Does anyone know if a graphic or animation was made to visualize a consent-based network or communal #fedifam#freefediverse network to help visualize this concept? I want to make one, but I wanted to see first if it already exists! @ophiocephalic@thenexusofprivacy maybe you all would know?
"Meta's fediverses", federating with Meta to allow communications, potentially using services from Meta such as automated moderation or ad targeting, and potentially harvesting data on Meta's behalf.
"free fediverses" that reject Meta – and surveillance capitalism more generally
The free fediverses have a lot of advantages over Meta and Meta's fediverses, some of which will be very hard to counter, and clearly have enough critical mass that they'll be just fine.
Here's a set of strategies for the free fediverses to provide a viable alternative to surveillance capitalism. They build on the strengths of today's fediverse at its best – including natural advantages the free fediverses have that Threads and Meta's fediverses will having a very hard time countering – but also are hopefully candid about weaknesses that need to be addressed. It's a long list, so I'll be spreading out over multiple posts; this post currently goes into detail on the first two.
Opposition to Meta and surveillance capitalism is an appealing position. Highlight it!
Focus on consent (including consent-based federation), privacy, and safety
Emphasize "networked communities"
Support concentric federations of instances and communities
Consider "transitively defederating" Meta's fediverses (as well as defederating Threads)
Consider working with people and instances in Meta's fediverses (and Bluesky, Dreamwidth, and other social networks) whose goals and values align with the free fediverses'
Build a sustainable ecosystem
Prepare for Meta's (and their allies') attempts to paint the free fediverses in a bad light
Reduce the dependency on Mastodon
Prioritize accessibility, which is a huge opportunity
Commit to anti-fascist, anti-racist, anti-colonial, and pro-LGBTQIA2S+ principles, policies, practices, and norms for the free fediverses
We have recently been advocating the activation of a function which is present but usually off in Mastodon and other fedi services called Authorized Fetch. As we plead with the major development projects to take safety more seriously and make it a default, we have learned that Meta itself didn't think twice about it and has activated it in their own ActivityPub implementation against us.
We know this because of news that a fascist has devised a way to evade it and force federation with Threads. They promise to then turn their technique upon us and coerce unblockable federation with fascist and cryptospam instances: https://soapbox.pub/blog/threads-server-blocking/
While Authorized Fetch remains important to activate, it is clear that even it - which remember, provides better defense than that currently implemented on most of our home servers - is inadequate to the threats facing us as the Zuckerberg incursion progresses. If we're serious about protecting our communities and expressions from absorption into surveillance capitalism and the accelerating miseries of fascism, we need to talk about a stronger grade of defensive weaponry.
To this end, @are0h has fired a first volley: https://h-i.social/@are0h/111653850819592308 Every fedi community which serves as a refuge for those targeted and under siege should be thinking like this. True safety only awaits us in a transitive approach to defederation, and further on, in an intentional federation based on the allow-list.
We accept and support new spinups by fellow travelers were are already in community with. The servers which entirely come in from the cold are mostly those belonging to the creatures of the dark-fedi, which cause many of the moderation problems for those of us on proportionately-sized instances (and most of the other problems are caused by the disproportionately-sized ones, who will be joining the Zuckerverse).
By assuming agency for who we choose to federate with, rather than existing in a state of constant reaction against those who would try and force us to federate with them, we can defend our federation both from the fascists, racists, transphobes and pedos of the defediverse, and from the horrifying and corruptive threat of the Zuckerberg entity, and its collaborator instances.
A note also on the gaslighting we face from Meta's colluders; the latest being the embarrassing spectacle of ActivityPub co-author Evan wagging around a "small fedi". @thenexusofprivacy has a good rebuttal to this cringe exhibitionism here: https://privacy.thenexus.today/the-annotated-case-for-a-big-fedi/
Evan has seen fit to misappropriate the "small fedi" idea, then build a blog post around warping it into a smear, with a long list of patronizing and fictional mischaracterizations. But what is truly small is the thinking that the fedi's future is surveillance, algorithmic ingestion, centralized servers too big to moderate, and huge psychotic corporations like Meta. In fact, that is social media's catastrophic past, the one we're all here to reject.
An intentional federation would be a more decentralized one, as we could fully affirm a collective choice to keep instances small. That's not just an abstract idea; a more decentralized fedi would be a more democratic one: https://kolektiva.social/@ophiocephalic/110707707012210965
And it would also be a more community-centered one. Currently, the Mastodon network in particular is being driven by an approach which denies the prospect for a riotous polyculture of small and distinct communities in favor of a growth-oriented monoculture in which "servers are not... communities" ( https://mastodon.social/@Gargron/111628882009671820 ) and "it doesn't matter which one you use" ( https://www.theverge.com/23658648/mastodon-ceo-twitter-interview-elon-musk-twitter ), an outlook which Zuckerberg must find favorable.
A better vision for a near-future fedi requires an exercise of both the technical and social imagination, and another thing that Meta's collaborators appear to find elusive: a moral center.
Instead of a regression into another Zuckerberg-controlled nightmare of hate speech, harassment, "brand engagement" and dehumanizing surveillance, we can push forward into an intentional federation based on consent and community, which centers the non-negotiable requirement of safety for everyone who otherwise has the most to lose from the betrayal of this online space of refuge and resistance.
The notes and accounts from the FediForum in late September suggest that some of "the people who move the fediverse forward", as the conference promotes itself as platforming, are also acutely interested in moving forward the agenda of Meta.
The forum's notes tell the tale. Though a number of topics, including many of genuine benefit, were touched upon, digging through the sessions turns up a path of breadcrumbs that leads straight back to Palo Alto.
The blocklist system IFTAS proposes is called CARIAD - "Consensus Aggregated Retractable IFTAS Allowlist Denylist".
CARIAD's blocking data will be aggregated from two sources. The first is the Facebook Mafia spider-holed at Stanford, which fabricated the CSAM-scare influence operation that roiled the fedi a few months ago. More on them here: https://kolektiva.social/@ophiocephalic/110772380949893619
The second is "an aggregation of at least ten of the largest ActivityPub service providers"; this would seem to be a sugar pill to win over Mastodon gGmbH and a few other megaservers.
The system itself is somewhat similar to that proposed in the Nivenly FSEP plan which has proven so controversial over the last couple of months; except that, instead of centralizing blocklist control with WelshPixie, CARIAD centralizes control with Meta-linked authoritarian techbros.
Observing fedi-folk from various marginalized communities snipe at each other over the past week has been devastating and tragic. No conspiracy theory here, but if there were some nefarious plot to weaken the fediverse, provoking a conflict like this one would be an effective way to go about it.
The purpose of this post isn't to further stir the shit. But it's worth taking a look at origins, alternatives and possible consequences in light of the ongoing threat of authoritarian and capitalist recuperation looming over the fedi.
For those interested in the prefiguration of dual power, there is a perfect opportunity right under our noses - the fediverse. Moreover, such praxis may not be so much of a choice, as a necessity. The forces of authoritarian and capitalist recuperation are coming for this network.
So far, it remains largely out of the control radius of corporations, government security services and the fascists poisoning every other online environment. But there are well-resourced elements both without and within working to change that.
Consider the contrast with major capitalist services. This recent story explains how the "U.S." government has attempted to extort a price from TikTok in exchange for allowing it continued operation in the country - its conversion into a domestic mass surveillance tool under the control of state security and military agencies.
A Free Fediverse beyond surveillance capitalism should prioritize deepening its commitment to decentralization by keeping the maximum user count of its instances small.
This addresses practical needs. Smaller communities are easier to moderate, on a human scale which doesn't involve algorithms or invasive third-party data collection. Smaller communities disperse targets for threat models like spambots, and enhance network resilience. And smaller communities are better at scaling democracy, so that we can avoid being pulled back into the circumstance now plaguing the fediverse of mega-server admins unilaterally imposing their will on everyone else.
However, keeping things small can result in problems of its own. Smaller communities means more people grappling with the complexities of trying to set up, administer, moderate, and - not to mention - fund operations. A system of mutual aid, beyond the current haphazard status quo, is required.
As an approach to solving these problems, and to instilling a ethos of solidarity devoid of the for-profit "monetization" impulse, consider the concept of the fedifam. :fediverso: 👩👩👧
Yes, there was a fuckup; in fact, a fuckup compounded by another fuckup. But the wellspring of the disaster actually wasn't Kolektiva, it was mastodon-dot-social, that mega-server with hundreds of thousands of silo'ed users, open registration and next-to-no-moderation; that irresistible honeypot for spammers and scammers, that 500-pound gorilla with a bullseye painted on its ass.
Zuckerberg is not just absorbing certain of the fediverse's communities, but also certain of its technologies. We'll need replacements, but that's an opportunity to break the current state of developmental stagnation in the predominant microblogging service and ActivityPub. And more important still than protocols and apps are those who create them. Essentially, the Facebook Fediverse gets the techbros, but the Free Fediverse gets the catgirls - which means we win!
Prominent voices advocating for collaboration with the Zuckerberg surveillance entity sure do talk up decentralization a lot, when they're not advocating the subjugation of the fediverse to a single vertical silo of 100 million users. The irony, of course, is that they tend to be admins of instances with tens or even hundreds of thousands. And two of the most prominent control multiple mega-servers, which means they're not just overseeing centralized instances, they're hoarding them.
In contrast, by default Pixelfed servers are limited to a maximum of 1000 users. Though a deep dive into the parameters can override this, its status as a default is an affirmation of the decentralizing ethos. "Thou shalt keep thy instance small."
The microblogging space of the fediverse hasn't been allowed to develop an equivalent consciousness, as the agenda has been set by mega-server admins who drove the conversation around topics like "smooth onboarding". But these aren't evil people; the problem is that they have no real vision.
A comment circulated recently - receipt unfortunately not saved - suggesting that the development of fediverse tools to useful to organizing community would be an effective alternative to the "how to funnel in granny" mentality, because then there would be incentives for entire communities to migrate in together; surely a more holistic view of "onboarding" than fretting over how to pick up confused and wandering individuals one at a time. That is the kind of exercise of technical and social imagination we need.
To become viable, the Free Fediverse will need to define itself by not just what it stands against - corporate enclosure by the Meta monstrosity - but by what it stands for. Real and actual decentralization - not just shallow lip service towards it - can be one of those foundational values.
This value can then be encoded into the technology, as it was with Pixelfed; because, let there be no doubt, Zuckerberg is not just absorbing certain of the fediverse's communities, but also certain of its technologies. We'll need replacements, but that's an opportunity to break the current state of developmental stagnation in the predominant microblogging service and ActivityPub. And more important still than protocols and apps are those who create them. Essentially, the Facebook Fediverse gets the techbros, but the Free Fediverse gets the catgirls - which means we win!
Real decentralization - lots and lots and lots of quite small communities, distinct yet federated - has already proven itself to be a better facilitator of good moderation, and will enable another important value to be addressed shortly. But on the moderation issue, a timely real-world example of why decentralization matters is instructive.
There has recently been a calamity visited upon our instance, Kolektiva. Among all of the discussion following its disclosure, there was not a full analysis of its chain of causality. Let's take a flyover of the recent timeline.
April - A massive spambot wave first hits mastodon-dot-social, then spreads quickly through the entire fediverse. Kolektiva, and many other servers, temporarily limit dot-social until the invasion is under control.
Early May - Another spambot attack hits masto-dot-social, and of course, everyone else. This time, an error is made, and a Kolektiva admin defederates rather than limits dot-social. All Kolektiva users irrecoverably lose their follows and followers from dot-social. There is disquiet.
Mid-May - In an attempt to restore the lost follow-follower data, a Kolektiva admin recovers a snapshot backup of the database from before the defederation, an operation which occurs with what turns out to be "spectacularly bad timing".
Yes, there was a fuckup; in fact, a fuckup compounded by another fuckup. But - beyond noting that both mistakes were attempts to do right by the users of the instance - the wellspring of the disaster actually wasn't Kolektiva, but mastodon-dot-social, that mega-server with hundreds of thousands of silo'ed users, open registration and next-to-no-moderation; that irresistible honeypot for spammers and scammers, that 500-pound gorilla with a bullseye painted on its ass.
The mother of all instances has repeatedly proven itself to be a problem for the rest of the fediverse, as in the examples above, when the admins of literally every other server federated with it were put in the position of having to locally address a crisis not of their origination, each an opportunity to make mistakes they would not otherwise have needed to risk.
Smaller instances are easier to moderate, larger instances more difficult. And if masto-dot-social is any indication, a large enough instance becomes a lost cause - take a look at dot-social's local feed and see if you agree. Decentralization distributes moderation agency more effectively, both to admins and even to users. And by scattering targets, it creates network resiliency against threats like spambots and crypto scams. Decentralization isn't just a foss-nerd buzzword, it yields tangible benefits for those seeking safer community online.
great collection of resources, writing, etc for supporters of a Fedi that's free from the clutches of surveillance capitalists. Thanks to @ophiocephalic for putting it together :)
Those who advocate for the surrender of the fediverse to the Zuckerberg surveillance entity have been busy mischaracterizing adherents of the FediPact alliance in various ways. More needs to be said about this, but for the moment, let's unpack one of their more persistent slurs, the claim that we are "gatekeeping".
The term itself is one they have inherited from Silicon Valley crypto-fascist propertarians who, themselves, have seized power by overseeing the construction of a number of rigidly gatekept "walled gardens"; and the corporation they are so eager to collaborate with and invite in to colonize the fediverse is one of the most draconian of those gatekeepers.
But why accept this metaphorical territory on which to battle? Beyond the "walled gardens" and "marketplace of ideas" of neoliberalism, anarchist thought provides an alternative lens for viewing the predicament - the ZAD.
Within the Zone To Defend - the acronym derives from the French equivalent - there is safety, autonomy, solidarity, and yes, real freedom - freedom to express and freedom from the poisoned expressions of those who seek to weaponize speech to declare others inferior, excluded, and unworthy of existence.
However, as often when ideal meets reality, a contradiction is encountered. The presence of a "zone" infers the dialectical presence of space which is not the zone. Ultimately, our autonomous zone is one we would like to see grow to be boundless, which would be the fulfillment of its natural condition.
But provisionally at least, our zone is situated in the world as it currently is; a world in which we are surrounded by enemies on all sides. We do not ourselves choose the boundaries, but we acknowledge them, as we must. Unhappily, the Zone To Defend is bounded, and at the boundaries, we make our stand.
The defense of the zone is necessary, not just to guard the terrain, but more importantly, to defend the souls who have taken refuge and find community within it. This is a conviction the Meta collaborators don't appear to be able to grasp. They hunker down in the topography of protocols and MAU analytics, unable to catch sight of the actual people nestled in its hills and valleys.
In fact, the boundaries of the ZAD are not calculated, but rather emerge spontaneously from the defensive needs of those within. Their struggles, traumas, defeats and victories form the positions, shapes and composition of the barricades. Those who point this out are sneered at; as in, for example, the recent blog post of a prominent mega-instance admin and pro-Meta activist, who rolled his eyes at the "almost religious overtones" of our argument. Speak of people rather than protocols, and one will be waved off as a woo-dazed fanatic.
The communards of the Zone To Defend don't want to live in a bounded world, but they have to. And certainly, there is no interest in swinging open the gate now, as they observe the approach of perhaps the most dangerous of enemies - a totalitarian empire which has claimed its power by enabling and profiting from exactly those elements and forces which the ZAD exists to shelter them against.
Sorry Zuckerbros, but we will be keeping our gates.
Announcing Free Fediverse, a website resource for all of us fighting to save our communities from absorption into surveillance capitalism!
There are lots of stories, thinkpieces, links and statements flying around and disappearing quickly, and it would be handy to have a place to store and reference them all. Free Fediverse is that place.
Free Fediverse is a wiki-based site linking to resources of the following categories:
Links to and information on the FediPact
Essays on the Meta threat to the Fediverse
Articles on P92 in mainstream media outlets
Announcements from instance admins on joining the pact
Links and information for development projects beyond corporate enclosure
Articles on Meta's many crimes against humanity
Free Fediverse will continue to be updated. Just hit me up to suggest a link for any category. More links to FediPact instance statements are very welcome!
The website has no ads, trackers or analytics. Ferdi the Free Fediverse Froggy sez "hop on over!"
For anyone mobilizing to defend their own account, the fedi community they administer, or the entire fediverse against the Zuckerberg incursion now underway, the Free Fediverse website has a plethora of links to helpful resources.
🐸 FediPact: Info on the pact and how to find an instance you can trust
🐸 Developments: Information on blocking Meta, account migration, and authorized fetch
🐸 Articles: An ongoing history of the Meta scheme to take over the fedi
🐸 Essays: Thinkpieces on the threat and how to save the fediverse from corporate enclosure
🐸 Nightmares: Tons of articles on Meta's many crimes against humanity
The most enraging of the Zuckerbros is actually Gargron, exactly because he's so quiet. Say what you will about the others, they're at least in the discourse. About the only thing Gargron tooted on the day of the NDA betrayal was a snap from a concert he attended. The federation is burning because of him, but he's having a ball.
It's a complete failure of leadership - and he has claimed leadership, even calling himself a "benevolent dictator". But there's actually no such thing, and these techbros who talk up decentralization, while sneaking around with a corporation which has spent 15 years trying to singularly enclose the internet, have ceded their claim to lead.
However, this is actually a golden opportunity for the fediverse to route around the damage of these Mastodon megaservers. What galls most is the spectacle of 3 mediocre white guys unilaterally deciding the destiny of hundreds of thousands, extolling the virtues of open standards and interoperability while dragging everyone else in the community around by the hair.
We don't need "new leaders", what we need is to horizontally distribute leadership so that everyone has some of it, and all network participants possess agency and an active stake in their own community.
Some have waved away the Anti-Meta Pact, noting that most of the participating instances are very small. That's not a bug, it's a feature. It's exactly what the fediverse should become - a network of countless small communities, distinct yet together. By default, Pixelfed limits instance user count to 1000. It's a good idea, and whatever we replace Mastodon with should implement something similar.
The #FreeFediverse will look back some day and see the megaservers, and the Zuckerbros that dominated them, as a aberration on the path to actual decentralization and democratization.
Congressional Report Finds Meta and Tax Prep Companies “Recklessly” Shared Taxpayers’ Data – The Markup (themarkup.org)
I swear, almost every single day there is a new piece on how terrible this company is.
Meta cut election teams months before Threads launch, raising concerns for 2024 | CNN Business (www.cnn.com)
Keep in mind, this company had 23 Billion dollars in profits in 2022:...
FediPact gets a mention on the BBC! (article titled Threads: Meta sets out planned new features) (www.bbc.com)
Nice to see the Pact getting a little bit of press :)...
FreeFediverse.org wiki <3 (freefediverse.org)
great collection of resources, writing, etc for supporters of a Fedi that's free from the clutches of surveillance capitalists. Thanks to @ophiocephalic for putting it together :)