Lemmy.world Admin Response to Meta/Threads

There has been significant discussion in recent weeks regarding Meta/Threads. We would like to express our disappointment with the negative and threatening tone of some of these discussions. We kindly ask everyone to engage in civil discourse and remember that not everyone will share the same opinions, which is perfectly acceptable.

When considering whether or not to defederate from Threads, we're looking for a decision based on facts that prioritize your safety. We strive to remain neutral to make an informed choice.

First, there seem to be some misconceptions about how the Fediverse operates based on several posts. We’ve compiled some resource links to help explain the details and address any misunderstandings.

Fed Tips , Fediverse , ActivityPub

Initial Thoughts:

It seems unlikely that Meta will federate with Lemmy. When/if Meta adopts ActivityPub, it will likely affect Mastodon only rather than Lemmy, given Meta's focus on being a Twitter alternative at the moment.

Please note that we have a few months before Threads will even federate with Mastodon, so we have some time to make the right decision.

Factors to Consider:
Factors to consider if Meta federates with Lemmy:

Privacy - While it’s true that Meta's privacy settings for the app are excessive, it’s important to note that these settings only apply to users of the official Threads app and do not impact Lemmy users. It’s worth mentioning that Lemmy does not collect any personal data, and Meta has no means of accessing such data from this platform. In addition, when it comes to scraping data from your post/comments, Meta doesn’t need ActivityPub to do that. Anyone can read your profile and public posts as it is today.

Moderation - If a server hosts a substantial amount of harmful content without performing efficient and comprehensive moderation, it will create an excessive workload for our moderators. Currently, Meta is utilizing its existing Instagram moderation tools. Considering there were 95 million posts on the first day, this becomes worrisome, as it could potentially overwhelm us and serve as a sufficient reason for defederation.

Ads - It’s possible if Meta presents them as posts.

Promoting Posts - It’s possible with millions of users upvoting a post for it to trend.

Embrace, extend, and extinguish (EEE) - We don't think they can. If anyone can explain how they technically would, please let us know. Even if Meta forks Lemmy and gets rid of the original software, Lemmy will survive.

Instance Blocking - Unlike Mastodon, Lemmy does not provide a feature for individual users to block an instance (yet). This creates a dilemma where we must either defederate, disappointing those who desire interaction with Threads, or choose not to defederate, which will let down those who prefer no interaction with Threads.

Blocking Outgoing Federation - There is currently no tool available to block outgoing federation from lemmy.world to other instances. We can only block incoming federation. This means that if we choose to defederate with our current capabilities, Threads will still receive copies of lemmy.world posts. However, only users on Threads will be able to interact with them, while we would not be able to see their interactions. This situation is similar to the one with Beehaw at the moment. Consequently, it leads to significant fragmentation of content, which has real and serious implications.

Conclusion:
From the points discussed above, the possible lack of moderation alone justifies considering defederation from Threads. However, it remains to be seen how Meta will handle moderation on such a large scale. Additionally, the inability of individuals to block an instance means we have to do what is best for the community.

If you have any added points or remarks on the above, please send them to @mwadmin@mastodon.world.

You're viewing a single thread.

381 comments

Instance Blocking - Unlike Mastodon, Lemmy does not provide a feature for individual users to block an instance (yet). This creates a dilemma where we must either defederate, disappointing those who desire interaction with Threads, or choose not to defederate, which will let down those who prefer no interaction with Threads.
This here is the sticking point. With mastodon.world there's no particular urgency to look for an instance that will block Threads because in a pinch I can block the site myself. With lemmy.world this is not an option at this point and is a direct data point in my preparing to move instances (again: I moved from lemmy.ml to here).
Embrace, extend, and extinguish (EEE) - We don’t think they can. If anyone can explain how they technically would, please let us know. Even if Meta forks Lemmy and gets rid of the original software, Lemmy will survive.
Uh ... all the XMPP clients survived. It's not like anybody snuck around into people's houses and deleted the XMPP apps when Google and Facebook decided to stop playing nicely.
The issue isn't "survival". The issue is "thriving". They can quite easily turn the Fediverse into an irrelevance again.
- Uh … all the XMPP clients survived. It’s not like anybody snuck around into people’s houses and deleted the XMPP apps when Google and Facebook decided to stop playing nicely.
  It's always the XMPP response... but is there any data out there that XMPP before Google/Facebook was better off than after it?
  Because from my point of view XMPP stagnated, got adopted by Google and Facebook which technologically was a huge rise of course, but in practice changed very little for 99.99% of people, and the inverse happened when Google and Facebook left, which was irrelevant for 99.99% of people and XMPP continued to stagnate.
  I'd really love some comparison from popular XMPP server Traffic (or monthly active users) before, during and after the Google/Facebook era.
  
  That’s my take on the whole thing. Google adopted a small OSS framework, used it with some of their apps and then as google does they killed their apps. They never did anything to the framework.
  It feels like people on this site have this notion that without Google stepping in XMPP would have huge, widespread adoption. The reality is that the average person isn’t interested in federation or anything else remotely technical. They want an easy to use client that abstracts as much as possible, and those tend to be centralized and corporate.
- The problem you're missing here is relative relevance. The entirety of the fediverse is ALREADY irrelevant compared to threads userbase. EEE just doesn't make sense.
  Fediverse outside of threads is already incredibly insignificant and likely always will be. This is perfectly fine. This is probably the best for us.
  
  The Fediverse has to exist for Threads to get around certain claims of being a monopoly in Europe. If the Fediverse at large rejects Threads, they can't point to Billy-Joe-Bob's Real Good-Like Fediverse Provider as "evidence" they're not monopolistic. The more of the Fediverse that interacts with Threads, the stronger their position as "not a monopoly" gets when arguing with European regulators.
  They didn't pick ActivityPub because it's a great protocol, trust me.
  
  That's not really the case though. The technology behind threads does not play a role in deciding if it is a monopoly or not.
  
  So let me ask you, what caused you to come to Lemmy?
  I am genuinely interested, because for the vast majority, it seems we came here to get off corporate social media. If the first thing we do is invite corporate social media back in, what was the point?
  
  Because I support open source technologies, and support the idea of the fediverse. I like to be able to get content all in one space, or my friends being able to follow me without having to use the same platform. corporations hosting would be less than ideal, but if they help invest money into the fediverse and help it grow, I'm all for it. I can always leave their server if I don't want on it, and go back to how platforms like Mastodon or Lemmy are today. Either it stays how it is today, or we have a chance of hitting mainstream appeal and letting more people see it's benefits.
  Like I hate meta just like alot of other people here, but I know Tumblr talked about adopting activityPub. Are they are "good company" or are all companies bad? What about valve supporting Linux gaming, they obviously benefit from helping it, but Linux gamers have gained a lot, are those actions bad as well? My point is, are you against them solely because they're "corporate social media" or are you against their practices in the past? I understand if it's the second one, because Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, are KNOWN to show content to keep people scrolling and interacting, to get ad money, for better or for worse. But The fediverse doesn't necessarily have that problem, especially with mastodon and lemmy. Thread may show ads to their users, but Lemmy and mastodon users will probably never get those. Basically federation with meta just provides more users/content to the platforms, not forcing everyone to switch to thread.
  Also if you're just mad at the fact that Facebook is a company, Mastodon is owned by a (non-profit) company. A company is just made up of people, and it isn't hard for once community focused companies (like Linux distros like Ubuntu or redhat) to get corrupted over time, and defederating with meta ISNT going to prevent that
  
  Using tumblr as an example, I really would not be as opposed to it them using ActivityPub. Would I like it? No, but there are 2 things that make Tumblr different. The first is userbase, tumblr is nowhere near as large or mainstream so while it would still be a firehose of content, it wouldn’t be nearly as unmanageable as Meta. The second is, well, tumblr is a joke compared to Meta. Meta is literally a household name, they have shitloads more resources than tumblr does and has a much higher chance of being able to fuck our shit up.
  Regarding your example with Valve and Linux, while I see the point you’re trying to make, I don’t think it’s quite the same. In this case, as you yourself say, Valve stands to make more money if Linux users are able to purchase and play their games. That is their incentive to help Linux, without one they just wouldn’t do it. Those actions aren’t bad either, they are good for Linux users.
  This scenario is a bit more like if Microsoft announced that they were working to get the Office Suite built into the Linux Kernel itself. Some users welcome the change, after all, Office Suite is used everywhere, so maybe this will make Linux more accessible to some. But other users are pissed, because they could just use Windows if they wanted Office Suite built in, they chose Linux because it did not.
  In this scenario, i’d be more inclined to side with the latter users. There are 2 seperate, distinct pieces of software, and some want one to be more like the other, instead of just using it themselves. I mean, it’s silly really. You can choose to use either platform, why force one to become the other?
  
  Good points, I'll mainly respond to your last line. Isn't that the whole point of the fediverse? Does it make sense for platforms to keep to themselves instead? Mastodon only to mastodon, Lemmy to Lemmy, kbin to kbin? You could probably make exceptions for some platforms since kbin has parts of mastodon and Lemmy in it, so maybe it can talk to both, but I mean that would solve a lot of these questions, only allow federation to similar software. I feel like it defeats the point of the fediverse and would hurt other things like pixelfeed or peertube as I only really see those posts on my mastodon feed, but to be fair, it is pretty confusing trying to figure out what posts from what platforms will show, like when I see a peertube post on mastodon, I assume it's like a tweet linking to the video, not the ACTUAL video.
  I think the cat is out of the bag already with doing it that way, with the fediverse existing as different open source apps commonly used together but separately rather than an interconnected mess of posts we're kinda working our way towards. But it would be an interesting and, dare I say, almost better way to handle this, as thread is its own type of server, if it was made Public, it WOULDN'T be Mastodon, so why would anyone assume thread posts should show up together.
  Basically I agree with your last line, that leaving them seperate may be better, even if it's alittle counter to what the fediverse is
  
  I do see what you are saying and I think this point is really the only one that has any validity to it, because the idea of this thing is that it should be as open as possible. I would of course say Lemmy, Kbin, Mastodon, they should federate with one another despite being technically different sites.
  But the issue doesn’t lay with Threads itself. Take Meta out of the equation and i’m up to federate with it. I think it might really change things with there suddenly have 10’s of millions of users suddenly here, but I couldn’t assume it would be for the worse.
  The issue lies with the ruthlessness of the company itself, and its history of awful behavior. As soon as it becomes more profitable to screw over Lemmy (this will happen, you are always going to be more profitable if everyone is using your platform, plain and simple), they will. In my eyes it is not a matter of if, but when. Everyone at Meta involved with threads could have good intentions for it, I can’t say they don’t, but staff changes, and a company’s attitude towards projects shifts.
  Meta has the resources to create whatever they want. They could develop something much more feature-rich than anyone could ever want, without ever involving or needing the Fediverse at all. They would own the entire thing, and would not need to deal with outside forces at all. So we have to ask ourselves, what do they look to gain from federating with us?
- Very good, rational response.
- The matter of "thriving" is exactly why I believe federating with Meta can be beneficial. We won't be able to prevent them from becoming the biggest instance, they accomplished it the very moment they opened Threads, regardless of federation. But if Threads user can see Fediverse posts and the experience they have, they might decide they'll be better off dropping Meta and jumping ship.
  The reason why Threads immediately became so big is because everyone in Instagram was one click away from making a Threads account, and federation means they will also be pretty much one click away from making a Mastodon account too.
  But if we stay cowering by a corner, closed off to the biggest userbase, is that really gonna make us thrive?
  
  I don't call "being flooded with toxic surveillance capitalist stooges" thriving, personally. I like what we had before we had VCs looking for ways to monetize a nicer corner of the Internet after they fucked up the previous nicer corners.
  
  A lot of people are looking for better social platforms to be in. A lot of people have been leaving Reddit and Twitter, and people have been leaving Facebook for years now. What's with calling them all "toxic surveillance capitalist stooges"? These are people. Friends, family, creators. People who are worth having in a community.
  Gotta say I'm finding this increasing purist elitism I'm seeing in Lemmy pretty off-putting.
  And at the end of the day this is all fear. I see folks are scared that the Fediverse will be yet another thing to be ruined rather than trusting that it can endure and entice people. If you want this place to thrive, you need to believe in it.
  
  If you are supporting corporate surveillance-capitalist social media, you're a stooge for it. It's that simple. Are you necessarily a bad person for it? Of course not! But I still don't want you in my space while you're doing it because that shit infects everything it touches ranging from its attitudes ("why is my timeline empty instead of having the site tell me what I want to read?") to its culture ("outrage keeps eyes on ads").
  And again, you and I have different underlying warrants, I'm guessing. I don't view "a mass of Twitter- or Reddit-style users" to be thriving. I left Twitter (YEARS before Musk took it over!) precisely because it wasn't "thriving". It was merely loud. (And I never was on Reddit.)
  And here's the thing that the "the line must go up" crowd doesn't seem to get.
  It's alright to have different spaces for different tastes. I don't care if people go to Twitter or Instagram or Bluesky or Threads or whatever other place surveillance capitalism sets up to generate outrage. That's their choice and if that's how they want to live, more power to them.
  I just want them to stop coming into the spaces I enjoy while doing it. We already have Twitter. And Gab and Parler and FrankSocial and Bluesky and Instagram and Facebook and now Threads. They don't have to be here too.
  
  It's always a little weird when people use this talk of "it's okay to like different things" when what one side wants is to exclude people and they don't care what anyone else wants. Just seems like a soft, pseudo-philosophical way to say "I don't want them here". Which to be fair you are also saying directly. But no, this is not alright, this is just gatekeeping.
  But on top of that it's interesting to know that even though you treat other people as if existing in bad platforms changed them so that the platform has become an inextricable part of them and vice-versa, as if allowing Facebook users in is equivalent to handing the keys to Mark Zuckerberg. Even though you have been on one of these bad platforms and it doesn't seem like it tainted you in that manner. What's with this platform purity mindset? Now that you are over them you think the time is up for people wanting to shed them and doors should be shut?
  Spare me this "line must go up crowd" talk, I'm not interested in inviting people because of Capitalism, just to raise numbers for the sake of raising numbers, I'm interested in it because these are people that I like, that I think will contribute to this place and we communities we have here. And lets be clear, many of them need it. There are whole communities that simply haven't gotten off of the ground yet, we don't have as many people as we need to thrive as it is.
  Gotta say you may never have been on Reddit but you could have fooled me, this way of playing with connotation to make people look bad is something I saw plenty there.
  
  I just want them to stop coming into the spaces I enjoy while doing [their thing in Twitter/Instagram/whatever].
  If they want to join the Fediverse as actual "citizens" (so to speak) I'll be the first to welcome them with open arms. It's them behaving as they have been (manipulated into) doing on said platforms that is not welcome.
  If they come to the Fediverse knowing it's a different place, knowing that it's got a different culture and a different set of expectations, they're welcome. The more the merrier. What I object to is having them use the toxic corporate surveillance capitalist systems (that manipulate them into being antisocial) to then also connect here.
  It is META I do not welcome. Its users are welcome to ... join us. Just not on Meta. Because Meta's products are explicitly designed to turn on the outrage by careful (quasi-algorithmic) selection of what their eyes fall on. And if they're connected to us while that happens, that spreads to us. If the same people ditch Meta and join us, I have zero objections.
  Do you see the difference?

381 comments