For anyone wondering if Threads and Facebook at large will be a fine neighbor in the space and compatible with other apps/services in the fediverse: they’re already automatically hiding comments that mention Pixelfed mastodon.social/@dansup/112126250737482807
Migrate away from instances that embrace Meta to those that do not. Choose an instance that aligns with you.
Or in the extreme case, if you’re the first who can’t find such an instance and you’re technically inclined, there’s your room for a new instance. It’s how the fediverse works and partly why Meta is so intent on destroying it.
The tooltip for fedipact says: “Agreed to block all communications (their blocklist is private)”
To me that says, they’ve agreed but it’s not confirmed that they’ve gone through with it because the blocklist is private. Blocked on the other hand says “All communications are blocked”
No, that’s not how federation works. My instance sends my content directly to everything my instance federates with. No instance takes content from other instances and sends it further - that is not a thing. I sent my content to lemmy.world and it is free to be there. Lemmy.world will not forward that to Threads.
This is a strange response for me because de-federating is an active step on behalf of its admin, usually after a vote amongst its users, at creating a virtual boundary between the two entities. How is that burying your head in the sand? And yeah, lemmy.world is big, but aside from the obvious loss of content/users, what other effect will that have on the mass of de-federated instances?
Someone correct me if I’m wrong, but my understanding is that since LW will federate with them, any content they host, will end up on meta.
For example, this discussion we’re having right now is on !technology. So it doesn’t matter whether our own instances have defederated meta - our posts and comments here will bring them value. Directly, in the form of content. And indirectly, in the form of processable data for machine learning, shadow profiles, etc.
but my understanding is that since LW will federate with them, any content they host, will end up on meta
Your understanding is wrong. Instances don’t forward stuff from other instances to other instances. Instances only send their own content directly to the instances they federate with.
@Minotaur@henfredemars@technology You are using an account on lemm.ee to reply to someone commenting from an account on infosec.pub in a community hosted on lemmy.world.
Those are all running Lemmy software, but I am replying from an account on social.goodanser.com, which is running Mastodon software.
That's federation. We're all using different service providers, sometimes even different software, but we can talk to each other because they speak the same protocol, called ActivityPub. Threads.net has announced plans to support ActivityPub and conducted some limited trials, which they're in the process of expanding. They claim they intend to support it fully, but only for users who opt in to it.
Servers can block, or "defederate from" other servers, and many have chosen to preemptively defederate from Threads.
Very interesting. Appreciate the response. Didn’t know big companies like meta had any interest in the whole “federation” gig, seeing that it seems a little “opposed” to the kind of big revenue that supports tech companies like that
But it actually isn’t, because the largest driver of growth for platforms like facebook & instagram is the already present userbase.
That userbase will always be there if the programs are all federated together, so creating a new platform is now just making a better site versus that and bringing in the userbase.
And now I’m commenting from a lemmy.world account because Lemmy from Mastodon has some rough edges like the need to tag the community in my comment above to ensure it actually reaches the lemmy.world server.
Tumblr and Flickr are also talking about ActivityPub support, but it’s not clear if or when that will actually happen. It would make more sense to me for those services since they’re fairly small and it’s a way to substantially increase the possible audience. It’s not clear what Meta’s motivations are here, though a motivation some have proposed is that they’re trying to get in front of potential regulation. The EU Digital Markets Act, for example requires some services to interoperate with competitors, and having one of its new products join an established standard protocol is a way to say “you don’t need to regulate us, we already do the thing”.
I don’t think their blocking of comments mentioning Pixelfed is intentional. Pixelfed is not popular enough for Meta to care about as a competitor, and blocking mentions of competitors has never been among their tactics.
Appreciate this response, it seems to make a lot of sense to me.
I think people on sites like Lemmy and similar can kind of uhh… overestimate how much anyone outside of a very niche crowd care about the whole “federalization” movement, and yeah it seems unlikely to me that Threads is going out of its way to shadowban a (comparatively) niche competitor like Pixelfed
I’m about 99% sure Threads uses automated spam/abuse filtering based on uncommon words present in posts that have recently been flagged as abusive. Somebody, perhaps several somebodies probably posted “follow my porn account on Pixelfed” or similar that Threads doesn’t like. I’d use something like that if I was making a huge social media thing because you can’t not at that scale.
That’s exactly why Threads is incompatible with the Fediverse. Any huge server that is impossible to moderate for admins is detrimental to the network and failure to properly moderate is the number one reason we should be looking at to defederate from instances.
Automatic “spam” protection is the exact thing which co-opted e-mail. Big corps with the largest e-mail user base use algorithms that automatically assume the worst about any small e-mail server. If you spin up a small server you are assumed to be spam unless unless unless, which ended up with e-mail being centralized in the hands of Google, Microsoft, Yahoo and Apple, despite being theoretically decentralized too.
Is that what we want for the Fediverse? 4 or 5 huge instances automatically defederating from all small instances unless they fit some criteria defined by the big corps, which they can change anytime?
Youtube was blocking comments mentioning Fediverse and ActivityPub 2 years ago way before all the exposure the Fediverse got last year. Facebook was blocking links to mastodon instances also before all that. There is absolutely no way a very specific word such as Pixelfed would be blocked “accidentally”, how do you propose such accidental block would even be possible? Oops, intern smashed his butt against a keyboard and set a filter that happened to catch Pixelfed by accident? Come on.
You need more training in corporate risk management, grasshopper! AP/AtProto isn’t a revenue opportunity, it’s a potential front for which they’ll need to have a battle-ready product and brand. Ever heard the saying ‘engagement is containment’?
It doesn’t work so well in that direction. Lemmy doesn’t have a concept of content that isn’t posted to a community. If a Mastodon post tags a Lemmy community, it’s available as a normal Lemmy post, but otherwise it doesn’t exist.
FWIW I think this is intentional and a feature, not a bug. By spreading content to communities, you can delegate moderation responsibility much easier.
Content not posted to any community would need something akin to a site-wide moderator or an admin to moderate, and such a moderator wouldn’t be as effective. They’d cover a wider array of very different content. Community moderators work better because they can define rules that are only confined to their comm and they know better how to moderate their own community and they also care more about their own community so are more motivated to keep it well-moderated in the fashion they want.
I didn’t fully understand what I was talking about when I replied, and for that I apologize. Now that I know a little bit more, this is basically how it works (I think):
We cannot see posts made directly on Mastodon. However, they can see posts made on Lemmy and even comment on them. We are able to see those comments as normal and without doing anything on our end, but again, that’s only as long as they’re made under Lemmy posts
Threads hasn’t had federation enabled until now, but you’ve always been able to interact with Mastodon… sort of. The Lemmy UI doesn’t really have a good way of finding Mastodon posts that don’t tag a Lemmy community or of following Mastodon users, but if they do tag a community the Mastodon post will show up as a Lemmy post in that community.
You’ve had some well-meaning but ultimately not quite accurate answers in this thread so just to clarify:
You can follow, post to and interact with Lemmy communities from Mastodon, because they’re treated the same way as a “group” on Mastodon in general.
You can NOT follow and interact with Mastodon users from Lemmy, because Mastodon accounts are individual “users” and Lemmy doesn’t have the concept of following and interacting with users, only with communities. If Lemmy ever does add a feature to let us follow other users, then in theory following Mastodon users will also become possible.
The UX can be awkward though. As an example, I had to add the community tag to this comment manually, as it won't federate to lemmy.world otherwise. That's because Mastodon doesn't push replies to every server with users participating in a thread, which I think is a design flaw.
To post to Lemmy from Mastodon, just tag a community. You can load any of the fediverse links shown in the default Lemmy web UI in a Mastodon search box and reply to them. You can also follow a community and receive every subsequent post and comment as a boost (this is a bad UX and I don't recommend it), as well as follow Lemmy users, which you can't do in Lemmy itself. You cannot vote on Lemmy posts/comments from Mastodon.
I find tagging an appropriate Lemmy community from my Mastodon posts to be a good experience. You'll see a few of those from my @zaktakespictures account in @birding, and from @zakreviews in @flashlight.
I'm pretty sure Lemmy won't make new toplevel posts out of this in those communities since it's a reply, but I'm going to check just to be sure.
It’s not just true, there’s a history of this mentioned in the replies to the original masto comment. Pixelfed is a direct competitor/alternative to instagram and meta’s has a pretty clear policy of not giving it any airtime on their platforms.
Why, well they dominate the instagram style platform space (and I’d guess it’s their biggest platform ATM and most prospective going forward). Twitter-style platforms are new for them and introduce monopoly issues … so they toy with the fediverse to allay potential issues.
I think all of the schmoozing the likes of Evan, Gargron etc are doing with meta (they have active accounts on Threads AFAIU, for instance) will reveal their true colours (techbro growth mindset just the hipster way) and leave them with egg on their face.
One of the cool things about the fediverse is that you are free to run your own instance with whatever rules you do or don’t want, and tell the rest of us to fuck right off.
Some instances will defederate from you depending on what those rules are, like those specific relatives we all avoid if we can at holidays, and ignore the rest of the year. They are also free to do so.
IOW, folks might tell your instance (or Meta’s) to fuck right off.
That’s what freedom looks like. It’s not supposed to be just your freedom, it’s supposed to be everyone’s freedom.
Edit: And by the way, I’m very surprised if a company scrubbing mentions of competitors from its platform isn’t a solid anti-trust violation.
each instance can do its own thing. so its very strange to see people shitting on meta for doing exactly that.
You mean scrubbing mentions of a competitor from their platform? That’s not OK, and it’s an indicator of their future behavior that is very consistent with their
this hate-boner everyone gets from the idea of meta on the 'verse is childish.
You are entitled to your opinion. (And so are the folks you think are being childish.)
Nobody is saying to shut down any instance, only that we, and others on the platform who think likewise, would like to not have to see those instances. Nobody is saying to shut down Truth Social or Pawoo or Baraag, for instance, despite having severe disagreements with those instances - we just decided, on our instances, not to federated with them. You aren’t obligated to agree with us - you can make your own instance with your own rules, as others have said, or switch to an instance accommodating to your beliefs. But at the same time, it doesn’t mean the rest of us have to listen. Think of defederation like blocking - I’m sure you have some sort of block list for trolls, spammers and bots. Same thing, but for an instance.
It still is. I think more folks percentage-wise are OK now than were then. Had the argument just yesterday. I’m not seeing nearly enough pitchforks, and it worries me.
Oh no, it was everywhere, and I got into some decent arguments with those lovely people who ask you to show them how it’s going to have any effect on the fediverse at all, complete with citations.
I’m actually quite glad about this. Currently Pixelfed is absolutely beautiful, without me having to do any blocking at all. I don’t want spammy low-key commercial posts to start showing up on it, turning me cynical and sour trying to work out who is legit on it. The whole culture of mainstream social media is based on people commodifying themselves, whereas Pixelfed is about artistic expression for its own sake. That’s my own take on it anyway. For me, Pixelfed is the best thing on the internet at the moment and I feel protective of it!
Im surprised no one has copy pasted libs of tiktok posts with info of mark zuckerberg, elon, etc to see if that breaks TOS and yell free speech and right wing censorship if the accounts are taken down
I know everyone loves having biases confirmed but we’re also not stupid, we know how the internet and evidence works. A random comment getting spam canned means almost nothing.
If this is true it’ll be incredibly easy to make a really good case for it which would be a potential news story - however I suspect that it’s just a glitch
Thank you! I thought it was but then I have been seeing toots from instances that I’m not supposed to be able to see (or so I thought) so I wasn’t so sure I understood the whole thing anymore. Also, I don’t understand the difference between defederated and fedipact 😬
Fedipact is people who’ve signed some thing pledging to never federate with threads, whereas all the other ones have just defederated them without signing the pact. In reality there’s not really any difference at all.
Thanks a lot for taking the time to reply! I apologize for having a “knot in my brain” about this. I have now had the time to read most of this whole exchange and understand better. Also I realized that what was confusing me was not on a Lemmy server. I was under the impression that the fedipact meant that my other server (Neuro different.me) will not federate with thread but will also defederate from servers who federate with Thread. But that doesn’t seem to be the case so what I don’t understand now is: if my server defederated Thread but remains federated with a server that didn’t defederate Thread… My data could still land on a Thread server?
If my server defederated Thread but remains federated with a server that didn’t defederate Thread… My data could still land on a Thread server?
if your instance defeds threads then it blocks any information being sent to threads at all so they wont receive anything that you post, not even your upvotes on posts will federate with threads.
The only case where this gets kind of weird is if you’re on an instance that federates via an allow list of approved instances instead of using the normal method of federating with everyone by default then blocking selected bad instances (the only large instance that uses this method for federation though is hexbear as far as im aware so its not really that important).
We can’t federate with something that’s completely against our ideia of “social”. I mean, meta wants a monopoly of the public space. Meta is a shopping center, the Federation ( Mastodon, Lemmy, and stuff) should be like a public square.
“We can’t federate” is not really an option… Sure, every instance can add threads to the blocked list. But to keep big corporations out of ‘our public square’ ActivityPub would have to be twisted into a grotesque version of itself.
Small businesses can individually refuse to do business with the big shopping mall -> add threads to the block list (‘defederate’ them)
The big shopping mall is not allowed to put their building at the public square -> threads is not allowed to use ActivityPub
The first statement is totally ok and a lot of instances do this. However, similar like shopping malls it can pose a challenge for small businesses to stay competitive, while categorically refusing business with the big actor. The second statement would require the towns construction committee to not give the shopping mall a license to build. However, this construction committee is a centralised power and not in the design of ActivityPub.
I do not like threads and see them as a potential threat to what we have here. Exactly because it could become harder to stay competitive while refusing them. But i don’t see much that we can actively do.
Thanks, that added some good context to your position. I think it’s a legitimate worry but I think we have a chance, unlike the shopping mall scenario.
It’s like combat, companies like this see it as necessary to take every protective step possible, they have an inferior product so manipulation is the only way to maintain their monopoly
Choosing a defederated instance might be a good idea…I just signed up here but I’ll consider it.
I could also just block the threads.net domain, no? Or would my data still get shipped off to Meta? I’m a little fuzzy on how detailed user account level federation works still.
The issue is less Facebook getting your data and more Facebook getting invited to the party when they have ruined every other party they were invited to.
We can’t really stop Facebook from peering into the window to the party, but we can slam the door in Facebook’s face when they knock and try to come in, as we should.
I could also just block the threads.net domain, no?
Nope domain blocking in Lemmy only does anything for communities. Plus blocking on Lemmy isn’t even really blocking, it’s a more extreme mute function that is deceptively called “block”.
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