Context
There have been a lot of posts and comments recently about Facebook entering the fediverse, and how different instances will handle it. Many people have asked me to commit to pre-emptively defederating from Threads before they even implement ActivityPub.
The lemm.ee federation policy states that it’s not a goal for lemm.ee to curate content for our users, but we will certainly defederate any server which aims to systematically break our rules. I want to point out here that Facebook makes essentially all of its money from advertising, and lemm.ee has a no advertising rule - basically, Facebook has a built-in financial incentive to break our rules. ActivityPub has no protections against advertising, so it’s likely we will end up having to eventually defederate from Threads just for this reason alone.
However, I would still like to get a feel for how many people in our instance are actually excited for potential federation with Threads. While personally I feel that any theoretical pros are by far outweighed by cons, I do want to use this opportunity to see how much of the community disagrees with me. I am not intending to run this instance as a democracy (sorry if anybody is disappointed by that), but I would still like to have a clear picture of user feedback for potentially major decisions such as this one. This is why I am asking every user who wants lemm.ee to federate with Facebook to please downvote this post.
Here are some reasons why I personally believe that Threads will have a negative effect on the fediverse
- As mentioned above, Facebook is completely driven by ad revenue. There is nothing stopping them from sending out ads as posts/comments with artificially inflated scores, which would ensure that their ads end up on the “all” page of federated servers.
- Threads already has more users than all Lemmy instances combined. Even if their algorithms don’t apply to the rest of the fediverse directly, they can still completely dictate what the “all” page will look like for all instances by simply controlling what their own users see and vote on.
- Moderation does not seem to be a priority for Threads so far, meaning that they would create massive moderation workloads for smaller instances.
- In general, Facebook has shown countless times that they don’t have their users best interests in mind. They view users as something to exploit for revenue. There are probably ways they are already thinking about hurting the fediverse that we can’t even imagine yet.
By the way, we’re not really in any rush today with our decision regarding federation
- Threads does not have ActivityPub support yet today
- Even if they add ActivityPub support, their UX is geared towards Mastodon-like usage - it seems unlikely that there would ever be proper interoperability between Threads and Lemmy
- We don’t really know what to defederate from - it’s completely possible that “threads.net” will not be their ActivityPub domain at all.
So go ahead and downvote if you feel defederation would be a mistake, and feel free to share your thoughts in the comments! It would be super helpful to me if folks who are in favor of federating with Threads could leave a comment explaining their reasoning.
Update:
By now, it’s clear that there is a group of users who are in favor of federating with Threads. The breakdown is like this (based on downvotes):
- lemm.ee users: 136 in favor of federating with Threads
- Others: 288 in favor of federating with Threads
While it seems to be a minority, it’s still quite a few users. There is no way to please all users in this situation - any decision I make will certainly inconvenience some of you, and I apologize for that.
A big thanks to everybody who has shared opinions and arguments in comments so far. I think there are several well written comments that have been unfairly downvoted, but I have personally read all comments and tried to respond to several as well. I will keep reading them as they come in.
The main facts I am working with right now are as follows:
- The majority of lemm.ee users are strongly opposed to immediately federating with Threads
- Facebook has a proven track record of exploiting users (and a built-in financial incentive to do so)
- We currently lack proper federation/moderation tools to allow us to properly handle rule breaking content from Facebook
Considering all of the above, I believe the initial approach for lemm.ee should be to defederate Threads, and then monitor the situation for a period of time to determine if federating with them in the future is a realistic option
In order to federate with them, the following conditions would need to be fulfilled:
- There needs to be actual interoperability between Threads and Lemmy
- Threads needs to prove that they are not flooding instances with rule-breaking content (mainly ads and bigotry for lemm.ee)
- There needs to be a mechanism to prevent feed manipulation by Threads algorithms (potentially this means discarding all incoming votes from Threads)
Note: this is an initial list, subject to change as we learn more about Threads.
Again, I realize this approach won’t please everybody, but I really believe it’s the best approach on a whole for now. Please feel free to keep adding comments and keep the discussion going if you think there is something I have not considered.
Please follow lemmy.ml and stand up to the big guys and defederate in whatever form it comes. This is a chance to finally stand alone from the Mega corps and have some peace and quiet.
Peace and quiet is so rare in social media these days, that is so not obvious that we somehow have it here
Looks like I chose poorly with mastodon.social. I really don’t want to have to switch instances at this point.
I’m really surprised by how many
allows I’m seeingThank you for sharing this. I’m looking for a new masto server.
What does N/A signify? And does allow mean they are federating?
Preach! There’s a good opportunity here to keep this space free from the greedy hands of a bunch of rich assholes. People are so eager for there to be a ‘new twitter’ but haven’t even raised one question about whether threads has fundamentally addressed the problem that has lead to the downfall of twitter and Reddit. Meet your new boss, same as the old boss. Why the hell should we keep just hoping that some billionaire ceo will do what’s right. Even if that ceo does the right thing, they will eventually be replaced.
There can be a place on the internet free from capitalist exploitation for profit. Communities can exist solely for the sake of the community. Not every goddamn thing needs to be monetized. Send a clear message that past tactics will not fly here.
Amen
Exactly we’re here and doing all this work on our own dime so we can have a social media site that won’t turn out like every corporate social media site ever. It’s already working the way we want it to without any help from Facebook, so logically giving them a seat at the table can only not help.
Agreed. I want this place to remain completely free from corporate fuckery.
“Peace and quiet” is very well put.
If you don’t defederate we might as well go back to reddit. I don’t want to see posts from instagram accounts
100% get that shit out of here
Absolutely on point. If it’s deal with Facebook or deal with Reddit that doesn’t have a partnership with Facebook I would go straight back to Reddit. Fuck Facebook and their rebrand attempt to distance themselves with the Meta shit.
Exactly, if we want them in our space why put up with the growing pains of the Fediverse, just go to them and forget Lemmy, Mastodon, etc. We need to be our own space or why exist at all. As said before, if you want their content just go to their sites.
Isn’t it pretty simple though, if you don’t want to see those posts, block them personally. Why make it so that none of the users can access them?
Because fuck meta and everything to do with it.
How does defederating do that tho?
It fucks them. They aren’t even using the fediverse now, this stuff is all so old.
How? How does this ‘fuck them’?
They can still access all the public data on the fediverse, because that’s how the fediverse works.
It seems like defederating will only hurt users of this instance by not letting them access that content
problem ignoring doesn’t make the problem go away
Hell no. I came to Lemmy to get AWAY from the corporate overlords.
I’m excited by the potential of the fediverse, and I want the fediverse to grow. That means more users. However, the noncommercial nature of the fediverse is why I’m excited by it in the first place. I couldn’t care less if there’s yet another gigantic social network full of ads.
Allowing any profit-driven interest to influence the fediverse risks destroying what makes the fediverse interesting and special. I’m not willing to risk the fediverse in order to grow it.
First you say you couldn’t care less. Then you say you’re not willing to risk it. Seems like you care a lot?
I think you’re misunderstanding their point. They’re saying they don’t care about another ad-filled, user tracking social media platform (Threads), which is inherently opposite to what Lemmy is. They and myself care enough to not see the influence of Threads / Meta on Lemmy, and the Fediverse as a whole.
Couldn’t care less about the existence of commercial entities on the fediverse. But also willing to preemptively fracture the fediverse to ensure that no user of this instance can ever choose to see any content from any user of any commercial instance. But seriously other than that couldn’t care less about their existence.
Have I got it right?
I think what they’re saying is that they don’t care if they are creating their social networks on their own island, on their own networks, but they DO care if they invade on the fediverse.
Couldn’t care less about the existence of commercial entities
Right…
on the fediverse.
Nope, you inserted that yourself from absolutely nowhere.
But also willing to preemptively fracture the fediverse
Uh, that’s what the fediverse inherently is.
to ensure that no user of this instance can ever choose to see any content from any user of any commercial instance.
Again, no. No one is being deprived of the Zucc. If you want to see his dogshit, you can make an account on an instance that federates with it. That’s how all this works.
“Everyone sign up separately for each instance if they want to see it, that’s how the fediverse works”.
Bro that’s exactly how the non federated internet works. What’s even the point of federating, with this attitude?
Now you’re just being incredibly hyperbolic and acting like a drama queen over a complete non-issue.
If you want to participate in the Zuccfeed, no one is impeding you, nor can they. If you’re genuinely this outraged over the censorship you’re pretending is happening, you can host your own private instance and federate with literally anyone and everyone you want to.
Likewise, though, you don’t get to decide who other people choose to federate their instances with or not.
There are definitely some hyperbolic drama queens in this threads. It’s the ones screaming “all corporations are evil and no one should want to view corporate hosted content!”
As for me, I am well aware how it works. Many lemmy instances have declared their intent to defederate. I’m looking for one that will not. If I don’t find one I will consider next steps.
Fuck Zuck and fuck Meta
EDITED: After initially misreading the post, I’m actually very glad that I just joined an instance where the majority of people is so against Facebook and their scummy business.
Hey, are you sure you’re not misinterpreting the votes? There was a small minority of users in favor of federating, but the majority was against it.
I did misread lol thanks for reaching out. The way it was phrased confused my brain…long day at wok haha
Considering Meta mines as much data from as many people as possible just to advertise to them and also they can’t even launch Threads in the EU right now because of how aggressively it tracks literally everything about their users and Threads’ only purpose is to gather more data to sell to more people, I think that alone is worth not letting them play.
This is a community of individuals escaping from corporate manipulation and abuse. As a new platform, we need to support our own and grow a healthy foundation.
If we give this parasite access to our community, others trapped on meta platforms will never leave their comfort zone to try something new and potentially better(to them).
When were big and strong like ox and with a name more recognizable than reddit, we can federate and show off our strong community. Or move on due to fading interest in threads like most meta platforms
If there’s one thing that the Fediverse has the capability of doing it is introducing real competition into the social media space though,
By defederating and cutting off users of that meta platform from the rest of the Fediverse you are strengthening metas monopoly though. You’re making it more difficult for people to leave that platform.
People choose a social platform based on the people they can communicate with. I still have to maintain a Facebook account because there are people on that platform that I need to stay in contact with. I don’t want to have a Facebook account but I have to because it’s the only way to keep in contact with them.
If Facebook federated and I could communicate with those people who decide that they want to stay on Facebook I could then get rid of my Facebook account. I could take advantage of the biggest benefit of the Fediverse and enjoy my social media experience on whichever instance I want without cutting myself off from people who’ve chosen to be on a different social media instance of some kind.
Federating with meta platforms will Make it easier for people to leave meta platforms. Anymore most people are only on Facebook because it is a monopoly and you have to be there in order to talk with everyone that’s there. Giving people an option to talk to people on Facebook without having to be on Facebook yourself makes it easier for people to leave Facebook.
Staying as far away from Meta has been my goal since leaving Facebook 8 years ago. I really like this instance, it meets all of my needs for my Reddit replacement.
I don’t see a reason to federate with a corporation unless they were able to deliver something I’m not currently getting and their corporate support would greatly improve performance/sustainability for this instance. But based on previous experience, a company entering a space usually makes it worse.
I wish I didn’t love my quest 2 so much.
Sad thing is I don’t even have time to play it.
The thing with VR is that non-bigcorp alternatives cost a fortune, as Meta takes the loss on the hardware. Standalone VR is also impossible without bigcorp interference (as of now!)
I knew it was right decision on my part to start using lemm.ee and stop using .world
deleted by creator
Fuck Facebook and the horse it rode in on.
Thank you for staying with the decision to defederate, and keeping lemm.ee a safer place when Threads arrives.
If we federate with threads I’m deleting my account
If I want to see threads content, I will just make an account on threads…which I doubt I’ll ever do, but who knows.
No Federation with Corporations.
Sounds like a good recipe for failure. Let’s block all instance we don’t like for whatever reason. Let’s fragment the fediverae till nobody uses it because it’s a mess of instances that don’t talk to each other for a slew of reason.
Oh stop being hyperbolic. That’s not what I said at all. Big companies like Meta will ruin this place given half the chance. They don’t want a Fediverse, they want access to the users here so that they might one day absorb them. Federation with corporations will ruin the Fediverse, it’s that simple.
Go make a threads account if you want to look at ads so badly.
Already made an account to see that it was all about. So how big is too big? Who do we block after meta?
We should make a “No Federation With Corporation” sticker
I’d buy a patch, it would go well with
.
