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The free fediverses should focus on consent (including consent-based federation), privacy, and safety
(privacy.thenexus.today)
this post was submitted on 02 Jan 2024
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Privacy is a reverse idea on the Fediverse. I know it's a hot take, but by design the Fediverse is never going to be private and people should stop assuming it is.
When you send out a comment/like/post/whatever, you are literally broadcasting a message to any other instance listening. It essentially just says
and if you want to delete that message it's essentially
While Lemmy and Mastodon respect that, anyone can build any fediverse app and simply choose not to use it. Anyone can build a search engine and can choose to respect the delete or not. Any instance could defederate from them if they don't like that, or they may not care. The point however is that ActivityPub is designed this way, and there really isn't a better way.
If your comment has been sent out to other instances - well then it's there already. You can't delete it without some form of just asking politely that they delete it. They have it already, it could be stored in their DB, duplicated in other DBs, aggregated and sent to AI, searchable, whatever. They have it. There is no concept of "delete" on the fediverse. It's asking nicely for them to delete it.
The thing most people get wrong is privacy friendly =! private. If you say something publicly (on the internet) you can assume it will stay for ever, if not directly then via some sort of archive. The privacy part of Lemmy/Mastodon is them not collecting data on what you look at to sell it. If you want something private then don’t use Social Media, because what you say publicly will stay public.
Nor requesting your real name and ID, phone number...
As you say though it's only shared to any other instance listening. The point of consent-based federation is that you get to choose which instances do and don't get to listen. So if your comment hasn't been sent out out to other instances, they don't have it.
and I would agree with them. Consent based federation would fundamentally change the fediverse and create large tenants overnight. Small instances like mine would be at the mercy of large instances to be federated with them. It relies on people being kind and open, something we have already seen that some instance owners can be, others are not. I would even argue that that isn't even federation anymore, it's just slightly more open walled gardens
Yeah, as I say in the article Mastodon makes other decisions that are also hostile to the idea of consent, so I also agree that they see it as contrary to their mission. In terms of large tenants, though, Mastodon changed the defaults to put sign people on mastodon.social, which as a result now has 27% of the active Mastodon users, so I don't think that's the basis of their objection.
And no, consent-based federation doesn't rely on people being kind and open. To the contrary, it assumes that a lot of people aren't kind, and so the default should be that they can't hassle you without permission. It's certainly true that large instances might choose not to consent to federate with smaller instances (just as they can choose to block smaller instances today), but I don't see how you can say that's not even federation anymore. Open source projects approve PRs and often limit direct checkins to team members but that doesn't mean they're not open source.
I'm not saying that it's not open source, I'm saying that I would argue it's not federation anymore. Open source is irrelevant here, I'm not talking about the code.
I'm saying instances being "Closed to federation by default" and "whitelist only" is not true federation in my book.
I also am saying that instance owners are the ones who all of a sudden get a ton of power, specifically larger instance owners because they can decided arbitrarily not to federate with an instance they don't deem worth federating with. The larger userbase aside, instance owners I believe can become power hungry and greedy and refuse to federate.
For example, even I, a teeny tiny instance owner, felt a pang of annoyance when someone created a duplicate community on their instance. It was fleeting and I told myself that that's what the federation is, and that it's okay, but not everyone will react that way. It's inevitable that larger instances will say things like "Why should I federate with you, we have all of those communities over here"
My open source analogy wasn't great, but the point I was trying to make is that even things we usually think of as open are compatible with consent. Similarly we're used to thinking of federation as unconstrained (well except for Gab) (and everybody else who gets blocked) but that's just the specific flavor of federation that's been practiced on the fediverse so far -federation's compatible with consent, at least in my books.
Power-hungry instance owners can already decide not to federate with other instances, arbitrarily or for any reason -- counter.social's an example. Consent-based federation just changes the default. It's true that this changes the equation a bit; today there's a small amount of effort required not to federate, a consent-based approach flips that and there's a small amount of effort required to federate. At the end of the day, though, power-hungry instance owners are gonna do what power-hungry instance owners are gonna do; threads.net and mastodon.social are going to make their own decisions about federation policies no matter what the free fediverses decide.
What's stopping malicious actors to create an account on the same instance as you and follow you (or your RSS feed) exclusively to pull your data?
Remember "information wants to be free"? That adage works both ways. If people want (or need) real privacy, they need to be equipped with tools that actually guarantee that their communication is only accessible to those intended to. The "ActivityPub" Fediverse is not it. They will be better off by using private Matrix (or XMPP rooms) with actual end-to-end encryption.
Agreed that people who need strong privacy should use something like Signal (or maybe Matrix or XMPP). And also agreed that RSS feeds are a privacy hole on most of the fediverse; Hometown and GoToSocial both disable them by default, Mastodon should do the same.
Nothing prevents malicious actors who want to make enough of an effort from creating accounts on instances (or for that matter Matrix chat rooms). But that's not feasible for broad data harvesting by Meta.
Your whole wordlview is hinging on two conflicting realities:
The "consent-based" social media does not work well for a small business owner who wants to promote their place to their local community, or the artisan that wants to put up a gallery with their work online. They want to be found.
If you tell them that they have to choose between (a) a social network that makes it easier for them to reach their communities or (b) a niche network that is only used by a handful of people who keeps putting barriers for any kind of contact; which one do you think they will choose?
What your recent articles are trying to do is (basically) try to shove the idea that the majority should change their behavior and completely reject a public internet. You are basically saying that the "social" networks should be "anti-"social in nature. This is, quite honestly, borderline totalitarian.
Why? You keep writing about how evil Meta is and their infinite amount of resources. If you really believe that, why do you think they would stop at the mere wall of "federation consent"?
It's not that I think that most people will (or should) reject a public internet. In fact I don't even think most people will reject surveillance capitalism-based social networks. As I say in the article "many people who make their home in the free fediverses (including me!) are likely to have other accounts for now – on Threads, or in Meta's fediverses – just as many do today on Facebook, Instagram, Xitter, TikTok, LinkedIn, and other surveillance capitalism social networks." As you say, small business owners and artists will want the broadest possibility for their work; and there are lots of other situations where that's what people want.
And I wouldn't frame the choice between (a) and (b) the way you do. With queer and trans people, I'd frame it as an opportunity to have an account on a smaller pro-queer social network that's gone to great lengths to insulate itself from hate groups like Libs of TikTok, and a choice of whether their other account is better on Threads or in Meta's fediverses. With progressive or leftist people, I'd frame it in terms of being on a social network that's not actively working with white supremacists, fascists, and authoritarians. With people who hate Facebook / Instagram / etc, I'd phrase it in terms of being as far away from Meta as possible. And so on ...
Some will say "two accounts? I think not! And there's a lot of stuff on Threads that's valuable for me, so I'm not interested." Oh well. But most people already have a bunches of accounts on various social networks -- none of which are particularly queer-friendly, all of which work with white supemacists, fascists, and authoritarians -- so (if signup is easy, the software's easy to use, if it's well-moderated and they don't have to deal with harassment, if there are enough interesting people there, etc etc etc) won't be averse to one more.
Also, why do you think most people want social networking to be an inherently public activity? Look at the most popular social network. Facebook gorups are extremely popular. Facebook supports friends-only posts and viritually everybody I know uses them at least part of the time. Facebook events allow posts that are only visible to people attending the event. The list goes on ... And it's not just Facebook. Reddit has private subreddits. Twitter has private profiles. Most fediverse microblogging software has local-only posts. Heck even Mastodon has followers-only posts. So, I'd say it's the other way around. Most people want social networking to be a mix of public and private activity.
I think I get your point, but I surely don't agree with it. Honestly, it seems that you are not really interested in dismantling Surveillance Capitalism, just afraid that "Big Fedi" will attract the attention of too many people, and ending bringing scrutiny to some marginalized groups you care about.
To put it less nicer words, you are not really concerned about privacy or Surveillance Capitalism, you are just worried about losing your echo chamber.
Right, I'm on Lemmy because I want to stay in my echo chamber. 🤣 🤣 🤣
Interesting that you didn't argue against "not really being against Surveillance Capitalism", but instead chose to use your presence on Lemmy as if that was enough reason to dismiss what I said.
Anyway, you said it yourself: if people are okay of having two online personas, one for the "acceptable in public" and other for the "things to be done in private", why couldn't that be case here, and your presence on Lemmy is just a decoy "for public messaging" and to keep trying to convince people that no one should be looking any further than that?
This is nonsensical to me. Why make a big raucous about Threads and others, go through all of these private and secure measures to then have two accounts, one actively on the side or the Fediverse you so called need protection from? That’s some real privilege
Today, I've gone to a lot of trouble to have fediverse accounts today, and accounts on other enviroments that aren't as toxic and hostile as Facebook ... I still have a Facebook account. It's necessary to keep in touch with some family members. It's valuable for activism -- meet people where they are. It's the best place to find out about music events. There are some friends and former colleagues that it's the best way to keep in touch with. etc etc I wish those things weren't the case, but they are. So I have an account but limit my engagement -- these days I rarely post except for activism, private messages, and occasionally resharing posts that people are trying to get the word out about. There's still a lot of value in keeping most of my activity off there.
And I still have a Twitter account despite all its issues. A lot of reproductive justice and abolitionist organizers are still there. It's better than any other social network for getting first-hand views of Palestinians. A lot of Black Twitter is still there. There are some friends and former colleagues that it's the best way to keep in touch with. It's potentially still useful for activism purposes. etc etc. So I have an account but limit my engagement -- these days I rarely post except for retweeting, DMs, and stuff that I don't care if it's public. There's still a lot of value in keeping most of my activity off there.
And some reproductive justice and abolitionist organizers have left Twitter and gone to Threads. Threads is likely to be useful for activism purposes. Over time there are likely to be friends and former colleagues that it's the best way to keep in touch with. I'm sure other etc etc's will evolve. So I have an account but limit my engagement. There's still a lot of value in keeping most of my activity off there.
And Meta's fediverse is likely to be useful for activism, and there are likely to be people there that I don't have any way to keep in touch with. Also, it's a great audience for The Nexus Today. I already have accounts there so don't expect to give them up. So I have an account but limit my engagement.
It's a classic double-bind. Being able to staying in an environment that some people find isn't safe enough to stay in is a form of privilege; but then again, feeling like I have to stay in an anti-LGBTQIA2S+ environment where I feel constrained as to what I can say publicly and my data's being exploited is a form of oppression -- and so is the expectation that I should have to give up on all these valuable things just because I want to spend most of my time in an pro-LGBTQIA2S+ enviroment. So, there aren't any perfect answers.
That’s not oppression and that’s offensive to suggest such a thing. You and others are making a big deal about blocking Threads and safety. People having an expectation to hold you to account is not oppression in the slightest. Facebook & Twitter are poor examples because they are well over a decade old thus people have built communities and relationships on those platforms. You and others have stated how those that want to federate with Threads due to relationships, communities and interests that are on Meta’s platform isn’t worth the compromise. Yet, you’re saying it is in fact valuable, so valuable you’ll have an account on this “unsafe” platform. That is hypocrisy not oppression
That's not how I see it. It's completely parallel to Facebook and Twitter: there's value for being on those platforms, it's not hypocritical to be there while at the same time criticizing them and pointing out the safety risks. And I've never said that being on Threads -- or being on an instance that federates with Threads -- isn't worth the compromise, I've consistently said that it's something that everybody has to decide for themselves. I have criticized instance admins who have deciding to federate with Threads without discussing with their users, without involving LGBTQIA2S+ people in the decision, or while inaccurately minimizing or ignoring the risks to LGBTQIA2S+ people on their instance for federating with Threads; in my view, they aren't acting in line with their stated values. And I've predicted that many LGBTQIA2S+ are likely to move as a result. But when instances like infosec.exchange have had discussions with their users -- or instances like hachyderm.io that have LGBTQIA2S+ representation in leadership -- have said they're federating, I haven't criticized them.
As for what is and isn't oppression, people outside a community often have different views than people inside a community. And, people who put a high value on privacy have different views of the tradeoffs that are required to participate in society today. I know people who have lost their entire social life because they won't be on Facebook, people who have lost job opportunities because they're not on LinkedIn, people who been physically harmed or had their mental health affected as a result of being on Facebook because they felt they had to be there for family reasons. So I'm sorry that you're offended that they (and I) see that as a form of systemic oppression but that doesn't change how I'd describe it.
I totally agree that there isn't a lot of privacy on the fediverse today -- in fact I even say that in the article and link off to recommendations for how to improve things. But also I think there's a huge difference between the situation on the fediverse where there's no privacy because developers haven't prioritize it and with Meta, where their model is focused on exploiting data that they've acquired without consent and they've repeatedly broken privacy laws (although to be fair they break other laws too, not just privacy).
And it's true, many people don't care about privacy, and many more care some but it's not important eough to them to make it their primary reason for choosing a social network. But a lot of people do care, at least to some extent, so the free fediverses will be a lot more appealing to them if they improve privacy. And even though I think privacy by itself won't the major driver for most people who choose the free fediverses, improving privacy also works well with that I think will be the major drivers -- like safety, pro-LGBTQIA2S+ focus, and (for people who want nothing to do with Meta) highlighting the core differences from Meta.
Circles' approach is certainly interesting, I remember looking at it when they did their kickstarter. Did it go forward? It looks like their blog hasn't been updated since 2021.
That's good to see -- seems like they've made a lot of progress. I'll check it out!