones, we can have lots of interaction and movement. Were you there for the times when we had to shutdown Gab and Poast? Now, Meta isn't Nazis, it just wants to steal and abuse us, and ideally would like to steal from and abuse *my* users, and I want to stop them. But it's scary to be the only one banning the Big New Instance, so we've decided to get together and show people that it will be safe to do it! Is that bad? Should we let Gab back in?
2) Why Meta? Why is Meta the organization that should do this and be allowed to do this?
Carey Lening :blobcatverified:
•https://dataprotection.social/@privacat/110622529595459640
Carey Lening :blobcatverified:
2023-06-28 15:24:04
silverwizard
Shut up and go away.
You don't like the community and you don't want it to be safe.
That's fine you're allowed to do that. But stop writing fucking articles telling us we should be harmed by facebook and that we're bad people, elitists, and gatekeepers because we think facebook is bad.
You seem to understand the contours of the problem, but just have no desire for a useful group of shared communities with their own rules.
I can't believe that you think the Fediverse is closed. It's amazing. It's baffling. You seem to think that ejecting Facebook is the same as closing the doors for people entering. Which is an unshakable assumption you have, which is baffling and obtuse, and you should stop talking until you figure out why a person might disagree with that.
Carey Lening :blobcatverified:
•Anyway, enjoy your life. I'm sticking around for now, but feel free to block me!
@ploum @dangillmor @matthieu_xyz
silverwizard
I meant shut up.
Get the fuck out of the comments
You are literally saying you don't care if people defederate and don't oppose it, so stop being the concern troll in every comment thread
If you refuse to ever make a point you defend, you're not contributing
ploum
•Writing is the best thing people can do to put order in their ideas, to find their own flaws and discover, sometimes year later, their own contradiction (at least for myself)
It seems that Carey and I have divergent views of the world but, so far, the debate has been mostly civilized and I really appreciate that she takes the time to write longer pieces.
MortSinyx likes this.
silverwizard
Every point she has been called on she had intentionally abandoned, but she has not gone back to reconsider.
It would be less frustrating if she wasn't the person appearing in every conversation.
As for my *tone*, well, I did my best to interrogate her points, and learn her side, and then when I found out it was vacuous concern trolling, I told her to stop engaging.
Davey
•Also you mention big popular servers blocking Facebook but the biggest I know of aren't doing it again. Most of
FediPact is smaller, weirder, etc.
Matthieu
•I doubt a lot of instances will actually do this though.
Davey
•> Plus, and I cannot stress this enough, not every user of Meta is a monster/racist/bigot
Of course not, and Fedi has some ghouls. The response to behaviour is the main difference I think. /1
Carey Lening :blobcatverified:
•Personally, if this leads to an elegant technical solution that achieves beneficial goals and doesn't devolve into a splintered/tribal Fedi, I am all for it.
Matthieu
•Claude Gohier
•Carey Lening :blobcatverified:
•I suspect that Masto (absent an interesting technical approach) will be a very niche service, used by a very small group of folks who share a very specific worldview. Despite the protocol being 'open' Masto may not be. For some people, that's a good thing (as I've seen some argue, would a splintered internet).
Maybe that's the new reality? I don't know. Though at that point, there's little difference between the 'open' Mastodon and the closed systems like Twitter, or Facebook. Sure it's not 'owned by a corporation', but depending on how all of this shakes out, it may be effectively managed by a small group of people who control what this 'open' platform is. That's functionally not much different than a corporation (minus the profit angle!)
ploum
•ploum
•ploum
•I suggest you ask yourself two sincere questions:
1. Why do you believe that Mastodon is more niche than you previous network? Is this just a feeling? Or hard numbers? If the later, at which point is a niche not a niche anymore?
2. Why do you believe Mastodon should change to not be a niche anymore? Is it even possible to not be a niche?
I think you have core, foundational beliefs that may not be as universal as you think.
Carey Lening :blobcatverified:
•There is less diversity (at least based on my followers). It skews far more techie, queer, and male. That said, I don't know if I would characterize Mastodon as niche currently - but as I said "I suspect that Masto ... _will_ be a very small group of folks who share a very specific worldview" -- at least if defederation is widely adopted and downstream defederation occurs. If we go to a more moderate approach, the results may vary.
Separately, there's also evidence that active users on Mastodon (and servers) are going down organically. See: https://api.joinmastodon.org/statistics and that may exacerbate the problem.
Some people, are of course, totally fine with that, and I suspect the people who are fine with that will stick around regardless, even if a splintered version of Masto exists. But I think it's hard to argue that if a schism occurs, it _wouldnt_ lead to a more niche Mastodon experience.
2. I think there are too many closed universes already (closed groups, tribes and subcultures, diametrically opposed political factions, etc. I _personally_ don't find those to be interesting or enriching. It's been my experience over the last three decades online that the more insular or hyper-specialized a group, the more It leads to echo-chambers, and sadly, extremist positions.
I _personally_ like a lot of different things, and read and listen to a lot of varied voices (and I'm forcing myself to broaden that even more since I've started writing in earnest). I try to desperately avoid absolutist positions (though I acknowledge that sometimes I fail). I try to think about systemic failures and cross-interest observations of problems. That is, IMHO, only really possible if you expose yourself to a lot of different, and sometimes disagreeable perspectives.
That isn't to say that I hang out with (or advocate condoning) nazis or fash, or TERFs, or am some sort of freezepeeches absolutist. I'm not. But I get that problems rarely have a single explanation, and when you realize that, you gain a little empathy and perspective on why black/white approaches tend to be more harm than good. Or in my case, why I can see Facebook as evil and still hold the view that the company != every user.
David Nash
•6 months ago - decided to try Mastodon, was totally fine with picking a server, but picked a largish one because I wasn't sure what small, tightly-focused server etiquette was (b/c, you know, *totally new user*)
6 days ago - have to decide if I want to move again because a significant number of people I follow might be on instances that cut off the one I'm on b/c it *might* federate w/ whatever Meta cooks up
Davey
•I've been following the broader conversation and haven't seen anyone planning to do that at the server level yet.