#Threads is testing federation for a few selected profiles. I'm now following @mosseri! It's one-way for now, but it's exciting. It's a step towards the interoperable social web that we've been advocating for 🙂
@Gargron thank you for this. I’ve seen a lot of noise (and outrage!) today about how Meta will harvest user data from federated servers and insert advertising. I appreciate that you’ve addressed these points clearly in this blog for lay people like me to understand!
@Gargron Eugen, I know I'm not the only one who believes that Threads will become the "MEGALOVANIA of the fediverse". If it happens billions (or milliards) of people will join. Gonna follow Mossery and even you on Threads. Also you can follow me on Threads @luiscgm20
Make no mistake, this is huge for Mastodon. Currently people have to choose between X, Mastodon, and Threads, and network effects play a dominant role in that choice. If we can say, you can access all the folks that went to Threads from a Mastodon account, that makes it a far more attractive option given all of its other perks 😉
@Gargron Do you still trust meta? Their only interest is to harvest & sell user data. I am really concerned about meta creeping into our privacy. Are there any checks in place to prevent data collection?
@Gargron Ok. I’ll behave. You have to start with assuming good intentions.
If actual #interoperability appears, where Threads users can find other ActivityPub users as easily as Threads users, and #Fediverse users aren’t made to jump through hoops to get followed in there, I’m all for it.
If #Meta doesn’t send in it’s goons and exercise it’s immense monetary might to take over nonprofits and boards that decide the future of the #protocol, I’m all for it.
This is huge, especially when you consider many people, politicians & brands on #Threads will consider setting up their own instances under their own domain & connect with the rest of the #Fediverse!
Also with prominent sites using #WordPress, we could see everyone from #NASA to the #WhiteHouse join the Fediverse (pending activation of the #ActivityPub plugin).
@darnell@Gargron How does it work? Is Threads only federating with certain servers. I’m unable to follow or view any profiles or posts on Threads from my Mastodon account.
@darnell@Gargron That makes sense. Still doesn’t make sense why I can’t load those accounts through Mastodon or follow them, even though, clearly, others on my server were able to follow them.
@ramsey@darnell@Gargron
Maybe your instance admin is one of those who DNS blocked everything related to threads and therefor actively de-federated them?
@devSJR all while MS tries its hardest to break Open Document implementation standards every day of the week and changes their proprietary file format standards as much as they can, as regularly as they can, in order for LibreOffice not to work properly with them. Hope I'm wrong, though I don't think I am. @Gargron
@jt_rebelo Yes, that may be. I can also remember the time when Document Foundation developed its open format, and a short time later Microsoft came around the corner with a supposedly open format and numerous binary blobs.
We know how history will turn out. And that is precisely what I want to say with my statement. We will see how it works.
The chance for a good interaction exists. And if not? So what, then we just decouple again.
@Gargron freedom of choice is the key principle. I already blocked all Meta subnets on our pacifist mastodon instance because of the role of this company in promoting nationalism, white supremacism and even genocide in Burma, according to UN reports. I won’t block or silence communities who will act otherwise, and I hope that communities determined to keep evil companies outside of their door won’t be marginalized in the Fediverse, which is my greatest fear and an actual risk.
I just don't want Meta to scrape my posts and images that I put here.
I want nobody from Meta to read what I post here unless I choose to connect with them. And even then, I want to keep control. Which I doubt is possible.
Yes, I am on FB. But I do post very differently over there because I am aware of the total lack of privacy over there.
@Firlefanz@Gargron
What, exactly, is preventing someone from scraping your posts here right now? AFAIK public posts and comments here are just as public as anywhere on the Internet.
You know, the comments along these lines reek of white male privilege. You have nothing to fear.
You never had to think about protecting yourself. Not in the street, not in the dark, not on the internet. It shows.
I am taking steps to protect myself on the internet. Have you wondered why I use a stick horsie avatar and not a photo? Have you read about my experiences about being molested?
I find it at least problematic to invite a huge instance with little to no moderation.
@Firlefanz@Gargron
I'm unsure what in my reply triggered this. I commented about scraping, not about any other aspect of Threads federation. I'm a bit uneasy about it myself.
As for the rest; I am indeed cis, but atypical enough in other ways that I have been afraid outside. I have been assaulted for these things.
No, I did not read your posts.
Sorry if I sound off, or too direct, or unfeeling. It's hard to fix that without outside help. I'm trying to learn how, but it's a process.
I know who I am, I have been molested more than once in real life, a few times online, not something I want to repeat. Guess why I use a stick-horsie as avatar?
I don't open myself up to that on FB, I left Xitter because I don't tolerate Nazis. I really, really would like to keep Mastodon a safe space.
@Firlefanz@Gargron Can’t you just block all of Meta for your account(s)? Wouldn’t that make you effectively invisible to them?
Although I gotta tell you - if I was training an AI and wanted access to Mastodon data (not sure why given the dataset is so tiny compared to every other social media but whatever), I’d simply spin up a Mastodon instance and grab from there. Anything you post on the internet anywhere is, well, on the internet. It’s public.
But I have picked certain privacy settings here on Mastodon. I haven't allowed searching of my posts, for example. I at least want to be able to choose, you know.
And yeah, I can probably block all of Meta. That's my plan so far.
@Sonnenbrand@Gargron indeed as their data handling doesn’t comply with EU rules.
This would at least be something of a workaround for EU folk to follow Threads users (setting aside the concerns over Threads data handling for a moment)
@Gargron I hope they don't drop this support later when they see the content they're linking with is useless for their business. But it's a good way to introduce people to the fediverse. I think a lot of people are scared of it. This may make them used to it. Let's hope it's positive for everybody, and not just Meta.
@Gargron i would agree ASSUMING they actually follow thru and allow full access to thier network. Honestly I doubt they will… Read only access for a handful of accounts is not going to help much and i for one don’t trust Zuck.
@Gargron for all of us that leveraged the bird.makeup hack, to remain connected with the holdouts, do you anticipate anyone building a mapping utility that might permit Mastodon users to follow those :twitter: holdouts that finally made the move to :mastodon: or 🧵 ?
@Gargron I know who owns threads and this is all I need to know. I do not want to engage with them in any fashion. If I cannot block their interaction with mastodon I guess I will be leaving mastodon as well. If I wanted to interact with threads, facebook, meta, truth social, or any other fascist social media site I would join those sites. I am here because I do not want to be there.
This is the kind of company you're excited about working with?
There is zero chance Meta is genuinely interested in interoperability, they just want to take over control of whatever community the Fediverse has built up. As Meta's CEO said, people who trust him are "stupid f**ks".
@feditips@Gargron Threads is going to lay in ActivityPub support whether we like it or not, because the EU won’t let them stay in business there if they don’t. That ship has sailed; nothing we do here can change that.
What instance admins can do here is block Threads. If they do, they’d also block Threads users from…easily moving to their friendly neighborhood Mastodon host.
Who would that help, and more importantly, who would that hurt?
@feditips@Gargron Yet. New things get rolled into old things in stages, that’s just normal IT development cadence. The whole point of the APub deal with the EU was that antitrust claims would be set aside if Meta tears down their walls and lets their users exit with their social graph. If they don’t fulfill that part of the bargain, they lose their ability to operate in the EU, yes?
@Gargron I think this is great. This is what fediverse is about: federating instances. Worst case is that we have a big new shitty instance, so we have everything to win and nothing to lose.
@Gargron As #meta federation approaches actuality, I’m feeling more nervous and skeptical that there will be any way to protect ourselves from an onslaught of commercialization and or bot-filled infiltration. Maybe paranoia, but it’s concerning.
@cedric@Gargron If it doesn't mean losing any of their friends, more will likely move over to the fediverse. Twitter API used to make it possible to mirror your account to Twitter and back and no one viewed that as a sell out move
You always have the option of muting or blocking the instance, just like you do with any other instance. Personally, I’m excited to follow and interact with the people I want to from here in a client and using a platform I love, without having to head “over there.”
Totally get it. But if it helps, I think Meta sees a few things going on. 1) decentralization is the future and they know the walled gardens are going to come down, so they are betting on making their clients and algos a way that most people will want to introduce and participate in that. They aren’t after those of us here to avoid that. 2) I love Mastodon but it’s not the big fish. But WordPress is huge for them. And giving creators the ability to interact with followers from Wordpress is a big deal. 3) Threads could also be a test for opening IG to AP and giving their creators there, who are truly committed to that platform, greater reach (something Tik Tok, for example, doesn’t have).
@Gargron@mosseri Nope, nope, nope. I have an Instagram account and often get bombarded with Threads — see who you know etc. crap from there. I refuse to download it!!!
Meta is going to do embrace, extend and extinguish on ActivityPub (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguish) as they did with XMPP.
It would be nice if you implemented a way to easily block them into Mastodon admin interface, but it's also evident you won't, last but not least because of what you've written in the first post of this thread, and the fact you mentioned @mosseri in it.
So we need, in spite of you, to share knowledge on how to do that other ways on any already ActivityPub federated platform (Mastodon, Pleroma, Pixelfed, PeerTube and so on).
CC: @vantablack@FediPact --- @cwebber@evan (the latter 2 contributed defining the ActivityPub protocol)
@Gargron@mosseri
I don't like how it's only one way. This feels more like them advertising by setting up the equivalent of a Twitter relay, rather than actually federating.
Still going to set up an account there, just so I can have a presence if it does take off, but really, I'm all in on Fediverse at this point.
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