3 ms·

I get the impression that Mastodon server operators have a tendency to become dictators (banning accounts, speech etc), which I guess is their right as they are

by vlod 3y ago

I get the impression that Mastodon server operators have a tendency to become dictators (banning accounts, speech etc), which I guess is their right as they are hosting content for free. There are questions also raised about the scalability of Mastodon. I'm more hopeful/wishful that Nostr [0] will take over. [0] https://nostr.com/ https://nostr.com/

OfSanguineFire 3y ago
Mastodon server operators sometimes complain that they don’t like to have to ban accounts and limit speech, but they have to do it, otherwise they’ll be cut off from federation. Control of federation is in the hands of a relatively small group of initial adopters, whose values and identities are unrepresentative of the global population in many respects.
- DoctorOW 3y ago
  This sounds like reference to Fediblock, which seems unfair since they explicitly shutdown to prevent this kind of thing: https://joinfediverse.wiki/FediBlock https://joinfediverse.wiki/FediBlock
- WorldMaker 3y ago
  There's no single "cabal" in "control" of federation. Federation is mostly "controlled" by drama and gossip engines, as the case in any truly distributed system. (It's still far more anarchic than "control" is the right word for.) Just about no one wants to be the target of great drama or huge gossip so there are definitely cultural mores and norms that collectively form to skip some of the more common cycles and some people just "obey them" without question. It's hard to call that "unrepresentative" of the general population when by definition organically-grown cultural norms reflect a cultures values. Sure, many of those norms are standardized and stabilized in "Code of Conduct" documents that individual instances post and mandate in their instance's internal moderation and that obviously then gets reflected in their external moderation as well, but that's still a distributed "vote with your feet" culture. The population on an instance with a strict Code of Conduct believes at least implicitly in that Code of Conduct or leaves. They've agreed to the Code of Conduct. It doesn't matter if there are only a "minority" of Codes of Conduct and those documents are mostly chosen by "fiat" by instance admins, if users don't believe in their instances' chosen Codes of Conduct they are free to leave to other instances.

by vlod 3y ago

OfSanguineFire 3y ago

Mastodon server operators sometimes complain that they don’t like to have to ban accounts and limit speech, but they have to do it, otherwise they’ll be cut off from federation. Control of federation is in the hands of a relatively small group of initial adopters, whose values and identities are unrepresentative of the global population in many respects.

DoctorOW 3y ago
This sounds like reference to Fediblock, which seems unfair since they explicitly shutdown to prevent this kind of thing: https://joinfediverse.wiki/FediBlock https://joinfediverse.wiki/FediBlock
WorldMaker 3y ago
There's no single "cabal" in "control" of federation. Federation is mostly "controlled" by drama and gossip engines, as the case in any truly distributed system. (It's still far more anarchic than "control" is the right word for.) Just about no one wants to be the target of great drama or huge gossip so there are definitely cultural mores and norms that collectively form to skip some of the more common cycles and some people just "obey them" without question. It's hard to call that "unrepresentative" of the general population when by definition organically-grown cultural norms reflect a cultures values. Sure, many of those norms are standardized and stabilized in "Code of Conduct" documents that individual instances post and mandate in their instance's internal moderation and that obviously then gets reflected in their external moderation as well, but that's still a distributed "vote with your feet" culture. The population on an instance with a strict Code of Conduct believes at least implicitly in that Code of Conduct or leaves. They've agreed to the Code of Conduct. It doesn't matter if there are only a "minority" of Codes of Conduct and those documents are mostly chosen by "fiat" by instance admins, if users don't believe in their instances' chosen Codes of Conduct they are free to leave to other instances.