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> This achieves your goal, doesn't it? Running a server isn't practical for average people. It's also nothing new, people could do since the dawn of the Intern

> This achieves your goal, doesn't it? Running a server isn't practical for average people. It's also nothing new, people could do since the dawn of the Internet, they don't need a Fediverse for that. > You can freely move between the islands. I can freely move between Facebook and Twitter too. Again, not seeing what the Fediverse is doing here for me. The Fediverse does not prevent walled gardens, the federation is an optional server-provided feature that can be switched off any time they want. You can't even move your data from one server to the other unless both servers cooperate. And Lemmy specifically isn't even GDPR compliant, there is no way to export my comments in the UI. There are also other huge issues such as message-ids being tied to the server, so you can't even resolve a URL from one server with another (something Usenet did better 40 years ago, which is why I can still find old post today). > Mastodon achieves a similar If Mastodon decides to run ads and enshittify, it's just like Twitter again. There is nothing to prevent that, outside of being small and unpopular. > Decentralization obviously doesn't on its own protect anything from the governments, but it helps. I am not worried about the government, I am worried about overzealous mods and server admins, who are already running rampant on the Fediverse and the Fediverse provides no infrastructure to help me here. That's an area where I much prefer Twitter and Co., they are pretty hands-off with moderation as long as you don't violate the law. On the Fediverse thought-policing is getting sold as a feature.

fsflover 1y ago
> If Mastodon decides There is not entity "Mastodon" that could decide anything. It's like saying "if the Internet decides to show you ads". It's a meaningless phrase. > there is no way to export my comments in the UI It's just a technical, UI problem, which anybody can solve, as it's free software. > Running a server isn't practical for average people. This is not the point. Like with repairs, you don't have to know how to do it to benefit from the right to repair. You can pay anybody in the free market to do your repairs or set up a Mastodon (or web) server for you. This solves the monopoly problem even for ordinary people. This is why you need free software btw - and it's not the case with Facebook or Twitter. You can't freely move between them. Once you leave them, you loose all your followers and specific features. > That's an area where I much prefer Twitter and Co., they are pretty hands-off with moderation as long as you don't violate the law This is not even funny. Twitter promotes nazi content according to the latest investigations.
- grumbel 1y ago
  > There is not entity "Mastodon" that could decide anything. mastodon.social is a server, if you have an account on there, they can delete it. If you don't have an account there, they can still block you by defederating whatever server you are on. This is no different from Twitter and Co. Simply put, look at this from an angle when it goes wrong, not when they go right. > It's just a technical, UI problem, which anybody can solve, as it's free software. No, that's a fundamental problem with how the data is organized and distributed. Without cryptographic signatures and unique message-ids, you are slave to the server, even if you get the data out of the server, there is no way to get it up on another. To see how broken the situation is just look at the URLs: - https://feddit.org/post/18147843 https://feddit.org/post/18147843 - https://lemmy.zip/post/47572103 https://lemmy.zip/post/47572103 Can you tell that both are referring to the same post? Can you find the feddit.org post on lemmy.zip when feddit.org goes down? This is not a simple "we'll implement that later"-feature, but a fundamental oversight in how data and control gets handled in the Fediverse. That it violates European law, that explicitly exists to empower the user, ain't helping. > This is why you need free software btw Free Software is completely irrelevant here. This is about protocols, data ownership and control, areas that no Free Software license even touches on. It's somewhat ironic that GDPR got there first with actual law, while the Free Software world still completely fails to address those issues, despite them being around for 20 years. > You can pay anybody in the free market to do your repairs or set up a Mastodon (or web) server for you. Which is worthless, since the value is in the users and their connections, which are under the control of whoever is running the popular instances, not me. > You can't freely move between them. I can freely switch between facebook.com or x.com in my browser just fine. > Once you leave them, you loose all your followers and specific features. Yes, that's just the same on the Fediverse. When feddit.de went down, where did my data go? My feddit.de account doesn't work on other servers. feddit.org was recreated from scratch and everybody had to move over manually. Account migration requires two cooperating servers, which you don't have if one of them is down permanently. > This is not even funny. Twitter promotes nazi content according to the latest investigations. As said "On the Fediverse thought-policing is getting sold as a feature."
  - immibis 1y ago

fsflover 1y ago

> If Mastodon decides There is not entity "Mastodon" that could decide anything. It's like saying "if the Internet decides to show you ads". It's a meaningless phrase. > there is no way to export my comments in the UI It's just a technical, UI problem, which anybody can solve, as it's free software. > Running a server isn't practical for average people. This is not the point. Like with repairs, you don't have to know how to do it to benefit from the right to repair. You can pay anybody in the free market to do your repairs or set up a Mastodon (or web) server for you. This solves the monopoly problem even for ordinary people. This is why you need free software btw - and it's not the case with Facebook or Twitter. You can't freely move between them. Once you leave them, you loose all your followers and specific features. > That's an area where I much prefer Twitter and Co., they are pretty hands-off with moderation as long as you don't violate the law This is not even funny. Twitter promotes nazi content according to the latest investigations.

grumbel 1y ago
> There is not entity "Mastodon" that could decide anything. mastodon.social is a server, if you have an account on there, they can delete it. If you don't have an account there, they can still block you by defederating whatever server you are on. This is no different from Twitter and Co. Simply put, look at this from an angle when it goes wrong, not when they go right. > It's just a technical, UI problem, which anybody can solve, as it's free software. No, that's a fundamental problem with how the data is organized and distributed. Without cryptographic signatures and unique message-ids, you are slave to the server, even if you get the data out of the server, there is no way to get it up on another. To see how broken the situation is just look at the URLs: - https://feddit.org/post/18147843 https://feddit.org/post/18147843 - https://lemmy.zip/post/47572103 https://lemmy.zip/post/47572103 Can you tell that both are referring to the same post? Can you find the feddit.org post on lemmy.zip when feddit.org goes down? This is not a simple "we'll implement that later"-feature, but a fundamental oversight in how data and control gets handled in the Fediverse. That it violates European law, that explicitly exists to empower the user, ain't helping. > This is why you need free software btw Free Software is completely irrelevant here. This is about protocols, data ownership and control, areas that no Free Software license even touches on. It's somewhat ironic that GDPR got there first with actual law, while the Free Software world still completely fails to address those issues, despite them being around for 20 years. > You can pay anybody in the free market to do your repairs or set up a Mastodon (or web) server for you. Which is worthless, since the value is in the users and their connections, which are under the control of whoever is running the popular instances, not me. > You can't freely move between them. I can freely switch between facebook.com or x.com in my browser just fine. > Once you leave them, you loose all your followers and specific features. Yes, that's just the same on the Fediverse. When feddit.de went down, where did my data go? My feddit.de account doesn't work on other servers. feddit.org was recreated from scratch and everybody had to move over manually. Account migration requires two cooperating servers, which you don't have if one of them is down permanently. > This is not even funny. Twitter promotes nazi content according to the latest investigations. As said "On the Fediverse thought-policing is getting sold as a feature."
- immibis 1y ago