I disagree with lemmy.world’s decision, for three reasons:
Address problems as they appear - negligence is bad, but so is jumping at the gun.
Locking users out because they’re misbehaving is different than locking them out under the assumption that they’ll misbehave.
Given that lemmy.world is a generic purpose instance, odds are that it would work better by letting users sort themselves out, and only intervene on problems when it is not reasonable to expect users to do so.
I also think that lemmy.world’s current size in comparison with other instances is a bit problematic. It’s great to see instances growing but it would be better if said growth was spread out.
Just my two cents, mind you. I’m from neither instance.
Please read and respect the rules of the community instance in which you are posting/commenting. Please try to keep the dirtbag lib-dunking to hexbear itself. Do not follow the Chapo Rules of Posting, instead try to engage utilizing informed rhetoric with sources to dismantle western propaganda. Posting the western atrocity propaganda and pig poop balls is hilarious but will pretty quickly get you banned and if enough of us do it defederated. Realize that you are a representative of the hexbear instance when you post on other instances.
Is this “a naked man outside a store, whippin’ his dong around & throwing poo at passersby” to you?
Visiting it costs nothing; but if they are federated with other instances I am on, I’m still gonna see the poo flinging and dong whipping outside the window as I scroll through the feed since I can’t block the entire shebang myself.
If he dressed himself before trying to enter my store, I’d probably let him in. However I’d keep watching him; and on his first attempt to take off his clothes, whip his dong or throw poo, I’d throw him out.
Note however that there’s an important difference between both situations: defederation affects a whole group of people. We could claim that some of them were whipping their dongs, were throwing poo, but we can’t automatically point at all of them and say “you’re all at fault”; that would be incorrect and immoral.
Note also that I’d likely see this in a different way, if the defederating instance was beehaw instead of lemmy.world. Due to the purpose of each instance (generic and free-for-all vs. safe space), and overall impact on the lemmy side of the Fediverse.
They can sign up for other instances. However the underlying “you’re from hexbear, so we’ll assume that you’ll misbehave” message is still the same.
And managing multiple accounts is still an inconvenience for the users; one of the cool things about lemmy is that you can register once and access content across multiple instances, but once you’re required to sign up to 2+ instances you’ll likely end off in the larger one, starving the smaller one, due to the network effect. (The exception is if the smaller instance clearly fills a niche that cannot be satisfied by the bigger one.)
It is inconvenient for people in general, not just for the ones who “never used a computer before”. Think on why.
The matter here is if that inconvenience pays off for some reason. Such as potentially protecting lemmy.world users. I don’t think that it does, and again, there are moral issues at hand too.
im on wefwef/voyager and it’s not a hassle to switch btween my accounts i also have a 3rd account on lemmy.wtf
And I have accounts in beehaw, kbin, lemmynsfw. And my point still stands - look at the big picture.
It is not just account switching on its own; you got two overlapping but not identical feeds (Satan forbids if you browse by “all”), content that you’ve seen in one feed becomes noise in the other, before posting/commenting you need to make sure that it’s from the right account, messages that you aren’t seeing from account A because you’re logged into account B… it’s a bunch of small things, none on itself a big deal, but they do pile up. And eventually, they make your typical user say “eh, why bother with that other account? I’ll keep browsing from this one alone”.
And if a lot of people end doing this (they will - humans are lazy by nature), it further reinforces the concentration of users into a handful of larger instances, at the detriment of smaller ones, due to the network effect.
As such, I think that defederation should be only used once it’s attested that users from one instance would make another instance worse (“worse” is relative to the instance’s goals). Pre-emptive defederation should be only used towards hostile entities, not entities where a few users might be bad. (Note that hexbear as an entity doesn’t show signs of being hostile - on the contrary, the admins are even telling their folks there “behave well in other instances”.)
I think the analogy would be more accurate if he was whipping his dong out and throwing shit within his own home. And he can do what he wants there, because it’s not affecting anyone else. Sure, the people in his house can have whatever opinions they want of him, but if he’s cleaned up and dressed before he leaves his house, who cares?
I disagree with lemmy.world’s decision, for three reasons:
I also think that lemmy.world’s current size in comparison with other instances is a bit problematic. It’s great to see instances growing but it would be better if said growth was spread out.
Just my two cents, mind you. I’m from neither instance.
There’s a naked man outside a store, whippin’ his dong around & throwing poo at passersby…
Do you have to let him the store just because he hasn’t actually done any of that stuff inside yet?
Or can you preemptively decide he won’t be allowed inside?
FWIW, I agree with everything you’ve said, just looking for clarification.
Visiting hexbear costs you nothing, dude. Take a look at their official statement about federation: https://www.hexbear.net/post/280770?scrollToComments=false
Is this “a naked man outside a store, whippin’ his dong around & throwing poo at passersby” to you?
I read that, thanks. From my point of view, when I read the term “dirtbag lib dunking”, yes, I did equate that with poo flinging & dong whippin’.
Visiting it costs nothing; but if they are federated with other instances I am on, I’m still gonna see the poo flinging and dong whipping outside the window as I scroll through the feed since I can’t block the entire shebang myself.
If he dressed himself before trying to enter my store, I’d probably let him in. However I’d keep watching him; and on his first attempt to take off his clothes, whip his dong or throw poo, I’d throw him out.
Note however that there’s an important difference between both situations: defederation affects a whole group of people. We could claim that some of them were whipping their dongs, were throwing poo, but we can’t automatically point at all of them and say “you’re all at fault”; that would be incorrect and immoral.
Note also that I’d likely see this in a different way, if the defederating instance was beehaw instead of lemmy.world. Due to the purpose of each instance (generic and free-for-all vs. safe space), and overall impact on the lemmy side of the Fediverse.
then they can just sign up for a different instance.
They can sign up for other instances. However the underlying “you’re from hexbear, so we’ll assume that you’ll misbehave” message is still the same.
And managing multiple accounts is still an inconvenience for the users; one of the cool things about lemmy is that you can register once and access content across multiple instances, but once you’re required to sign up to 2+ instances you’ll likely end off in the larger one, starving the smaller one, due to the network effect. (The exception is if the smaller instance clearly fills a niche that cannot be satisfied by the bigger one.)
I mean, maybe if you’ve never used a computer before
It is inconvenient for people in general, not just for the ones who “never used a computer before”. Think on why.
The matter here is if that inconvenience pays off for some reason. Such as potentially protecting lemmy.world users. I don’t think that it does, and again, there are moral issues at hand too.
im on wefwef/voyager and it’s not a hassle to switch btween my accounts i also have a 3rd account on lemmy.wtf
And I have accounts in beehaw, kbin, lemmynsfw. And my point still stands - look at the big picture.
It is not just account switching on its own; you got two overlapping but not identical feeds (Satan forbids if you browse by “all”), content that you’ve seen in one feed becomes noise in the other, before posting/commenting you need to make sure that it’s from the right account, messages that you aren’t seeing from account A because you’re logged into account B… it’s a bunch of small things, none on itself a big deal, but they do pile up. And eventually, they make your typical user say “eh, why bother with that other account? I’ll keep browsing from this one alone”.
And if a lot of people end doing this (they will - humans are lazy by nature), it further reinforces the concentration of users into a handful of larger instances, at the detriment of smaller ones, due to the network effect.
As such, I think that defederation should be only used once it’s attested that users from one instance would make another instance worse (“worse” is relative to the instance’s goals). Pre-emptive defederation should be only used towards hostile entities, not entities where a few users might be bad. (Note that hexbear as an entity doesn’t show signs of being hostile - on the contrary, the admins are even telling their folks there “behave well in other instances”.)
Thanks for the follow up! New to Lemmy & still working to understand the impact of defederation, so I honestly do appreciate the expanded viewpoints.
I think the analogy would be more accurate if he was whipping his dong out and throwing shit within his own home. And he can do what he wants there, because it’s not affecting anyone else. Sure, the people in his house can have whatever opinions they want of him, but if he’s cleaned up and dressed before he leaves his house, who cares?