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2y ago

A thought about federation

There's been discussion of federation with Lemmygrad. I think this is probably a good call. I just want to know how the anti-sectarian rule would be enforced. Like, it someone makes an anti-anarchist post on lemmygrad.ml and it shows up on hexbear.net, would the moderators hide the comment on our end but not on Lemmygrad? Would repeat offenders be banned from hexbear.net even though they made the comment on a different iteration?

Same for one of the bigger anarchist instances like lemmy.blahaj.zone which has good leftist and trans content but also has regular struggle sessions about "tankies." It seems like federation with then would be a boon for both sites, but moderating the left unity rule would be a nightmare.

Also, another thought: would downbears from other instances carry over here?

77 comments

I really wanna know the answer to the downbears. For such an insignificant back-end change, I think removing them did a lot to shift site culture for the better.
- I believe the way it works is that on lemmygrad if this comment got 400 downvotes it would show up at (time of writing) -395, but anyone viewing from hexbear would still see +5
- I think removing them did a lot to shift site culture for the better.
  What is better about it, though?
  
  They didn't really help filter out low-effort content and we're mostly used as an "I disagree" button. Removing them meant it took a little bit of effort to dogpile someone and the site seemed much friendly after they were removed.
  Of course, it means we can no longer down vote wreckers and trolls to hide their comments, but the mods usually ban them pretty fast anyways (
  to our mods )
  
  Downvotes tell you that someone doesn't like your post or comment, but tell you nothing about why. Can't really see them doing anything but making the site feels more hostile.

Copied my comment from another thread: We should actually do this.
We should bring back chapo.chat, but with a twist:
hexbear.net federates with no one except for chapo.chat
chapo.chat federates with the entire outside world for agitation purposes.
- that's cool
  chapo.chat the posting division of hexbear
  
  posting division
  Heresy.
- I kind of like this, have a federated version and a non-federated version and folks pick their experience.
  I'd pitch three version, an insular hexbear.net, a left wing only federated one, and an all-of-lemmy version with relaxed moderation of other instances
  
  We need a third name, I suggest lib.rehab
- Sort of an air-gap for shitfuckery. I like it.
- Make it so when you click on the hexbear icon in the top left it puts on the ideology sunglasses
  and you can see the federated content.
- so basically a Lemmy where we don't ever defend AES. because that is all it takes to be TANKIE.
  
  😊
- I don't know if I've seen a fediverse site try this before. Kinda want to see how well it'd work now.
- This sounds like more work for the dev team and it will no doubt push actual federatin' further out, but I do really like this idea

I don't get people's grips about Lemmygrad. We outnumber them in users and in posting activity. There's little to fear about Hexbear being Lemmygradized. Our megathread is probably as active as their entire instance and we have two megathreads on top of the rest of the site. We're also, shall we say, far more aggressive about airing out our grievances against our online opponents.
If anything, it's the opposite. They have to fear Lemmygrad being steamrolled by Hexbear users. There's going to be a learning curve because no one would want to federate with us if we're completely aggro on random users even if they completely deserve it lmao
- We're apparently 10% of the entire lemmy usercount, odds are every instance should be afraid of us federating with them
  
  We're not locked in here with them.
  They're locked in here with us.
  
  We will all share one toothbrush
  we will all share one server
- There's going to be a learning curve because no one would want to federate with us if we're completely aggro on random users even if they completely deserve it lmao
  Nobody is gonna wanna federate with me and you know what that's okay

Blahaj zone is regrettably a shithole about "tankie" hysteria. Comparing it to lemmygrad is unfair to lemmygrad.
- Seriously "are the tankies in the room with you right now?" Energy. We have to be one of the smalest left of thatcher cliques in politics right now.
- :this:

which has good leftist and trans content but also has regular struggle sessions about "tankies."
So they're a bunch of
's
- Yeah, saying they have "good leftist content" when they spew bile on nearly any AES is being overly generous.

We've federated Lemmygrad with other instances for over 3 years now, and essentially our way to go about it is to only moderate what happens on our instance or from one of our user.
If hexbear removes a post that's on lemmygrad for example, it will only be removed for Hexbear. The post will still remain up on lemmygrad and will still federate with other instances.
If you ban someone from lemmygrad on hexbear, they will only be banned for hexbear and cannot interact on your instance anymore.
But the way reports are made is they're sent to every relevant mod/admin. If someone from Lemmy world posts on lemmy ml, and a lemmygradian makes the report, all three admin teams will receive it. We just take a second to see which instance the report is made on, and which instance the reported user is from, and then mark it as solved because we don't have the inclination to moderate what happens on other instances. We figure it's the "price" of federation, if you hop on to All then you're gonna see libreddit stuff.
It's a system that works for us, it might not be perfect but so far we haven't received any complaints.
- if you hop on to All then you're gonna see libreddit stuff
  suggest making the default user settings "Subscribed". would also help with people accidentally breaking sub rules
  
  Or perhaps a "local - all" would be good
- But the way reports are made is they're sent to every relevant mod/admin. If someone from Lemmy world posts on lemmy ml, and a lemmygradian makes the report, all three admin teams will receive it.
  The reporters admins/mods can't actually moderate though right?
  Like some beehawite reporting a Hexbear post doesn't let beehawite mess with our stuff right?
  
  They can remove the post, but it would only remove it for people browsing from beehaw. Every other instance would still see the post.

As a side note, there is lots of (anecdotal) talk about how Lemmygrad was far less insufferable and far more chill and well-read before the GenZedong reddit influx a year ago, and from my experience their shittiest whiny users are a small, screaming minority of them.
My point being, for those user to get banned by us, an instance with an obviously substantial M-L userbase (among other socialist and anarchist ideologies), is a slap in the face I really want to see.
- Why would you call yourself an ML unless you've well, read M and L? I feel like you've got to earn the right to be an ornery asshole.
  
  I feel like you've got to earn the right to be an ornery asshole.
  
  big bill haywood might've had something to say about that, and a lot of maoist outreach was to illiterate peasantry but as for us jackasses on the internet... not being able to focus on long-form reading or find good audiobooks consistently is why i don't identify as any tendency
  
  Everyone I hate hates them so they must have done something right/.

The way i see the discussion going on blahaj.zone makes me think they'll probably make the decision to block grad and hexbear before hexbear has to make any decisions.
- Rn they've been monitoring lemmygrad users but letting them hang out and given the moderation culture I don't see that changing
  
  That's better than I expected tbh, but I expect beehaw and sopuli to press them to block lemmygrad eventually. Those two are really salty about not being able to impose a quarantine on "tankies".

downbears = cringe

You won't see that content on Lemmygrad unless you subscribe to spaces on lemmygrad that produce it, or unless you use Lemmy's equivalent of /r/all which shows you everything in the federation regardless of the comms you are subscribed to.
You've got to think of the Federation as the big Reddit network of communities. You don't see the communities unless you subscribe to them or go looking in feeds where all of their content is visible at once though.
- Right, but we'll still be commenting in each other's communities. Most sectarianism doesn't happen at the post level.
  
  Ah I see. Well the way I see it is you should have to observe the rules of the federated-site (and comm) when participating in their comms, and they should do the same vice versa.
  I would expect us to ban anyone that comes here and spews sectarianism. But I would not expect us to ban a Hexbear if the sectarian posting they do is not actually on Hexbear but instead in a lemmygrad comm.
  This seems like good-practice for avoiding the site getting defederated too. If Hexbears go elsewhere and just break the rules of everywhere they go then the reputation will eventually be that Hexbear are a nuisance that do not care about the rules of any space they go into and that will result in defederation. This will take some time for Hexbear users to get used to though and I suspect there will be initial pains that look quite similar to major drama explosions that happened here for
  except cross-federation.
  There are also some problems in my opinion with Lemmy looking the same too much. Comms need banners and sidebar images so that users can FEEL that they are in a different space and adjust their behaviour accordingly. Right now if everything looks the same everywhere you go people's default behaviour will be whatever they have already gotten, but the default behaviour of a Hexbear isn't going to go down well in a lot of liberal spaces. If it actually felt like you were in a different space you would be more likely to adjust behaviour.

wait, this isn't about Star Trek? shit.
(you raised several good questions)

What does Lemmygrad think of federating with us?
- They seem more or less very excited to watch us purge their libs.
  
  That sounds like unpaid labour if you ask me.
  
  Well, then even if we dont federate I propose sending an International Brigade over.

Yeah I hadn't actually thought about that consequence of federating with lemmygrad.ml, but generally I don't love how there is no user input into these decisions mods just do them.
I get it with migrating because that's ultimately a move to allow them to do less work on the back end, and therefore maybe shouldn't be subject to a democratic decision. But federating seems like a much bigger deal and I'd like to at least have users feelings on federation heard even if we end up ultimately agreeing with the mods.
- Lemmygrad really is the closest comparison to this site and the only unknowable cross-pollination would be lemmygrad people commenting and posting here.
  
  the only unknowable cross-pollination would be lemmygrad people commenting and posting here
  Yeah that's what the OP is about.

Are there good user tools for blocking who they want? If so, I think federating would be a good thing as long as the communities we are federating with aren’t transphobic or filled with chuds or extremely bad takes. In particular, it would be nice to find a larger audience for some of the topics/comms here that don’t get much attention, like /c/diy.
- I agree! Every individual has a "block user" button next to their name and a little crossed out circle on their comments you can use to block them. I'm not sure if there's also a block community feature but I bet there is.
  
  There is a block community feature, but if you want to block an entire instance then you're out of luck.
  
  click username in top right -> Settings -> Blocks -> Block communities

Very good question. I'm sure the admins/devs have talked about it but I don't know what more to say than that.
- My goal is to bring the conversation into the open, get people thinking about it, maybe come to a concensus and even get admin input.
  I also saw a lot of people taking for granted the idea of federation with leninist instances and wanted to use this post as a way of reminding folks that this is a unity site.
  
  Lemmygrad is a bit more "tankie", but they're not violently anti anarchist in the way some of the lib instances are violently anti "tankie"

can users be banned from an entire instance that isn't their home instance? if so, i guess a "you guys respect our site culture over here and we'll respect your site culture over there" type of agreement would hopefully work out.
- yes, if my lemmygrad account were to be banned from this instance I wouldn't be able to comment in any hexbear comms, and I don't think you would see any of my comments in lemmygrad comms or even a 3rd instance either

Disclaimer: I am NOT a mod or admin, or in any way affiliated with the admin or modteam. (Still massively appreciate you all for all the work you do). These are just my educated guesses.
Probably how it works on Reddit with subreddits. People will only be banned for rule breaking content if they post it on the hexbear instance. If users don't want to see posts from other instances, they can browse by local only. In the same way you can only view subscribed subreddits on Reddit. Local only is a big button at the top of the UI in Lemmy when federation is enabled. So the only interaction people browsing by local only will have with users from other instances, is those users that comment on hexbear posts. Kinda like other users from r/all stumbling on subreddits you are subscribed to.

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