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Trying to use Bluesky without getting burned again

chrisholdgraf.com

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Re: Trying to use Bluesky without getting burned again

#501

Post by Dylan16807 »

glenstein wrote: post #413
Dylan16807 wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> throw you off for using the domain to email things they disagree with Right, you can get kicked off for your emails. But nobody is going to ban you based on which domains you do or do not put on your block list.

Modern email most definitely does block domains and distrust unfamiliar ones (I extend my personal guarantee that getting around spam filters will be an issue if you host your own email), and there most definitey are such things as domain restricted email servers. Moreover social media faces distinct issues that require specific tools, causing the email analogy to break down a bit. A lot of organized harassment campa…

I think you didn't understand what I meant.

Those domains are being blocked because of what they send.

They're not being blocked on the basis of what domains they block. There's no recursive blocking that wants you to take a stance and punishes you for being a neutral acceptor of emails. Those blocks are the behavior that can make federation suck.

Re: Trying to use Bluesky without getting burned again

#502

Post by GlacierFox »

louthy wrote: post #497
GlacierFox wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's my biggest issue with it. I didn't even have twitter to begin with, but after trying out Bluesky I've barely had the patience to use it. Most people on there seem to be ultra-left wing virtue signalling phychopaths. It's obnoxiously progressive with no space for nuanced thought.

So, to be clear, the GP was stating that their issue is a lack of free speech. You agree that that’s your biggest issue with Bluesky too. But you’re unhappy with people expressing their personal opinions, primarily because you don’t agree with them? What version of free-speech is it that you want? I assume it’s just like all ‘free speech absolutioniats’: free speech as long as it’s your own or from people you agree w…

Who said any of this nonsense you're coming out with?

Where did I say I was unhappy with people expressing their opinions? What sort of surreal strawman are you attempting to build here?

My issue was, quite simply, with the predominantly ultra-left phycho's that have taken a foothold there dominating the discourse. Theres no conversations there, as expected, there's just abuse. It's like twitter but in reverse. Probably why the out-of-touch celebrity mass has transfered there, with the assumption that's what real people in real life are actually like...

Re: Trying to use Bluesky without getting burned again

#503

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

zaik wrote: post #323
SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course they have a right to free speech, but when I'm choosing a platform it's the user experience that matters to me and not the rights of the operators. Twitter lets me visit or follow any other account on the platform and see what they have to say, and the ability to do that across a wide range of interests and viewpoints is exactly why I use it. If Mastodon requires setting up a custom server to replicate that…

> Twitter lets me [...] see what they have to say * if their viewpoint agrees with Mr. Musk.

No, that's not accurate. I don't agree with all of Musk's moderation decisions, but there are still many large and influential accounts on Twitter who think he's wrong about everything and aren't shy about saying so. (I would not use Twitter anymore if that stopped being the case.)

Re: Trying to use Bluesky without getting burned again

#504

Post by glenstein »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #501
glenstein wrote: post #413

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Modern email most definitely does block domains and distrust unfamiliar ones (I extend my personal guarantee that getting around spam filters will be an issue if you host your own email), and there most definitey are such things as domain restricted email servers. Moreover social media faces distinct issues that require specific tools, causing the email analogy to break down a bit. A lot of organized harassment campa…

I think you didn't understand what I meant. Those domains are being blocked because of what they send. They're not being blocked on the basis of what domains they block . There's no recursive blocking that wants you to take a stance and punishes you for being a neutral acceptor of emails. Those blocks are the behavior that can make federation suck.

I accept that I overlooked your distinction here. You are right that there's no recursive blocking with email.

But I also think that's an oversimplification, because the block list is a helpful proxy for content characteristic of an instance.

But this is a case where I think the analogy to email breaks down insofar as its instructive to social media generally, because some things about email don't cleanly map on to what federated instances are managing. It makes sense that you would want to block instances and their enablers, to connect to an ecosystem consistent with the intentions of a particular instance.

As parent commenter said you can use a general purpose provider (with email) or general purpose instance (with Mastodon), so you are accessing the fediverse. The only thing you are "missing out" on is the ability to make it compulsory for other users to listen to you against their consent.

Re: Trying to use Bluesky without getting burned again

#505

Post by socksy »

akvadrako wrote: post #434
mozarella wrote: post #340

Related : Corey Doctrow's article (again) about how he doesn't trust Bluesky enough to move there from mastodon. Especially Bluesky's promise to allow users to migrate to another host in the fediverse. https://doctorow.medium.com/https-pluralistic-net-2024-11-02... Older article : https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/06/fool-me-twice-we-dont-get...

What does he mean there is only one "Bluesky server" ? You can already run your own Personal data server (for your data), Relay (to aggregate all feeds), AppView (that holds a view of the data), or client (that talks to the AppView).

He's almost certainly talking about the AppView. Yes, people run their own PDSes, but afaik no-one is running their own AppViews. It seems prohibitively expensive. Even running a relay requires at a minimum terabytes of storage space (and presumably more when the network gets bigger?).

The AppView - controls the way you can search posts - has the ability to show or hide posts from everyone using that AV - has per-user data such as notifications, last skeet seen etc - is a CDN for media, and as such can filter there - is where the algorithms of what posts to show are implemented

In other words, someone who controls the AppView holds a lot of power in the AT Protocol world.

At the moment, it seems that Bluesky are doing a great job with their AppView, and they've rather magnificently scaled with the extreme load increases in the last months. However, for someone like Doctorow who wants independence from being on someone else's platform, there has to be a viable alternative AppView, or at the very least a documented process for how to host it.

However, it's my personal belief that it's only a matter of time until people do this. I don't know how practical it will be (and what level of resources would be needed to divulge if Bluesky go bad compared to a Mastodon server), but it seems like this is a priority for them, and everything else in the stack has been made easy to self host (see https://alice.bsky.sh/post/3laega7icmi2q).

Re: Trying to use Bluesky without getting burned again

#506

Post by josteink »

minitech wrote: post #338
josteink wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Things like this? https://lunduke.locals.com/post/6505039/bluesky-bans-lunduke... And this: https://x.com/clownworld_/status/1858194893249917377?s=46 And this: https://x.com/immeme0/status/1872482191869132932?s=46 Etc. They seem REALLY ban-happy over there.

Nothing concrete in any of those links, but they all smack of bad faith (and the middle one didn’t even depict a ban). That said, if people whose entire personality is being anti-trans perceive Bluesky as ban-happy and aren’t interested in it, I see that as a win.

> they all smack of bad faith

> That said, if people whose entire personality is being anti-trans

Are you talking about protecting women’s rights? That’s pro something, not anti something, right?

So speaking of bad faith… The only one I see acting in bad faith here is you?

Re: Trying to use Bluesky without getting burned again

#508

Post by dettil »

josteink wrote: post #506
minitech wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing concrete in any of those links, but they all smack of bad faith (and the middle one didn’t even depict a ban). That said, if people whose entire personality is being anti-trans perceive Bluesky as ban-happy and aren’t interested in it, I see that as a win.

> they all smack of bad faith > That said, if people whose entire personality is being anti-trans Are you talking about protecting women’s rights? That’s pro something, not anti something, right? So speaking of bad faith… The only one I see acting in bad faith here is you?

It's both. To be pro-women is to be anti-trans, and vice versa. The two stances are fundamentally incompatible.

Re: Trying to use Bluesky without getting burned again

#509

Post by jrflowers »

epolanski wrote: post #378

Open question, why do people keep caring about socials that much? Especially educated people should stay away from that toxicity. Boards like HN and occasionally Reddit, where it's mostly about discussing and being anonymous are the only places worth contributing on the internet other than personal blogs.

Going to guess that they get some sort of enjoyment or value out of them, their definition of “worth contributing to” is different from yours, or they do not share your standard of what “educated people” should do with themselves on the internet

Re: Trying to use Bluesky without getting burned again

#510

Post by sangnoir »

shwouchk wrote: post #496
sangnoir wrote: post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I failed to respond simply because I didn't realize you were making that point. To me, the existence of large players in a decentralized system is not something in need of addressing or fixing; IMO, decentralization is not the right tool to achieve egalitarianism - but it's a great way to avoid a monoculture. The fediverse, like email and most other human systems that benefit from economies of scale will have a Paret…

decentralization is not some magical binary property. Real world systems can be more, or less, decentralized. To start with, yes banking giants exists but everyone finds this undesirable to a certain extent and regulators would object if suddenly eg elon musk decided to buy out goldman and chase. banks are highly regulated and enjoy completely different economies than email. Banks of the same nation are often legally…

> With email, if gmail decide to ban you, you are unable to communicate with 90% of people with no recourse

To reiterate my point (and perhaps what you said in your first sentence) this is completely unrelated to the decentralized nature of email, and is proof that decentralization is ill-suited to avoid that problem: legislation and oversight are what works for banking. "Decentralized" has never meant "there are no dominant players"

Edit: when it comes to tech platforms or protocols, the ability to decentralize is binary: it's present or absent. There is one Twitter/Instagram namespace with no other instances, there are countless email MTA and MDA and standards for interoperability defined in RFCs. That GMail is dominant is not a fault of the protocol - it happened to be a superior product for reasons not included in the protocol like generous mailbox storage quotas, and superior spam identification.

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