3 ms·

>it's generally seen as an imposition on people's time to ask a question that could be readily answered by clicking through to the site in question and having a

>it's generally seen as an imposition on people's time to ask a question that could be readily answered by clicking through to the site in question and having a look That's not going to help anyone know if there are other Mastodon servers out there, which aren't on the list. Unless that person is already aware of the existence of said server in the first place. Anyone remember when Gab had the biggest Mastodon instance by far, by user numbers, but all the Mastodon indexes were pretending it didn't even exist? The myth of the Fediverse as some libertarian promised land free from censorship and heavy handed control is just farcical.

commoner 4y ago
Freedom of association is an essential part of freedom of speech, and is one of the core principles of libertarianism. One of the main features of Mastodon is that individual instances have the option to either federate with or reject other instances to curate the character of the community they want to build. Unlike Twitter, which puts everyone on a single instance, people on Mastodon can choose to be in a community of people with shared interests and values, hosted on an instance with rules that they agree with. The decentralization makes individual Mastodon instances more pleasant and less divisive to their users. Forcing instances to federate with others would be compelled speech, not free speech, and would take away from what makes Mastodon different from Twitter. In the same way, forcing any website to list Gab would not be free speech. (Gab disabled federation, so it is not actually part of the fediverse anymore: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26012558 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26012558.) Gab still exists as a service running on free and open source code derived from Mastodon because Mastodon is AGPLv3. Anyone who wants to sign up for Gab can just do that.
- Normille 4y ago
  >In the same way, forcing any website to list Gab would not be free speech... I think you're being a bit disingenuous talking about "forcing" sites to list Gab. If individual instances wanted to de-link from it that was their perogative. But I was talking abuot sites which claim to provide indexes of what Mastodon servers are out there --ignoring the biggest one by a considerable margin, because they didn't like the politics of the people who used it. I think if ypu're claiming to provide an index, it kind of behoves you to index everything you're supposed to be indexing. Not leave huge sections out because you don't like them. Imagine publishing a business directory where you didn't list the Jewish or black owned businesses... or printing a dictionary but leaving out all the words that began with a letter you didn't like. Yes. No-one who believes in free speech should be "forcing" you to make good those omissions. But they're prefectly entitled to question the value of your 'publication' if you don't.
  - commoner 4y ago
    Gab is not an instance of Mastodon. It is a fork of Mastodon that has been modified to not interoperate with Mastodon instances and other fediverse services. Because of this, Gab is not part of the fediverse and has no place on instances.social. If you want to create a list of social networks that includes Mastodon instances and Gab together, go for it. But there is no reason a list of Mastodon instances needs to include a service that is not a Mastodon instance.
    - ThrowawayTestr 4y ago
      I did not know that, I assumed gab was a regular instance. Thank you.
      - Normille 4y ago
        >Gab isn't an instance of Mastodon. It was in the past. Hence why I said [using past tense]... >Anyone remember when Gab had the biggest Mastodon instance by far... As far as I remember the details, Gab forked Mastodon, after being effectively frozen out of the fediverse by all the other instances and indexes. BTW --My politics are polar opposite to Gab's. But if you really believe in free speech, you shouldn't just defend it for people you agree with.
        commoner 4y ago
        > As far as I remember the details, Gab forked Mastodon, after being effectively frozen out of the fediverse by all the other instances and indexes. Gab, after its backend switch, has always been a fork of Mastodon instead of a stock implementation. Some Mastodon instances exercised their free speech (free association) rights by blocking Gab afterward, and some websites exercised their right to free speech by choosing not to mention Gab. Other Mastodon instances did not block Gab, and there were also websites that listed Gab alongside other fediverse services. The owner of Gab later exercised his free speech rights when he decided to remove Mastodon's federation feature from Gab, turning Gab back to a single-instance monolithic social network like Twitter. By doing this, Gab exited the fediverse and no longer met the criteria for inclusion on websites that list fediverse services. Of course, there are websites that list social networks in general, which do include Gab. > But if you really believe in free speech, you shouldn't just defend it for people you agree with. Promoting or hosting content from Gab on a website is not a necessary condition for exercising free speech. This is because free speech includes free association, and website owners can opt to exercise their free speech rights by choosing not to promote or host content from Gab. The owner of Gab also exercised his free speech right by changing Gab to not interoperate with other Mastodon instances and fediverse services. As far as every party in this situation is concerned, the exercise of free speech has been upheld. While it is no longer possible to host a Mastodon instance, it's still possible to create a website that lists Gab alongside anything you want. If none of the existing websites have the content you want to see, go ahead and exercise your free speech right to make one yourself.
pixl97 4y ago
>The myth of the Fediverse as some libertarian promised land free from censorship and heavy handed control is just farcical. I have problems controlling my snark at times, but this is how any libertarian idea should be viewed. But also to counter that, why do people think that libertarianism encodes the right to an audience, and serving up convenience and an easy to use system (that's much more capitalism oriented). You're free to host your own mastodon server and connect with any server you like and that will accept you, and that the government has not right to block this communication. Of course this is where I go back to disparaging libertarians as try to hold the opposing viewpoints of absolute property rights and that you should let them your server in defiance of your property rights.

commoner 4y ago

Freedom of association is an essential part of freedom of speech, and is one of the core principles of libertarianism. One of the main features of Mastodon is that individual instances have the option to either federate with or reject other instances to curate the character of the community they want to build. Unlike Twitter, which puts everyone on a single instance, people on Mastodon can choose to be in a community of people with shared interests and values, hosted on an instance with rules that they agree with. The decentralization makes individual Mastodon instances more pleasant and less divisive to their users. Forcing instances to federate with others would be compelled speech, not free speech, and would take away from what makes Mastodon different from Twitter. In the same way, forcing any website to list Gab would not be free speech. (Gab disabled federation, so it is not actually part of the fediverse anymore: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26012558 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26012558.) Gab still exists as a service running on free and open source code derived from Mastodon because Mastodon is AGPLv3. Anyone who wants to sign up for Gab can just do that.

Normille 4y ago
>In the same way, forcing any website to list Gab would not be free speech... I think you're being a bit disingenuous talking about "forcing" sites to list Gab. If individual instances wanted to de-link from it that was their perogative. But I was talking abuot sites which claim to provide indexes of what Mastodon servers are out there --ignoring the biggest one by a considerable margin, because they didn't like the politics of the people who used it. I think if ypu're claiming to provide an index, it kind of behoves you to index everything you're supposed to be indexing. Not leave huge sections out because you don't like them. Imagine publishing a business directory where you didn't list the Jewish or black owned businesses... or printing a dictionary but leaving out all the words that began with a letter you didn't like. Yes. No-one who believes in free speech should be "forcing" you to make good those omissions. But they're prefectly entitled to question the value of your 'publication' if you don't.
- commoner 4y ago
  Gab is not an instance of Mastodon. It is a fork of Mastodon that has been modified to not interoperate with Mastodon instances and other fediverse services. Because of this, Gab is not part of the fediverse and has no place on instances.social. If you want to create a list of social networks that includes Mastodon instances and Gab together, go for it. But there is no reason a list of Mastodon instances needs to include a service that is not a Mastodon instance.
  - ThrowawayTestr 4y ago
    I did not know that, I assumed gab was a regular instance. Thank you.
    - Normille 4y ago
      >Gab isn't an instance of Mastodon. It was in the past. Hence why I said [using past tense]... >Anyone remember when Gab had the biggest Mastodon instance by far... As far as I remember the details, Gab forked Mastodon, after being effectively frozen out of the fediverse by all the other instances and indexes. BTW --My politics are polar opposite to Gab's. But if you really believe in free speech, you shouldn't just defend it for people you agree with.
      - commoner 4y ago
        > As far as I remember the details, Gab forked Mastodon, after being effectively frozen out of the fediverse by all the other instances and indexes. Gab, after its backend switch, has always been a fork of Mastodon instead of a stock implementation. Some Mastodon instances exercised their free speech (free association) rights by blocking Gab afterward, and some websites exercised their right to free speech by choosing not to mention Gab. Other Mastodon instances did not block Gab, and there were also websites that listed Gab alongside other fediverse services. The owner of Gab later exercised his free speech rights when he decided to remove Mastodon's federation feature from Gab, turning Gab back to a single-instance monolithic social network like Twitter. By doing this, Gab exited the fediverse and no longer met the criteria for inclusion on websites that list fediverse services. Of course, there are websites that list social networks in general, which do include Gab. > But if you really believe in free speech, you shouldn't just defend it for people you agree with. Promoting or hosting content from Gab on a website is not a necessary condition for exercising free speech. This is because free speech includes free association, and website owners can opt to exercise their free speech rights by choosing not to promote or host content from Gab. The owner of Gab also exercised his free speech right by changing Gab to not interoperate with other Mastodon instances and fediverse services. As far as every party in this situation is concerned, the exercise of free speech has been upheld. While it is no longer possible to host a Mastodon instance, it's still possible to create a website that lists Gab alongside anything you want. If none of the existing websites have the content you want to see, go ahead and exercise your free speech right to make one yourself.

pixl97 4y ago

>The myth of the Fediverse as some libertarian promised land free from censorship and heavy handed control is just farcical. I have problems controlling my snark at times, but this is how any libertarian idea should be viewed. But also to counter that, why do people think that libertarianism encodes the right to an audience, and serving up convenience and an easy to use system (that's much more capitalism oriented). You're free to host your own mastodon server and connect with any server you like and that will accept you, and that the government has not right to block this communication. Of course this is where I go back to disparaging libertarians as try to hold the opposing viewpoints of absolute property rights and that you should let them your server in defiance of your property rights.