1y ago

kbin.social

kbin has an issue at the moment. As a software platform, it was not ready for the huge influx of users that came with the reddit migration.

As such, it doesn't have robust moderation tools, and one of the biggest issues is that an instance can only have a single admin. In the case of kbin.social, the admin is also the lead dev of the kbin software project as a whole.

I love kbin, I love the project and what it stands for, and I think ernest has created an amazing platform that I has more potential than lemmy. But in the here and now, kbin.social is woefully under moderated. It has been a large source of spam, and harbours active transphobes and transphobic communities that are effectively unmoderated.

So, Blåhaj Lemmy folk, I'm seeking your feedback. Would you rather we defederate until the kbin moderation tools are improved, or stay connected and deal with the bigotry and spam on our end as best we can?

See this thread on kbin.social for a ongoing discussion about the issue https://kbin.social/m/kbinMeta/t/304907

Edit - So far, it seems that most of the spam etc isn't making it through to people, which is great! It means we can keep things going as they are without it impacting people too much. Please use this thread to let me know if that changes though

Please note, this discussion is intended for Blåhaj Lemmy users to provide feedback. Top Level comments made from instances other than Blåhaj Lemmy will be removed. If you are from an external instance, you are welcome to engage in the discussion, but I request that you do so in reply to other comments.

28 comments

I haven't noticed much in the way of bigots from kbin, probably in part to the mods :P. Honestly, lemmy.world seems to have waaaay more issues with moderation; like, it seems that the worst of reddit moved there. I've literally seen people there throwing around slurs to insult each other and it feels like that's just to be expected as it doesn't really get moderated. Kbin.social is way more tame than lemmy.world imo, and if it were to be de-federated, then lemmy.world would have been ages before that.
- and if it were to be de-federated, then lemmy.world would have been ages before that.
  .world gets the "untouchably large instance" pass that mastodon.social and it's ilk always gets, especially amplified by the community oriented structure of Lemmy.
  This is in no way a dig to the admins here btw. Defederating from .world would cut off a LOT of otherwise alright communities. That said with their recent statement of "we're not big compared to Mastodon so we're not doing anything bad by keeping registrations open!! We want more 🚀 users 🚀" seemed so disingenuous that I myself am considering just outright filtering them out on my own end. And if the Beehaw defederation didn't bring any sense into them then Blahaj defederating won't do much either.
  Honestly we're lucky the admin doesn't seem to be namesearching and replyguying like some others (ahem universeodon ahem)

Depends on how much bigotry and spam comes from this instance.
- And that's why I'm asking :)
  If you're not seeing spam or abuse, then we're probably doing ok. But if you are seeing it and it's impacting your experience, that's what I'd like to know about
  
  May I ask why you posted this? Was there a post/community/behavior that you saw that was questionable?
  I ask because I don't think I've seen (yet) any offending posts from kbin so I was quite surprised to read your post. But then again I'm on smaller instances so maybe I don't see everything you guys see. :)
  
  I think that defederating should be left as a last-resort option. The more instances we have in Lemmy communicating between each other, the better (unless Nazis/bigots/etc).

honestly, I've never seen anything bad from kbin. only very positive. lemmy.world though... understandably most of it is all right, so I don't think defederating is the call. specific communities with moderation issues can be blocked by users. the instances as a whole are mostly all right.

I feel like this is something where you, the admins, take priority. While i havent noticed much hate or spam from kbin.social (aside from random), if it is making enough impact that the admins dont have the resources (either time wise, emotion wise, or what have you) to do other admin things then i support you in defederating. Of course, i prefer to stay federated, but because you and the other admins and mods are doing the heavy lifting here i think your thoughts and feelings on this matter take priority.

I'd personally say defederate if only to make your own lives easier for the foreseeable future, it doesn't seem worth dealing with even potential bigotry for an indeterminate amount of time like that
- As a kbin user, I see quite a lot of spam/inappropriate posting on the /c/random magazine coming from blahaj accounts. They do however seem to be removed fairly quickly as I can never find them again. So I'm not sure it's something that is specific to us.
  It's also unfortunate to hear the report of those types.of active communities. I've not come across any, thankfully!
  
  I'm honestly more thinking of it for the sake of our admins, it sucks to suggest blocking off any community needlessly but I'd rather their lives be made as easy as possible. I have occasionally seen bigotry which has been swiftly dealt with but I can't say I've noticed a particular source. I am disappointed to learn that there is inappropriate behaviour coming from blahaj users but I suppose it shouldn't be surprising, this being the internet and all 😕
  
  If Blahaj users are posting spam and it’s getting removed, then it must be the only spam getting removed from Kbin. I had to block it because of all the bot/spam posting.

On my own end I've elected to hide all comments from kbin.social users (via uBlock, see https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/post/1633853) and I've been avoiding subscribing to communities hosted there. Not because any bigotry or whatever (I try my best to report anything I find suspicious) but just because any time I've seen comments with "meh vibes" (even if it isn't anywhere near bigotry) it seems to come from there (or lemmy.world, which I've also been trying my best to limit my own participation to, but I haven't yet filtered them out completely)
Granted that's probably because of it's flagship status. kbin is way more centralized than Lemmy ended up being. (Even with .world's frankly unmanageable size)
I am not explicitly advocating for defederation (if it isn't causing a large burden behind the scenes, that is), but if you did defederate I personally wouldn't complain :p

Why do you think it has more potential than lemmy? What is that you like about kbin and what does it stand for? Genuine questions
- It's been like 2 months since the reddit migration started and kbin still doesn't have a way to collapse comments. I am confused when people say it has a better UI than Lemmy.
  
  I very much did not say it had a better UI :)

The only real community I visit from there is !SquaredCircle@kbin.social so hopefully not because I love it and they're staunchy anti bigot; I did notice that it seems like the community wasn't updating or sending messages from here to there the other day which is weird :(
- That's the only kbin I'm subscribed to as well, I would be sad to see it go.

I'm using Kbin.Social as a backup instance for when Blåhaj Lemmy goes down, so defederation wouldn't necessarily be ideal.

No, don't defederate. I haven't seen any problems on this instance. Plus I'll miss you.

28 comments