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I was having my 2 cents thought on the topic as well, my conclusion is: A shared blocking list (Or a blockchain system, hehe) can only be used as the last resor
by nirui 7y ago
I was having my 2 cents thought on the topic as well, my conclusion is: A shared blocking list (Or a blockchain system, hehe) can only be used as the last resort.
Systems like such already been developed, for example there is one for Twitter made by third-party called "Twitter Block Chain" (https://github.com/satsukitv/twitter-block-chain https://github.com/satsukitv/twitter-block-chain).
Yes, it can block "unwanted" posters and bots when a correct list is given, but it could also sometime block innocent accounts when somebody is been mistakenly added to the list (Or that somebody just simply changed their behavior for the better).
For such system to work, the maintainer of the list must be trustworthy, which is the hardest part and almost always falls apart.
Add to the injury, it can also be very hard for others to detect mistakes sneaked into the list, as the list may contains more than 10,000 items, makes it impossible to be completely verified manually.
And what to do if a mistake is indeed discovered? Maintain an unblock list to automatically request the user to unblock? Now user has to maintain their own "Yes I manually blocked this guy" list to counter act the automatic one.
My suggestion is: Yes, you can use a shared block list if there is no other way (The Twitter case). But since Mastadon is open sourced, maybe let's try something else first while still can?
Please give this a little thought: Can a system be designed in such way that makes it really hard for their user to accidentally come across some unwanted posts (without having to block the poster)?
- endgame 7y agoDon't forget that blocklist admins can be jerks, too. If I run a blocklist that gets popular, I could make people I don't like disappear without anyone really noticing.
- stevenicr 7y agoGood point! This is one reason why I a want a few portals with the bots and showing discussions about them, easy option to fork / clone / change. Would be nice to have something check for updated bots and discussions about them and put a flag in the browser bar maybe every two weeks - Some bots will get better over time - but some people who liked the old one may not appreciate the changes and want to re-hatch the old one with a merged list minus X and Y but leave Z.
- stevenicr 7y agoI had not heard of the twitter block list - thanks for the info. My thought on the blocker bots things in this thought process is that a few portals could spring up with the various bots listed and open discussions / comments about them will be available - and it should be a one-click to clone and rename / change.. so that people are encouraged to create new ones. Having open source blocking and discussion with one click clone and change will hopefully create lots of transparency, and give end users for options for finer grained control - The open discussions should have shape the various bots - something I have not figured is a process to auto-take and another bots updates and remove all instances of x and y terms.. and make Paulines-Copy-bot auto update when Pete's now block lists are added. I too would prefer not to block people and servers and instead just hide by topics as a first line of defense. Like mashable on fbook - I'd like to keep them in my feed, and block the stupid things they post about trump.. if I don't get a way to do this, I'll have to lose mashable completely. I think the discussions on the bots would be educational for people as well. I myself have read articles that discuss some of the edge cases of bans for things like the ISPs in the UK and the health sites and such.. but I don't think most people see that kind of news.. and some may benefit from seeing discussion about other things that are unintentionally, or intentionally blocked.. and make decisions on the info and controversy instead of taking the one size fits most censorship each country seems to have.