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The Fediverse is inefficient but that's a good trade-off

berk.es

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Re: The Fediverse is inefficient but that's a good trade-off

#11

Post by csande17 »

hnarn wrote: post #9
csande17 wrote: post #7

Does Mastodon need to spend more time per post on moderation than a service like Twitter? As I understand it, people generally report bad posts to the moderator of the instance they came from and expect them to take them down. And if the instance is unresponsive to takedown requests, it gets added to a blacklist that is shared widely across instances (via #fediblock etc). So the end result is you generally have one p…

I don’t really understand what point you’re trying to make. The way moderation is handled in your example sure sounds a lot more democratic, or at the very least with some fundamentals allowing it to be democratic, than twitter ever will be.

I was responding to the "human inefficiencies" section of the article, which claims that Mastodon is inherently much more inefficient than Twitter because many different moderators (from different instances) must act on the same post. I don't think that's true in practice.

Re: The Fediverse is inefficient but that's a good trade-off

#12

Post by seydor »

hnarn wrote: post #9
csande17 wrote: post #7

Does Mastodon need to spend more time per post on moderation than a service like Twitter? As I understand it, people generally report bad posts to the moderator of the instance they came from and expect them to take them down. And if the instance is unresponsive to takedown requests, it gets added to a blacklist that is shared widely across instances (via #fediblock etc). So the end result is you generally have one p…

I don’t really understand what point you’re trying to make. The way moderation is handled in your example sure sounds a lot more democratic, or at the very least with some fundamentals allowing it to be democratic, than twitter ever will be.

> it gets added to a blacklist

unless there is an election about who gets added to the list it s not even democratic. And the freedom of speech is generally protected, not subject to the whims of democracy

Re: The Fediverse is inefficient but that's a good trade-off

#13

Post by JonathonW »

dustedcodes wrote: post #10
csande17 wrote: post #7

Does Mastodon need to spend more time per post on moderation than a service like Twitter? As I understand it, people generally report bad posts to the moderator of the instance they came from and expect them to take them down. And if the instance is unresponsive to takedown requests, it gets added to a blacklist that is shared widely across instances (via #fediblock etc). So the end result is you generally have one p…

I don't understand the network-wide ban? That makes Mastodon inherently centralised. Who is the person who has the final say which server may be part of the fediverse? Why does a network-ban even need to exist? There is no algorithm that presents your feed with posts from other servers. You only see who you follow. It's like saying some person has the final say which RSS feeds all RSS feed readers should ban from the…

There is no network-wide ban; each server manages its own list of banned remote servers.

There are lists of servers with bad reputations that get passed around and form the beginnings of many servers’ blocklists, but there’s no central entity maintaining a single list that says which servers are or aren’t part of the fediverse.

Re: The Fediverse is inefficient but that's a good trade-off

#14

Post by lifeisstillgood »

This reminds me of acoup.blog and his take on subsistence farming as a risk reduction decision. Yes under Roman rule there was more "efficient" farming as some (slave worked) farms began focusing on primary crops for sale.

This meant efficiency of scale plus Ricardos law kicked in and Roman food production increased even without Haber or John Deere.

But most small farmers throughout the ages did not do this - they could have invented the co-op mass farm but the risks were too great - there was not a trade system globally that could guarantee delivery of food stuff X and so it was sensible to not focus your own production on food stuff Y but to grow a little of everything.

I think what we are seeing here is Mastodon etc as the response to the risks of centralised but efficient servers - privacy, ads, government monitoring etc.

Re: The Fediverse is inefficient but that's a good trade-off

#15

Post by csande17 »

dustedcodes wrote: post #10
csande17 wrote: post #7

Does Mastodon need to spend more time per post on moderation than a service like Twitter? As I understand it, people generally report bad posts to the moderator of the instance they came from and expect them to take them down. And if the instance is unresponsive to takedown requests, it gets added to a blacklist that is shared widely across instances (via #fediblock etc). So the end result is you generally have one p…

I don't understand the network-wide ban? That makes Mastodon inherently centralised. Who is the person who has the final say which server may be part of the fediverse? Why does a network-ban even need to exist? There is no algorithm that presents your feed with posts from other servers. You only see who you follow. It's like saying some person has the final say which RSS feeds all RSS feed readers should ban from the…

> Why does a network-ban even need to exist? There is no algorithm that presents your feed with posts from other servers. You only see who you follow.

Mastodon servers do often have a "federated timeline" that shows you all the posts from servers your instance knows about. People can also send you unsolicited messages by replying to you or @-mentioning you.

> Who is the person who has the final say which server may be part of the fediverse?

I don't think there's really a single person with the authority to ban someone from the whole fediverse; your instance admins always have the final say about whether their instance talks to another instance. But things like shared blocklists mean that, in the vast majority of unambiguous spam or illegal content cases, only one person actually has to respond to them directly.

Re: The Fediverse is inefficient but that's a good trade-off

#16

Post by peterweyand »

I've seen more and more advertisements for Mastadon on HN, probably because of the whole Twitter debacle. Does anyone use the service? I mean, enough people so that the average person would know what it is? From my experience with Mastadon it took me a while to even learn how the service was used, and all I remember was thinking "wow that's too complicated to use or get Joe Average User to sign up for". Without ease of use a critical mass of users won't be possible so it won't ever be anything other than a niche product.

Re: The Fediverse is inefficient but that's a good trade-off

#17

Post by davisoneee »

seydor wrote: post #12
hnarn wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t really understand what point you’re trying to make. The way moderation is handled in your example sure sounds a lot more democratic, or at the very least with some fundamentals allowing it to be democratic, than twitter ever will be.

> it gets added to a blacklist unless there is an election about who gets added to the list it s not even democratic. And the freedom of speech is generally protected, not subject to the whims of democracy

If it's an instance level ban, then you can vote with your feet by migrating to a new instance. You are not electing who goes on the list, but you are electing to follow certain lists implicitly by which instance you join.

With mastodon/fediverse, you have a choice of numerous different 'twitters', rather than being stuck with the global twitter decision.

Re: The Fediverse is inefficient but that's a good trade-off

#18

Post by xg15 »

dustedcodes wrote: post #10
csande17 wrote: post #7

Does Mastodon need to spend more time per post on moderation than a service like Twitter? As I understand it, people generally report bad posts to the moderator of the instance they came from and expect them to take them down. And if the instance is unresponsive to takedown requests, it gets added to a blacklist that is shared widely across instances (via #fediblock etc). So the end result is you generally have one p…

I don't understand the network-wide ban? That makes Mastodon inherently centralised. Who is the person who has the final say which server may be part of the fediverse? Why does a network-ban even need to exist? There is no algorithm that presents your feed with posts from other servers. You only see who you follow. It's like saying some person has the final say which RSS feeds all RSS feed readers should ban from the…

Also very new to this still, but from what I got so far, #fediblock is first and foremost just a hashtag. It's "well known" and there is a convention behind it, but it doesn't have any specific technical effects - i.e., you can't just remote control another server's blocklist by tooting #fediblock.

If your server's admin(?) makes a fediblock toot, that's more an statement that your own server has blocked someone and asks other servers to do the same. Admins of the other servers can always decide how to deal with that signal - ignore, issue the same block, boost the signal, etc. (Though there is probably some "peer-pressure"/reputation management at work, which makes their decisions not completely free)

So the "network-wide ban" really isn't. It's more a ban from the vast majority of the network - but there is no technical way to issue a genuine ban from all Mastodon instances, the way you can e.g. get banned from the entirety of Reddit.

That at least seems more democratic to me. Of course the usual pitfalls of democratic systems still apply: How to deal with bad-faith #fediblock signals? How to avoid hidden centralisation where certain instances gain more authority to issue blocks than others? etc...

If someone more experienced has some articles with more details about how the system works, that would be really cool.

Re: The Fediverse is inefficient but that's a good trade-off

#19

Post by throwaway0x7E6 »

seydor wrote: post #12
hnarn wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t really understand what point you’re trying to make. The way moderation is handled in your example sure sounds a lot more democratic, or at the very least with some fundamentals allowing it to be democratic, than twitter ever will be.

> it gets added to a blacklist unless there is an election about who gets added to the list it s not even democratic. And the freedom of speech is generally protected, not subject to the whims of democracy

there's no globally enforced blacklist. servers decide their own peering policy. cringe servers wall themselves off with much zeal, while based servers don't even care about cringe servers' existence. it's great

Re: The Fediverse is inefficient but that's a good trade-off

#20

Post by imagineerschool »

peterweyand wrote: post #16

I've seen more and more advertisements for Mastadon on HN, probably because of the whole Twitter debacle. Does anyone use the service? I mean, enough people so that the average person would know what it is? From my experience with Mastadon it took me a while to even learn how the service was used, and all I remember was thinking "wow that's too complicated to use or get Joe Average User to sign up for". Without ease…

I have been using it for a while, and it's pretty good. Only people who want to use it are on it. The feeling of community is real.
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