mastodon.ar.al is one of the many independent Mastodon servers you can use to participate in the fediverse.
This is my personal fediverse server.

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You EITHER federate with Meta/Threads and have them be a partner in your Social Web Foundation OR you support LGBTQ+ people and human rights for all.

You can’t do both.

Not after this.

The fact that we even have to fucking try to convince you to do the right thing is disgusting. What the fuck happened to you? Was it always just lip service? A fucking “unique selling point?” If not, pick a fucking side. It shouldn’t be too damn hard when one of those sides is fascism.

@aral Give them a little time. The momentum is there and I suspect they'll be convinced before long.

@dalias They need to be convinced? Why do they need to be convinced? What kind of person needs to be convinced when faced with this?

@aral Gargron seems to believe very little of the hate speech will spill over here (says they've only had 68 reports of posts from Threads so far) and that they can deal with moderating it.

He's overlooking (possibly intentionally) the double standard where explicitly pro-hate-speech instances are normally defederated on the basis of intent not action, and that now that Threads is an explicitly pro-hate-speech instance, it's somehow not being treated the same way.

He's also overlooking how folks replying to hate speech to argue against it will result in it getting federated and put in front of people.

@aral In any case, I'm hopeful that there's sufficient momentum and consensus now that he will cave to pressure and defederate them. But it will likely take a while still...

@aral @dalias they cannot moderate their much much MUCH too large instance already anyway, so how does he think he can moderate anything?

@mirabilos @aral Well his claim is that local moderation burden is orders of magnitude larger than burden from Threads. Which is probably because all the reports he gets are from other instances against his users, since anyone on his instance knows reporting is pointless...

@dalias @mirabilos @aral

I dunno, when I report, things get taken down 🤷‍♀️

@joy @dalias @aral that’s already a better than average experience. But nothing proactive, and they not only didn’t close new user accounts at all (because the instance is already too large by several(!) magnitudes) but not even unmoderated account creation, so it’s regularily used for spam waves…

@mirabilos @dalias @aral

Quite recently I’ve received proactive warnings about potential bad actors (i.e. someone abusively adding or replying to people), so something has changed with regards to moderation.

@aral@mastodon.ar.al he didn't seem to mind that meta's piss poor moderation and profit-at-any-cost drive had already facilitated a genocide, so I guess I can't say I expected any different at this point.

@aral Meta really went all-in on the "new reality" of mainstream fascism.

They explicitly permit harassment of queer folk, and explicitly reject facts.

There's no way to cleverly interpret that.

It's just 100% awful.

@aral seems like I started my own instance just in time 🤨

@aral I don't know who you think you're talking to, but you should be talking to the administrator of your Mastodon site. Each individual site has an individual administrator and that administrator is the one who can decide to allow or block on their site. If they all choose to block, then we don't have to deal with that. If yours doesn't, you might have to move to another site with an administrator who won't put up with this.

@wbpeckham The person I’m talking to knows who I’m talking to; and those who know what I’m referring to do as well :) (And I run my own instance, which, of course, blocks Threads and has done so from Day 1.)

@aral I am very glad your instance is blocking threads. Your post did not make it at all clear who you were referring to or if you even knew who should take the actions you were recommending. And posting it that way, there's no guarantee that other admins will necessarily see it. I hope they do.

@wbpeckham @aral his post literally mentions mastodon.social by name

@aral How can we get Facebook kicked out of the Social Web Foundation? And if we can't, in what way does it represent the people of the social web?

There ought to be some kind of petitioning process perhaps.

The idea of individually moderate accounts from an instance that it's 100x bigger than .social is ludicrous. Threads have made it very clear they are not different from a random Nazi mastodon instance, but they are still getting first class treatment

@javi @aral slightly tempted to make an account on .social and report dozens of instances of hate speech just to drive home this point.
but that would be self-harm.

@javi @aral

Exactly, it's just not practical. If they federate with Threads, the hate will get through.

@aral I am so glad my instance defederated and blocked threads very early in the piece. I also blocked mastodon dot social. I hope that any friends I had there will get off it now.

@aral he's gonna try to individually moderate accounts. on fucking threads. like that's even remotely viable. and try to convince people to migrate.
instances wouldn't be doing this silly dance for any other instance that proudly announced their support for hate speech, but they made threads the "too big to block" player on the block and after doubling down on this bullshit they are unwilling to let go.

@aral
Whatever is the name of Mastodon creator and mastodon.social owner is a fuckerberg wannabe. 🤮🤮🤮

@aral

@rober I don't remember if you defederated threads finally?

@DBG3D No lo hicimos, pero vamos a revisar esa decisión dada la nueva política.

@aral “bad and ugly”, new corporate motto?

@aral "complete and utter betrayal" is insane. You need some perspective.

@Amoshias You need to keep the fuck out of my mentions. Here, let me help.

@aral this kind of crap is exactly why it is a bad idea to create an account on an already too big instance. mastodon.social users get exactly what the deserve
Mastodon hosted on mastodon.socialMastodonThe original server operated by the Mastodon gGmbH non-profit

@aral ok, devil's advocate here. Please hear me out.

I personally don't use any Meta product anymore for all the reasons mentioned and more. However, I administer two instances now. Both federating with Threads.

We are here in the #Fediverse, and can see other servers thanks to the #ActivityPub standard.

I also own many domains and run at least a dozen websites running on HTTP standards of course.

There are *a lot* of illegal websites out there. There are even more websites with questionable content including, twitter, facebook, instagram, but also stuff like porn sites, hate sites, nazi sites, spambots, all the rest.

But are my websites compromised by simply existing on the same network without explicit action from day one? Is CBC.ca a lesser organization because it is on the same Internet as pornhub.com and doesn't actively block content from that domain until something actually occurs?

This is how the world wide web has always worked, so why would the open social web be any different?

So bringing this back to Threads (and eventually Bluesky as I think it'll end up in the same place)…. is a Fediverse instance automatically lesser because it exists on the same network as Threads and doesn't actively block content from them until there is cause to do so?

I see maybe 4 or 5 posts from people on Threads in a day on my personal feed. I thought at first that Threads content might overwhelm my public feeds on my server, but it hasn't. What I have seen is not abusive or problematic in any way, it's just normal content.

If at some point the posts emanating from Threads is so overwhelmed with problematic content that it impacts the well being of users on my servers, then of course it would be my responsibility to take action, from banning to outright domain block.

But today? Zuck’s change of policy has had zero impact and there remains good content from people on Threads.

@chris OK, so your basic argument is that federating with a server has nothing to do with moderating your own server.

So am I correct that the servers you run do not block any other servers. That they federate with all servers? (That they haven’t defederated any servers?)

Including ones that are known to host child sexual abuse material?

(After all, by your argument, there is child sexual abuse material on the web and there always has been.)

If not (and I sure as hell hope not and that you do at least implement the basic block lists), then you’re saying that you do have a line. But that Threads does not cross your line by allowing people to call LGBTQ+ folks “mentally ill” and women “property”.

And that, there, is the problem.

@aral “OK, so your basic argument is that federating with a server has nothing to do with moderating your own server.”

Not at all. As I said “If at some point the posts emanating from Threads is so overwhelmed with problematic content that it impacts the well being of users on my servers, then of course it would be my responsibility to take action, from banning to outright domain block.”

If Threads was a 100 or even 1000 person instance on the Fediverse that had a policy like Zuck announced and the majority of those users took 'full advantage’ by posting nothing but disgusting, harrassing, illegal stuff… then sure, domain block is super easy and services like IFTAS are very useful in automatically blocking those types of servers.

Has IFTAS blocked Threads? no.

Why?

Likely because we're talking about a server with *millions* of users.

And based on the content coming from that server, there has been nothing of concern *yet*. If someone comes along from Threads with an anti-LGBTQ statement then obviously that is a concern, first on an individual level and then, if it continues, or spreads, on a domain level.

I haven't seen that, and the mere *possibility* through a policy change (which isn't in effect in Canada apparently) isn't enough when you're dealing with such a vast base.

@chris Ok, Chris, so that’s one way of looking at it.

The other way is that when some fucking organisation says the things that Meta has said about LGBTQ+ people and women, and you’re a bloody ally, you act like it. Or, if you’re cool with it, and you aren’t an ally, people who aren’t cool with you being cool with this fascist shit can take action.

So, demonstration: I’m not cool with you being cool with Meta’s fascist shit and I’m blocking you. Do you see how fucking simple it is to take a fucking stand for what’s right?

…and that was apparently enough for me to be blocked.

Which is fine. Everyone has their limit and everyone has the right to take a stand for what they believe.

I don't see any difference between my web server existing on the same network as Facebook.com and my Mastodon server existing on the same network as Threads.net.

If Threads becomes a problem because of this policy change then it will be dealt with, but the simple fact is it's not a problem.

Yes, Zukerberg is a fascist. Yes, that's a problem. I'm not an "ally" of Zukerberg because I exist on the same planet.

We're not in a war with him (yet?).

It's unfortunate that we war amongst ourselves.

@chris Ah man, this is a complex situation

Is blocking threads closing the door on finally being able to communicate with family members locked into the facebook eco system, or is not blocking threads allowing a trojan horse to do damage to individuals as well as the fediverse in general? Most likely a bit of both

For what it's worth, I personally think the danger outweighs the benefits (and I'm glad my instance agrees). But I'm not keen on Aral's "how to be the best ally" squabbles

I understand the sentiment.

On the other hand, Mastodon is not much different, people can say bad things here too.

What we do is to kick out such people individually, not complete instances/networks.

If we kick out whole communities, just because there are a few rotten apples there, aren’t we doing the same like when we reject Muslims (or insert any other group here) because there are a few rotten apples there too?

Not all people on Threads are bad.

@aral Trust & Safety has always been a second class citizen on the fedi. It's why we don't have limited replies, why dot social is set as the default sign up in the app despite not having sufficient moderation resources for its already too-big population, why Threads is federated there, and why users are left with the responsibility to figure out which instances take T&S seriously enough to devote proper resources to moderation and governance, despite the fact that those details are usually completely opaque to anyone outside of a server's administration.

It's a damn good thing the general public never found Mastodon accessible like they did for BlueSky. If it ever got the sort of user influx that happened there, the bad actors who target influential networks would absolutely bring this place to its knees. The software from Eugen's side does not have the necessary tooling, and most instance admins have neither the humility nor the mindset necessary to keep their users safe on a major-traffic user-content network. The spam networks *alone* would wipe out dot social in a week or less.

@aral
I fail to see the betrayal, we've known for years that Gargon is just another project dictator, that he does not care about protecting the community, although most of the big contributors and moderators of masto (and forks like glitch.soc or pleroma) are LGBT+ people. None of them where ever paid well, all moderation tools and enhancement request have been flat out refused or just left on read (as only His Majesty can validate pull requests).
Gargon is a piece of shit and is problem with twitter and shit is not that he does not like it, it's that he is not the one possessing it. He's just another Musk like guy, he only cares for what makes him feel good, others don't matter.

I think that the time to defederate with mastodon.social (and their secondary serv which name I can't remember) has already happened a while ago, those kind of signals have been here countless time already, gargon is not gonna change any time soon and so are his policies.

No animosity towards anyone other than him in this toot though, I feel that it sounds aggressive so I'd rather say that this was definitely not my goal, I'm just so tired of this shit.

@aral TBH, #NSAbook et. al. are a net negative to the world and I sincerely recommend everyone to block their entire ASN from accesing one's servers...

@aral this post ended up being quite an effective honeypot (: