Meta threads will open federation to the fediverse soon, and while this is mainly to mastodon it will still affect lemmy. They are acting like they won’t be evil, but let’s be real this is Facebook when have they ever done that.

This article which has been trending lately explains some of the issues. https://ploum.net/2023-06-23-how-to-kill-decentralised-networks.html

This comment here is a simple analogy if you can’t be bothered reading the article. https://lemmy.ca/comment/5702922

@[email protected]

  • Deceptichum@kbin.social
    812·
    11 months ago

    Meta is a cancer, there is no benefit to the company being given any access to this instance.

    • capital@lemmy.world
      1024·
      11 months ago

      Get over yourself.

      There are tons of well-meaning people on threads who’ve never heard of mastodon, lemmy, or the fediverse.

      • aes@lemm.eeEnglish
        193·
        11 months ago

        Why would anyone join Lemmy/Mastodon if they could join Threads instead for the same content? Normal people don’t care that your shit is FLOSS or decentralised, they just want convenience.

        • capital@lemmy.world
          110·
          11 months ago

          Why would anyone run their own email server if they could just use Gmail instead for the same content?

          Your argument could also be used against the very idea of federation.

          • aes@lemm.eeEnglish
            12·
            11 months ago

            Your argument was that people aren’t using servers that run FLOSS federated software is because they’re not aware of them. My argument is that the people who aren’t aware are also people who wouldn’t use those servers even if they knew.

            The people who run their own mail servers are massive nerds, the people who are on Mastodon are also massive nerds. This status quo won’t change just because a megacorp adopts ActivityPub (in fact, you eloquently bring to attention how everyone uses Gmail or Hotmail, and basically no individual runs their own mail server*). So if that’s your argument, the original commenter’s point still stands.

            *Moreover I’ve heard that because of this monopoly on email, sending email from a mail server you run to the big providers without it immediately getting sent to spam, if delivered at all, is basically impossible.

              • aes@lemm.eeEnglish
                7·
                11 months ago

                Reread my message since my last edit. I’m not arguing that at all; I’m simply saying that if the open source Fediverse wants to appeal to a wider audience, it needs to appeal to the needs and wants of that audience. That’s not the same as merely federating with a closed source instance that already has that appeal.

      • Hanrahan@slrpnk.netEnglish
        1·
        7 months ago

        And ? Thats still not a reason to federate. I joined the Fediverse years ago to get away from the “well meaning people” dragging us into the pile of shit because they don’t grok that meta/twitter is cancer.

        If they’re that disinterested in why Meta/Bluesky is “cancer” then I’m not really interested in what they have to say on most subjects. Its not elitism, its the same reaosn I am not interested in what members of the Liberal Party have to say on a sinject, sure their is some sanity some times but I don’t want to have to wade through waist deep ship to find it.

      • we is doomed!@lemmy.world
        11·
        8 months ago

        Being “well meaning” and using “a toxic billionare run platform” are incompatable. You can be one …or the other, you can’t be both.

        Ignorance isnt an excuse. Let then stay with their toxicity is all that’s being asked.

  • Gnugit@aussie.zone
    34·
    11 months ago

    Meta don’t deserve any chances, I’m here to get away from that toxic bull and would much prefer it to be blocked from any instance I interact with.

  • Spaghetti_Hitchens@kbin.social
    3713·
    11 months ago

    Here’s my not-at-all-qualified take:

    Let the federation ride. If Threads users add meaningful content and activity, then cool.

    But the second we see a Meta ad, pull that fucking plug. We should not be distributing their ads for free (or at all).

    • Captain Janeway@lemmy.world
      372·
      11 months ago

      Yeah but you might have it in reverse. Meta would benefit from lemmy users providing original content. It would basically suck the life out of the smaller instances and people would have no incentive to stick with apps or instances made by the little guys. If Meta started serving ads and we pulled out, it wouldn’t mean much. By then, Meta might have adopted most users - all the while stealing our content.

      ^ Super hypothetical. I’m not a federation expert. But it sounds like that could happen.

      • Encode1307@lemm.eeEnglish
        83·
        11 months ago

        I don’t think lemmy and mastodon are big enough for meta to care about stealing our content.

        • Aniki 🌱🌿@lemm.eeEnglish
          7·
          11 months ago

          I think you’d be surprised at how few people make OC for the internet and how those brains operate. I know I’m not porting my content bot over to threads anytime soon. He’s very happy on mastodon and writes frequently.

    • andrew_bidlaw
      101·
      11 months ago

      Let us have all users from Lemmy, Kbin, Mastodon and probably Tumblr, and none from Meta. Is it so damaging to exclude them? With them comes the Meta fuckery, them dictating rules. It’s better without them.

      • Paradoxvoid@aussie.zoneEnglish
        1·
        11 months ago

        Are you planning on signing up for a Meta account? Their rules won’t affect anyone who isn’t using their instance.

        • andrew_bidlaw
          8·
          11 months ago

          It’s not how it works, I believe.

          We are as regulated as 4chan.

          If they get federated with other big instance, their mil+ audience wouldn’t only bring their own shenanigans, it would bring attention from regulating bodies - for one, and for two - Meta’s want for control over how fediverse is operated.

        • ⸻ Ban DHMO 🇦🇺 ⸻@aussie.zoneEnglish
          4·
          11 months ago

          I would see it as the fediverse being like the UN and Threads being like America. The UN can say whatever they want about their rules and America will and do ignore them due to their size, influence and power.

  • umbraroze@kbin.social
    22·
    11 months ago

    When I last looked at the defederations of some Mastodon servers, everyone was already blocking Threads. This was a year ago. Instances running Lemmy and Kbin and like should probably do the same.

  • JokeDeity@lemm.ee
    121·
    11 months ago

    Fully agreed, anyone who doesn’t either works for Meta or can’t see the writing on the wall about what this will do to the fediverse.

  • Crashumbc@lemmy.worldEnglish
    133·
    11 months ago

    Unfortunately, as much as I like Lemmy. It’s kind of stuck in a catch-22 situation.

    The bigger it grows the more likely it is to be destroyed by “bad actors”

    • shrugal@lemm.ee
      231·
      11 months ago

      Imo it depends on how it grows, especially how much decentralization it can preserve.

      • Crashumbc@lemmy.worldEnglish
        39·
        11 months ago

        Decentralization may be its biggest weakness. It requires too much overhead.

        What happens when 100’s of instances are stood up for the purpose of fragmenting or taking over? Or META just starts buying federated instances? The burden will fall on each individual instance owner to try and keep up. Ain’t happening.

        • shrugal@lemm.ee
          121·
          11 months ago

          Wtf are you talking about? Decentralization is the one thing that separates the fediverse from existing social networks. It’s the entire point of this whole endeavour. It’s even what happens in your failure scenarios, because the problem with someone taking over everything is the centralization it introduces.

  • Fluid@aussie.zoneEnglish
    10·
    11 months ago

    I presume this will be the case, but don’t think there’s been any official announcement yet. The majority of current servers have planned to resist by defederating.

  • gosling@lemmy.worldEnglish
    92·
    11 months ago

    I don’t quite understand, would it be harder to defederate later, once they start becoming evil? Lemmy and Mastodon were founded to actively distance ourselves from the likes of Twitter and Reddit. We’re not here because it’s the only option we have or because we’re creating a whole new system. We’re here because we chose to and decide that we could live without relying on those big corporations. Surely, people here are more willing to give Meta the middle finger and wouldn’t mind blocking Threads if that ever happened right?

    • RustyOperator@sopuli.xyzEnglish
      255·
      11 months ago

      So you want an alternative to closed source platforms, but you want said closed source platforms to be the biggest on the fediverse. Uuhh, yeah…

        • RustyOperator@sopuli.xyzEnglish
          14·
          11 months ago

          You’re missing the point, people don’t want to defederate from threads just because it would be the biggest, but also because it’s Facebook. How are people giving Facebook of all places the benefit of the doubt? This is insane. If they don’t have an alteriror motive now, they will most definitely later.

          • Ilandar@aussie.zone
            101·
            11 months ago

            It’s pretty unbelievable isnt it? You would think this wouldn’t even be up for debate on a platform like Lemmy but some people seem desperate for growth at any cost.

            • RustyOperator@sopuli.xyzEnglish
              71·
              11 months ago

              As far as I recall all these huge companies weren’t excluded from these open protocols and now look at them. For instance - email, try hosting your own email server and see how quickly you will be filtered to spam on most email providers.

              A perfect example of something being embraced by huge companies, then extended, and then finally extinguished and no longer viable to do by small parties.

              Gmail even marks new Proton mail account emails as possibly “malicious”, yet does not do this for their own service.

    • 0x815@feddit.de
      31·
      11 months ago

      @The Lurker

      … you must have a willingness to include those who want to be part of said platforms.

      If Marc Zuckerberg wanted to be part of a federated/distributed web, he could have done so with Facebook, Instagram, Whatsapp. This is nothing more than ‘Embrace-Extend-Extingiush’ activity.

    • EnderMB@lemmy.world
      33·
      11 months ago

      Couldn’t agree more. I fully understand that people don’t like Meta, but closing people off doesn’t make an open ecosystem, it just makes another closed one that fits a specific viewpoint.

  • maniacalmanicmania@aussie.zoneEnglish
    7·
    11 months ago

    This seems like a very important discussion but let me tell you how I came across it. It’s possible many others on Aussie Zone fall into a similar boat as mine. If not please ignore.

    I only use Voyager to interact with Lemmy regularly. Occasionally I check out Aussie Zone via a browser but that’s very rare.

    I think the ‘Default feed’ for Voyager is ‘Home’ which are the coms I’ve subbed to. I didn’t even know what ‘Local’ was until I looked it up just now (while trying to find out if Voyager can list all the coms of an instance like the coms page in a desktop browser, which I don’t think it does).

    So I was surprised not to see this discussion earlier after seeing it pop up more broadly across the lemmyverse. Turns out that’s because I never selected the Local feed to see what everyone is talking about and because I wasn’t subbed to Meta (as in the Aussie Zone com, not the company) until now.

    If my ignorance is unusual for Aussie Zone folk then please ignore this comment. If it’s possible that lots of other active or semi-active local users are not seeing this discussion is there any way to highlight it across the instance?