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I am stepping down as the CEO of Mastodon

blog.joinmastodon.org

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Re: I am stepping down as the CEO of Mastodon

#371

Post by amiga386 »

latexr wrote: post #359
rckt wrote: post #357

Decentralisation on Mastodon is an illusion. For me a truly decentralised thing is where I am a node that transmits and can receive transmissions, like radios. When there has to be a server that's being administrated by somebody, this already puts me in a position where I depend on the people who own the server. This means that if for any reason these people don't like me, they can simply ban me and that's it. Basica…

> When there has to be a server that's being administrated by somebody And that somebody can be you. There are Mastodon servers operated by individuals for their friends or their small company. Anyone can host a server with their own rules.

Though that will then open you up to legal liability, including for things that other people say (if their messages reach your server, even if you haven't personally seen them): https://denise.dreamwidth.org/91757.html

Being a user on someone else's server is much less legal risk. Using E2E software where nobody runs a server is much less legal risk. Running a one-person instance of Mastodon is the worst case for legal liability.

Re: I am stepping down as the CEO of Mastodon

#373

Post by brabel »

theshackleford wrote: post #271
api wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would never, ever want to have anything to do with running any kind of online community these days, or even anything adjacent to one.

It wasn’t that great 10 or twenty years ago either. I ran a sizable community in my county in the late to mid 2000s and got death threats, human feces mailed to my home, calls and visits to my place of employment and constant threats of various kinds of lawsuits. Eventually my blood pressure was driven too high and I fucked it off. A high percentage of people are like barely functioning apes flinging shit and I just…

Kind of funny how you complain about people being mean to you and then accuse a high percentage of them of being apes flinging shit. You have some unresolved issues.

Re: I am stepping down as the CEO of Mastodon

#374

Post by Angostura »

rckt wrote: post #357

Decentralisation on Mastodon is an illusion. For me a truly decentralised thing is where I am a node that transmits and can receive transmissions, like radios. When there has to be a server that's being administrated by somebody, this already puts me in a position where I depend on the people who own the server. This means that if for any reason these people don't like me, they can simply ban me and that's it. Basica…

There’s really nothing to stop you running your own server.

One of my impractical, but dream ideas was to create a Mastodon client that had a server embedded in it. No more ‘Signing up for a server’ by default you had your own instance

Re: I am stepping down as the CEO of Mastodon

#375

Post by Angostura »

amiga386 wrote: post #371
latexr wrote: post #359

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When there has to be a server that's being administrated by somebody And that somebody can be you. There are Mastodon servers operated by individuals for their friends or their small company. Anyone can host a server with their own rules.

Though that will then open you up to legal liability, including for things that other people say (if their messages reach your server, even if you haven't personally seen them): https://denise.dreamwidth.org/91757.html Being a user on someone else's server is much less legal risk. Using E2E software where nobody runs a server is much less legal risk. Running a one-person instance of Mastodon is the worst case for leg…

Just use your server only for you, and ingest the federated feed.

Re: I am stepping down as the CEO of Mastodon

#376

Post by amiga386 »

Angostura wrote: post #375
amiga386 wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Though that will then open you up to legal liability, including for things that other people say (if their messages reach your server, even if you haven't personally seen them): https://denise.dreamwidth.org/91757.html Being a user on someone else's server is much less legal risk. Using E2E software where nobody runs a server is much less legal risk. Running a one-person instance of Mastodon is the worst case for leg…

Just use your server only for you, and ingest the federated feed.

Even if you do that, you're still - legally speaking - liable for hosting all those federated messages.

IANAL, but my understanding is the most effective way to run your own server is to have it completely hidden, e.g. behind classic HTTP authentication so that nobody but you can even see it's a Mastodon server, and definitely can't see anything the server is ingesting, without first logging in.

Even then, if you're a resident of California, your server "collects and maintains personally identifiable information from a consumer residing in California who uses or visits" so you need a privacy policy for yourself, legally speaking. See how much work it is to be legally compliant with laws that never really considered your use-case but apply to you anyway?

Re: I am stepping down as the CEO of Mastodon

#377

Post by t0bia_s »

rckt wrote: post #357

Decentralisation on Mastodon is an illusion. For me a truly decentralised thing is where I am a node that transmits and can receive transmissions, like radios. When there has to be a server that's being administrated by somebody, this already puts me in a position where I depend on the people who own the server. This means that if for any reason these people don't like me, they can simply ban me and that's it. Basica…

Even Eugen himself set to position of labelling opposite opinions (1) and censorship. Fediverse, in Mastodon way, actually feeds social bubbles.

(1) https://ibb.co/qY082NjX

Re: I am stepping down as the CEO of Mastodon

#378

Post by kragen »

nabla9 wrote: post #315
bhhaskin wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here is the thing. None of that matters to me . The only thing that matters is the people I follow.

But we are not talking about you. Mastodon is not culturally or technologically meaningful. It had 2.5 million users few years ago, now there are 700,000 users and numbers go down.

How can a communications network with 700,000 users not be culturally meaningful? Are they all just re-tooting the same Willy Wonka meme and possessed of the memory of a goldfish? Or do they all live in the same suburb of Lagos and not use any other social media?

Re: I am stepping down as the CEO of Mastodon

#379

Post by arowthway »

KronisLV wrote: post #336
edoceo wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's possible for a person to be an absolute stupid asshole about one topic (children's well being) but right about other things (software). Should have just stayed in his lane. I admired this dude but those words are, kinda, punchable offense. TF with "voluntary" in there?!?

> I admired this dude but those words are, kinda, punchable offense. I think that's pretty spot on. Saying stuff like that means that there shouldn't be celebration of the person or reverence towards them. You can support the FSF views on free software and any good those do in the world, but it's not possible to ignore all of the other stuff a person has said. One can guess whether he's not neurotypical to such a deg…

"it's not possible to ignore all of the other stuff a person has said"

I don't know, for me it's not only possible but very easy, not only regarding pedophilia but also his various political opinions I don't agree with.

Re: I am stepping down as the CEO of Mastodon

#380

Post by Yodel0914 »

rckt wrote: post #361
latexr wrote: post #359

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When there has to be a server that's being administrated by somebody And that somebody can be you. There are Mastodon servers operated by individuals for their friends or their small company. Anyone can host a server with their own rules.

Yes, I know this. But it feels overkilling to host a server which is capable of hosting thousands of users just for me alone. I'd like something small, dedicated just for my own usage. Kind of a way to have my RSS feed discoverable and commentable.

Do you know about gotosocial? That’s pretty much exactly what you’re describing.
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