@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

ophiocephalic

@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social

Do you like my selfie? Let's build the commune!

Towards a Free Fediverse beyond capitalist enclosure and the growth-at-all-costs pathology #FreeFediverse #FediPact #DefederateMeta

Selfie alt-text: A friendly tree frog hangs out on a rock, while sporting a lovely hairdo comprised of two snails, one on each side of his head

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.

atomicpoet, to internet

Advocates of Fediblocking need to learn lessons from the when talk of Fediblock was also en vogue.

To review:

  1. Despite hosting Twitter employees, a mass Fediblock on macaw.social didn’t happen

  2. Despite being run by a for-profit corporation, a mass Fediblock on vivaldi.social didn’t happen

  3. Despite being run by cryptobros, a mass Fediblock on mastodon.cloud and mstdn.jp didn’t happen

  4. Despite being run by a walled garden and hosting two Twitter co-founders, a mass Fediblock on me.dm didn’t happen

  5. Despite being funded by VCs (including Marc Bernioff), a mass Fediblock on moth.social didn’t happen

So why do you all think the Fediverse will come together to block ?

And until mastodon.social and mastodon.online announce that Barcelona is Fediblocked, any notion of it happening is wishful thinking.

So Barcelona is coming. We need to brace for impact. And we need to be strategic in our response.

ophiocephalic,
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

@atomicpoet
"So Barcelona is coming. We need to brace for impact. And we need to be strategic in our response."

In that case, what is also coming is a schism. Then there will be a which carries on the banner of independence and decentralization, and a which acquiesces to being recentralized and data-mined.

None of these other examples you cite comes remotely close to the gravity of a Zuckerberg takeover. The historical example to point to is not Medium or Vivaldi, it's Gab

ophiocephalic,
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

@atomicpoet
The pro-Zuck contingent isn't paying attention to the intensity of our determination to avoid being assimilated by the borg. It's ironic, because said contingent seems to be mostly concerned with numbers, metrics, "growth". What we are concerned with is community, freedom and survival.

Another thing I'll point out in response to your curt dismissal. One can detect a certain demographic slant to the pro-Zuck crowd. I won't kick the hornet's nest any harder than that, except to note that ppl in marginalized communities have the most to lose in a Meta takeover and are the most adamant about opting out of it. Something to keep in mind as you wave off this perspective as insignificant

atomicpoet, to internet

Point blank, a mass Fediblock isn't going to work with .

The cold truth is that people will use whether it federates or not. Even if it fails, Barcelona will probably have more users out of the gate than almost every project save Mastodon. Hell, it will probably eclipse too.

And even if you convince every server to defederate -- which you won't -- this will not be a PR coup for the Fediverse. Newspaper headlines won't blare "Fediverse successfully resists Meta." Instead, they will probably follow @gruber take with "Open source zealots complain that an open protocol is open."

Again, as I've said countless times, I'm not saying you should federate with Barcelona or any Meta-owned property. If you want, defederate. The joy of the Fediverse is freedom of association.

But a mass Fediblock doesn't solve a few important problems with Meta, and perhaps makes them worse.

The most critical problem is that Meta users need to migrate away from Meta-owned social networks. Until now, a migration path has simply been unfeasible to most. But when Barcelona gets launched, it is possible that many of them will become aware of a greater Fediverse.

How to build that awareness? By interacting with them through services beyond Barcelona.

This approach works. I've interacted with many Mastodon users through services beyond Mastodon, and this has resulted in adoption of other Fediverse software. is a case in point.

However, there's a bigger problem concerning Meta: Fediverse replacements for Meta-owned social networks aren't getting mass adoption. And it's not because these apps aren't good.

is an replacement. It is also one of the slickest apps on the Fediverse. Yet, Pixelfed only has 150,000 registered accounts.

is a replacement. It's been around since 2010. It is a mature product that does many things very well, but Friendica only has 17,000 registered accounts.

The software is great but we are failing to effectively market the Fediverse beyond Mastodon. Now I'm trying my darnedest to change this, and so are many people. But facts are facts. Fediverse alternatives to Meta are a blip on the radar.

Refusing to federate with Barcelona won't change this. How do I know?

Because we don't federate now, and the status quo remains intact.

Meanwhile, Meta is practically gifting Pixelfed and Friendica an opportunity for federation, and it would be foolish to not consider broader implications.

How is it that more people aren't considering this opportunity?

Dare I say that most people -- including devs -- suffer from myopia concerning what the Fediverse is. The Fediverse is not Mastodon, and it is wrong to view the Fediverse solely through the eyes of Mastodon.

And I'll go further: by focusing Barcelona on text, I suspect that Meta is likewise making the same mistake of viewing the Fediverse as a "Twitter killer".

What they may not be considering is that the Fediverse might be a "Meta killer" too. And connecting Barcelona to the Fediverse is opening a can of worms Meta hasn't entirely considered yet.

If Barcelona is indeed text-based, what will happen when a Barcelona user encounters Pixelfed and asks, "Why does this post show reels? And why can't I do the same?"

Believe me, this is the kind of content that triggers migration.

We need to think bigger than Fediblock. Yes, for your own mental health and safety, you may not want to federate with Barcelona. However, there needs to also be a means for Barcelona users to encounter content outside Barcelona.

Perhaps there needs to be "lobby" servers that help Barcelona users enter the greater Fediverse -- helping them make the switch beyond Meta.

ophiocephalic,
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

@atomicpoet
"The most critical problem is that Meta users need to migrate away from Meta-owned social networks"

Disagree. No one appointed us to be the saviors of the lost souls of Meta. The fediverse should collectively be concerned with its own survival. And individually, many of us are concerned with the integrity of our own communications, which we refuse to allow Zuckerberg to assimilate for surveillance and AI ingestion.

ophiocephalic,
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

@atomicpoet
But a Meta takeover won't result in the fediverse replacing it, it will result in the fediverse being replaced by Big Social

ophiocephalic,
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

@atomicpoet
Respectfully, I don't think this is a clear view of the situation. The power dynamic is much, much more asymmetrical than this would suggest. Unless we stand together in opposition, ActivityPub is about to become Zuckerberg's private property

ophiocephalic,
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

@FeralRobots @atomicpoet
Except that I have yet to see any tangible explanation of how exactly it would happen that assimilation into the Zuckerberg surveillance system will somehow result in people migrating to the fediverse

ophiocephalic,
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

@atomicpoet @FeralRobots
We agree on this principle - which is why it will be a disaster if Zuckerberg is allowed to take over this protocol and its network. But we can route around this damage by blocking him

ophiocephalic,
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

@atomicpoet @FeralRobots
I know I don't have to remind you of embrace-extend-extinguish. In other news, I'm losing the ability to communicate with clients because emails from my own domain are being rejected by Gmail servers. Monopolists turn open protocols into closed ones

tchambers, to fediversenews

This seems very important and worth ongoing study:

“Once again, results suggest a rise in diversity as the 10 biggest server contribution to the Fediverse is reduced by more than 10%. So, even if the biggest servers are accumulating more users, it seems that the Fediverse is becoming more decentralized.”

@fediversereport @spreadmastodon @fediversenews

https://socialhub.activitypub.rocks/t/analysis-of-fediverse-diversity-in-terms-of-decentralization/3252

ophiocephalic,
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

@tchambers @fediversereport @spreadmastodon @fediversenews
Increased decentralization is great news; however, unless we all agree together to , the fediverse is about to become massively centralized, and mostly the private property of Mark Zuckerberg

ophiocephalic,
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

@tchambers @fediversereport @spreadmastodon @fediversenews
Thanks for your response. Yes, this is an issue that requires much more conversation and thinking ahead.

I would respectfully suggest that everyone disinclined to block Meta pay attention to the intensity of determination of others of us to prevent our expressions from being absorbed by them. We are defederating. And to avoid our toots being siphoned up into his machine for surveillance and AI ingestion, we will need to defederate with every other instance that doesn't. The community as it exists today will shatter, and Zuck will have been allowed to destroy the fediverse. The only way to avoid this grim scenario is to treat Meta as another Gab, and unify in our rejection.

Meta is a bigger threat to the federation than any fascist instance; the fediverse has never faced a more extreme situation.

ophiocephalic,
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

@mathias @tchambers @jupiter_rowland @spreadmastodon
Appreciate the attention to detail but wonder if this discussion got a bit lost in the weeds. No one wants a whitelist-only or Mastodon-only fediverse. What we are advocating for now is for us all to respond to Meta as we do to fascist/toxic instances. The technical details of implementing a schism are far less important that the big question - can we avoid it completely, and don't we want to?

ophiocephalic,
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

@tchambers @mathias @jupiter_rowland @spreadmastodon

Agree that we need more info. But skeptical on the prospect of a mass migration opportunity. It's highly unlikely Barcelona will provide account migration functionality. Theirs is a business model of enclosure and extraction, with zero incentive to provide captured users a means of escape.

Also suggest checking out this blog post by https://social.coop/@J12t , which speculates on a partial, extractive ingest-only federation. Considering the stakes and who we're talking about, it's not unwarranted to consider worst-case scenarios

https://social.coop/@J12t/110433521145084697

rolle, (edited ) to internet
@rolle@mementomori.social avatar

If Facebook and Instagram were to join the Fediverse and you could follow users from that world from your instance, would you do it?

Boosts appreciated. I'd like to know the current consensus of the Fediverse.

ophiocephalic,
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

@rolle
Meta is cancer. It will destroy the fediverse and it's worrying to see how many here don't realize that. Fediblock with extreme prejudice

ophiocephalic,
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

@smallpatatas @rolle
Honestly, I'm fine with a schism. We no longer enjoy the luxury of worrying about numbers or "reach". The radical bloc can split off, save part of the community and defederate with every instance that has no problem being assimilated by the borg

aral, to ai
@aral@mastodon.ar.al avatar

You steal one person’s labour and they call you a criminal. You steal everyone’s labour and they call you AI.

ophiocephalic,
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

@aral
"Numbers sanctify." - Charlie Chaplin. Charlie was talking about the difference in perception of a "murderer" who kills a few, and a "politician" who kills thousands; but you've hit on an equivalent for capitalists

info_activism, to random
@info_activism@mastodon.cc avatar

Our face has a unique set of data measurements -such as the width of your nose & the distance between your eyes- called a faceprint. Facial recognition tech is everywhere. But, do you know how it works & what can be done with the information collected? https://theglassroom.org/en/what-the-future-wants/exhibits/the-real-life-of-your-selfie-wtfw

ophiocephalic,
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

@earthworm @aral @info_activism
You will find this of interest: http://sandlab.cs.uchicago.edu/fawkes/

scy, (edited ) to random
@scy@chaos.social avatar

So @element took part in the European Police Congress in Berlin, had a booth and presentation there, and is proudly posting on the fedi about it.

https://mastodon.matrix.org/@element/110304013472307767
https://mastodon.matrix.org/@element/110310853505977058

I’m currently paying them $11.90 a month to host my homeserver on their EMS platform.

My payment in April will have been the last.

It’s one thing to provide FLOSS comms to the government. It’s another to proudly support our fucked up police system.

ophiocephalic,
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

@scy @element
Police abolitionist here. This is of course repulsive, and not the first unsettling signal sent by Element. That said, one wonders if there's a strategic aspect to this gambit of theirs. Reactionary elements in the US, UK and EU governments are again coming for encryption. Element may be thinking that the more intelligence and law enforcement agencies are reliant on their tech, the better argument they have against this legislation. But this all presumes against a technical bifurcation in which the state gets real encryption and the rest of us get backdoors

ophiocephalic,
@ophiocephalic@kolektiva.social avatar

@scy
I think the argument would be more about government and law enforcement's ability to defend against other states or malicious actors, not themselves

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