Not sure if this is the right community to post this in, as we don’t have any [email protected] or similar community, but it seemed the most relevant. Sorry if it doesn’t belong.
I’m sure that at this point it has become common knowledge that , Meta’s alternative to Twitter, is trying to implement ActivityPub into their site. If/when this goes through, this would make Threads an instance admin, giving then full access to all the data that is available to other instance admins. This would include all data that belongs to Lemmy/KBin/Mastodon/etc users.
My main question is, should we let them do this? Should we federate with them if/when they come online, or should we defederate? I know that does not usually defederate with others (we currently only have one instance blocked, bottom of ), but in this case, this is Meta we’re dealing with. They aren’t exactly a big fan of data privacy, which is the whole theme of this instance (our sidebar: “This instance is focused on providing security and privacy for its users”).
It seems that most people on Lemmy/etc. seem to be in favour of pre-emptive defederation and that many other instances have already defederated (Lemmy.ca, dbzer0, Blahaj, Beehaw, Lemm.ee).
There may also be another solution, but I’m not sure whether this applies to Lemmy.
What does everyone else think? Should we stay federated with them? Should we defederate, like other instances have already done? Should we wait and see? I’d love to hear others’ opinions on this.
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In general I think everyone should be able to connect to any instance, as I’m a big advocate of a free and unregulated internet.
But as with many principles there are exceptions, and big data harvesting cooperation are my exception. The idea of the Fediverse is to have a decentralized, free (in both ways, does not cost and libre) and privacy respecting place in a world, where more and more governments and companies start to regulate and decide on what the users can do.
When I look back on the history of those companies I neither like nor trust them, and I think it would be not only a needed action but also a statement when instances defedrate them. We can not stop the data harvesting, as this can be done with simple web crawlers. But with gate keeping (and I do not like it when people do it, but here, I think it is necessary), we can maybe bring the Fediverse more into the public eye. Because when we allow the Threads instances to federate, most people will just see it as Threads. They will not understand what the Fediverse is and will not see it as a new way of using the internet. The same kind of happened with Android, most do not know it is Linux and just talk about Android. I think for Android it is not a big problem, but the Fediverse is a movement, a change and statement people are fighting for, and it shall be and stay that, not just another protocol that is used to transfer likes.
At the beginning of this instance, I once asked the admin and if I remember correctly, a defederation of such instances is not seen as an action to take. Maybe we need to mobilize in other communities on feddit.ch to raise our concern.
(Pinned your post, as I think this is an important discussion to have)
I agree with this completely! I am also not generally a fan of such gatekeeping, but in cases like these I feel that it is not just justified, but rather necessary.
I once asked the admin and … a defederation of such instances is not seen as an action to take.
Could you please rephrase? Not sure I understand this properly. What I think I understand is that the instance admin is not a big fan of defederation. Is that correct?
Sadly I can’t find the comment-feed I had with the admin (was a year ago +/-), but yes as far as I remember the admin does not want to defederate other instances. Which is also a stance I understand, especially with the neutral mentality Switzerland has (and this is a Swiss instance after all).
I hope the admin comments so we can see the thoughts itself and not some phrases I remember hazily :)
I think i chime in for some comment. You got it right, i believe this open platform should stay as open as possible. But if i see that problems arise and users from this instance are having issues because of Threads or other platforms, i have to take action. And of course, there are borders to this openness.
I’m very aware, that Meta and the other big corporations are interested in our data and want to use them for their profit. But i don’t think that defederation will stop them. They will harvest our data anyway, with just simple web crawlers.
I support anyone who wants to defederate them, but i also want an open platform for people to have a place to express themselves and communicate. And with the new instance block feature of lemmy v.0.19, people are able to hide specific instances themself, if they do not like their content.
They are Facebook. Facebook has and will sell any and all data it can get.
I’m deeply conflicted about this, I want federation with big services, I think that is part of the raison d’etre of #activitypub.
But I know the risks, I’m old enough to remember #Microsoft embracing and extinguishing the browser, #Goggle defederating from #XMPP and #Facebook predatory tactics.
Also, I’m starting to think that federation with the big players is unstoppable. The protocol is open and there is no way to get every instance operator on board with the #fedipact . If people want to see the big players’ content they’ll move to an instance that federates with them. And defederating from those that connect to threads sounds like a Zealot’s suicide pact.
Ideally we’d need some kind of legal protection, that makes big services accoutable for what they do with open protocols, but the best we can hope is that the threat of such legislation being enacted will scare the bigs ones into playing fair.
In the mean while there are no technical measures that I can think of and the social measures are unlikely to work. The only thing we can do is to enter into this with open eyes, aware of our history and hope for the best.
We shall defederate from Threads. Everybody has known of Facebook’s willingness to scrape users’ data, even those on the rest of the Fediverse, and have the same admin privileges as any human granted admin privileges.
