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Chris Gioran 💔

Fosstodon decided not to defederate from Threads, deferring to the ability of each user to individually block

hub.fosstodon.org/our-position

This is disappointing in a big way. To me, this is equivalent to saying that we allow transphobic content in the local timeline because you can block offending users yourself.

It is the lack of a position, the avoidance of a decision. I hope the admin team revisit this soon.

hub.fosstodon.orgOur Position On Blocking ThreadsWe've been discussing this a lot both within the team, and with our Patrons. Here's what Fosstodon will be doing about Threads federation.

@chrisg I struggle to see how this comparison is at all relevant.

What people want ("no interaction with threads-dot-net") can be achieved with a user-initiated server block as good as with a server-to-server defederation. Only the latter is a forceful opt-in for everyone with no opt-out possibility.

Fosstodon (or rather Mastodon, the software) lets you be flexible. You can block Threads and pretend it doesn't exist, but not break anyone's experience. Isn't this a win-win?

@kytta Let me put it this way:

Why is this discussion happening? Why should fosstodon defederate from Threads in the first place?

It's the new moderation policy from Meta, right? Instances will be defederated if they are found to be bad. That's why already a whole bunch of instances are blocked by fosstodon.

If "you can do it on your own" was an actual solution, then no server blocks would be necessary. But they are. So _not_ blocking is a choice.

I disagree with this choice.

@kytta @chrisg Not for people being in a bad group that will have to actually get abused before they realise that they can block the domain, it's why we block stuff on an instance level, would you for example be okay with getting child porn in your feed because you have not yet blocked a bad instance?

You can block the CP instance and pretend it doesn't exist, but not break anyone's experience. Isn't that a win-win?

Basically this is not about priviledged people like you and me, but about protecting the people that aren't, I for one care about those.

@sotolf @chrisg thanks for clarifying this for me, I guess I need to step out of my perspective and worldview from time to time 😅

@kytta @chrisg That happens to all of us :) It certainly does to me quite often, but as long as we learn :) I fuck up pretty often still, with not really seeing things from other's perspective, and to be honest some times I'm just tired and don't think things through :p we're all human after all :)

@kytta no, it's not a win-win it's a shit take

@chrisg To brag: freeradical.zone #FRZ had a "referendum" on this and @tek , the instance owner respected the decision of the people to defed from Threads from the get-go onwards, even though it did not reflect his personal opinion.

@chrisg Are they at least silencing threads?

@linos I have no insight further to what the blog post provides, so I assume no limiting.

@chrisg That's what we wen't for, but we might reconsider that decision in our next meeting. However, we haven't received a single report yet of a threads account (maybe due to the silencing/limited federation mode).

@chrisg The new moderation policy of Meta means Threads is in breach of the Mastodon Server Covenant. That calls for instance-level blocks.

@foolishowl Based purely on the content of joinmastodon.org/covenant, I understand that moderation is necessary for being listed in joinmastodon's instance picker, which threads.net isn't.

Is it true that this also means that such instances should be blocked? Is that documented somewhere or is it more of an unwritten rule?

joinmastodon.orgMastodon Server Covenant for joinmastodon.org

@chrisg I think some instances have adherence to the Covenant as a formal policy, but in general I think it's understood among most moderators I've talked to that this is the minimum standard for federation.