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This is only true among mastodon servers that connect to each other. As I recall, most servers would not talk to gab's servers. Further, once you pick a serve

This is only true among mastodon servers that connect to each other. As I recall, most servers would not talk to gab's servers. Further, once you pick a server, if you are kicked off, you lose all your followers because they are following you@thatserver which you cannot get onto anymore.

VikingCoder 4y ago
...so why isn't there another layer of abstraction, where you have like a DNS to register where you (and here's your public key) are currently: you@thatserver, and you sign it... And then you can change (using the same public / private key pair) to be: you@someotherserver? This seems obvious to me as a necessary feature...?
- kixiQu 4y ago
  There is a move feature so you can transfer your account and its following relationships to a new server, without your followers having to update anything or any key signing at all. You can't use it if your account has been nuked, but it's not weird in "we're asking you to leave"-type moderation.
- JD557 4y ago
  There are a few issues for that, but they haven't seen any activity in a while: https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/issues/3796 https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/issues/3796 https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/issues/2668 https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/issues/2668
M2Ys4U 4y ago
>This is only true among mastodon servers that connect to each other. Most do, the default is open federation. > As I recall, most servers would not talk to gab's servers. It's hardly a surprise that most people don't want to associate with neo-Nazis and others with similar worthless ideologies. The fact that admins can firewall off instances if they're are run by arseholes is a good thing.
- safety1st 4y ago
  The problem with this idea is that if by some unfortunate accident of history, Nazis gain power again, they'll say exactly what you just said except replace the word Nazi with Jew. I would flip what you just said on its head and say practically the opposite: the virtue of Mastodon is that when the Nazis seize power not all instances will be forced to censor Jews (whereas Twitter will be forced to do it or shut down).
  - kaba0 4y ago
    What exactly is your threat model — every single country will simultaneously become a nazi dictatorship? Is their a world domination beforehand which somehow misses the “nuke the Earth” part? For a server to operate you only need a very basic power source and internet connection, even in an occupied country it seems plenty doable.
    - safety1st 4y ago
      Example: an extremist government comes into power in the US and orders all social media and traditional media companies to censor a certain type of speech. They could very well have popular support if there has been a war or a depression or some other crisis, it was only 75 years ago that we had a literal Office of Censorship, were putting Japanese-Americans in internment camps etc. US media is very concentrated today, the government only needs to go around to a handful of companies to censor the vast majority of outlets Americans get their news from. Sure someone can set up a server somewhere and publish whatever they want but if no one reads it it won't really matter. Most people won't change where they get their news overnight even if the government does impose censorship. That's why federated social media is so valuable, widespread use of it ASAP is a benefit to society. It can de-concentrate the ownership of media distribution, decentralize control and make the next Office of Censorship's job much harder.
phoe-krk 4y ago
> This is only true among mastodon servers that connect to each other. As I recall, most servers would not talk to gab's servers. Being able to choose which other servers your server federates with is a feature, not a bug. > you lose all your followers because they are following you@thatserver which you cannot get onto anymore. Not true as of recent (May 2022 or so) versions of Mastodon.
- snickerbockers 4y ago
  - michaelmrose 4y ago
    There is a difference between blocking every other server and blocking a singular server and the different shades between. In particular gab is full of toxic, stupid, offensive, psychos wearing human skin masks so that they can blend in and prey upon actual humans. Most people when consuming content at scale want SOME filter on the content whether they know it or not unless the community is very small and self selecting. This is because a singular scumbag can trivially ruin the good time of a thousand users. Large completely unmoderated communities always turn into nightmares at some point.
    - vorejdajo 4y ago
      The block if any should be at the user level per user and not at the admin level. No matter what gab user's beliefs are, it's wrong to dehumanize them. If anything, you're doing the same thing you're accusing them of doing: Dehumanizing humans with different (race)beliefs to commit (genocide) segregation.
      - phoe-krk 4y ago
        Choosing not to associate with a person or a group of people is one of the most basic human rights, not dehumanization. A private Fediverse instance has the full right to invite, or uninvite, any sort of people or content; you're just seeing the effects of that right being exercised, independently, by multiple administrators of multiple instances.

VikingCoder 4y ago

...so why isn't there another layer of abstraction, where you have like a DNS to register where you (and here's your public key) are currently: you@thatserver, and you sign it... And then you can change (using the same public / private key pair) to be: you@someotherserver? This seems obvious to me as a necessary feature...?

kixiQu 4y ago
There is a move feature so you can transfer your account and its following relationships to a new server, without your followers having to update anything or any key signing at all. You can't use it if your account has been nuked, but it's not weird in "we're asking you to leave"-type moderation.
JD557 4y ago
There are a few issues for that, but they haven't seen any activity in a while: https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/issues/3796 https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/issues/3796 https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/issues/2668 https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/issues/2668

M2Ys4U 4y ago

>This is only true among mastodon servers that connect to each other. Most do, the default is open federation. > As I recall, most servers would not talk to gab's servers. It's hardly a surprise that most people don't want to associate with neo-Nazis and others with similar worthless ideologies. The fact that admins can firewall off instances if they're are run by arseholes is a good thing.

safety1st 4y ago
The problem with this idea is that if by some unfortunate accident of history, Nazis gain power again, they'll say exactly what you just said except replace the word Nazi with Jew. I would flip what you just said on its head and say practically the opposite: the virtue of Mastodon is that when the Nazis seize power not all instances will be forced to censor Jews (whereas Twitter will be forced to do it or shut down).
- kaba0 4y ago
  What exactly is your threat model — every single country will simultaneously become a nazi dictatorship? Is their a world domination beforehand which somehow misses the “nuke the Earth” part? For a server to operate you only need a very basic power source and internet connection, even in an occupied country it seems plenty doable.
  - safety1st 4y ago
    Example: an extremist government comes into power in the US and orders all social media and traditional media companies to censor a certain type of speech. They could very well have popular support if there has been a war or a depression or some other crisis, it was only 75 years ago that we had a literal Office of Censorship, were putting Japanese-Americans in internment camps etc. US media is very concentrated today, the government only needs to go around to a handful of companies to censor the vast majority of outlets Americans get their news from. Sure someone can set up a server somewhere and publish whatever they want but if no one reads it it won't really matter. Most people won't change where they get their news overnight even if the government does impose censorship. That's why federated social media is so valuable, widespread use of it ASAP is a benefit to society. It can de-concentrate the ownership of media distribution, decentralize control and make the next Office of Censorship's job much harder.

phoe-krk 4y ago

> This is only true among mastodon servers that connect to each other. As I recall, most servers would not talk to gab's servers. Being able to choose which other servers your server federates with is a feature, not a bug. > you lose all your followers because they are following you@thatserver which you cannot get onto anymore. Not true as of recent (May 2022 or so) versions of Mastodon.

snickerbockers 4y ago
- michaelmrose 4y ago
  There is a difference between blocking every other server and blocking a singular server and the different shades between. In particular gab is full of toxic, stupid, offensive, psychos wearing human skin masks so that they can blend in and prey upon actual humans. Most people when consuming content at scale want SOME filter on the content whether they know it or not unless the community is very small and self selecting. This is because a singular scumbag can trivially ruin the good time of a thousand users. Large completely unmoderated communities always turn into nightmares at some point.
  - vorejdajo 4y ago
    The block if any should be at the user level per user and not at the admin level. No matter what gab user's beliefs are, it's wrong to dehumanize them. If anything, you're doing the same thing you're accusing them of doing: Dehumanizing humans with different (race)beliefs to commit (genocide) segregation.
    - phoe-krk 4y ago
      Choosing not to associate with a person or a group of people is one of the most basic human rights, not dehumanization. A private Fediverse instance has the full right to invite, or uninvite, any sort of people or content; you're just seeing the effects of that right being exercised, independently, by multiple administrators of multiple instances.