Meta/Instagram launched a new product called Threads today (working title project92). It adds a new interface for creating text posts and replying to them, using your Instagram account. Of note, Meta has stated that Threads plans to support ActivityPub in the future, and allow federation with ActivityPub services. If you actually look at your Threads profile page in the app your username has a threads.net tag next to it - presumably to support future federation.
Per the link, a number of fediverse communities are pledging to block any Meta-directed instances that should exist in the future. Thus instance content would not be federated to Meta instances, and Meta users would not be able to interact with instance content.
I’m curious what the opinions on this here are. I personally feel like Meta has shown time and time again that they are not very good citizens of the Internet; beyond concerns of an Eternal September triggered by federated Instagram, I worry that bringing their massive userbase to the fediverse would allow them to influence it to negative effect.
I also understand how that could be seen to go against the point of federated social media in the first place, and I’m eager to hear more opinions. What do you think?
Meta has repeatedly introduced features intended to scrape larger amounts of data about our lives and tie it all into one big profile that they can sell. This area of the internet feels like one of the few remaining areas that they haven’t reached, and I’d bet everything I have that’s why they’re introducing this. I couldn’t be more strongly against allowing them a way to link my data here with the data they have from my usage of their existing products. While I understand the idea of open federation to allow disparate communities to interact, one of the lines I’ll draw is letting a massive corporation in like that.
They’ll still be able to scrape the fediverse and all instances without threads federating with them. Defederating doesn’t stop their access to your PUBLIC data on the fediverse.
Anyone can access the public data, but that is not a good excuse to invite them in through the front door. Defederating, at the very least, sends the message that they are not welcome to participate here.
And not being welcomed is going to stop them?
The guaranteed way to fail is to not even try to succeed.
I mean, we have nothing more to lose if they are hypothetically going to succeed. What does it cost us to just try? Why are so many people against even trying, despite it requiring absolutlely zero effort from most of us? Why rush to submit to bad things before they happen?
I’m curious, are there policies for usage of data on a service like this? If you federate Meta (or any instance, or this instance), is that granting them the right to use your data as they wish? Assuming the answer is yes, could the Fediverse at large implement a broad, let’s call it “Terms & Conditions”, that must be acknowledged upon federation, regarding how the data is used? Or, if the answer is no, what are the limitations to how data in the Fediverse is used?
Also, how useful is my data to them anyway, if they can’t target me with ads? Certainly there are uses, but isn’t the primary end-game just selling me something? If I’m on an independent instance, I’m not sure how much I care about them having access to my data.
Edit: Mastodon founder Eugen touches on some these questions here. This is specific to Mastodon, I have no idea how much of this carries over for Lemmy.
Will Meta get my data or be able to track me? A server you are not signed up with and logged into cannot get your private data or track you across the web. What it can get are your public profile and public posts, which are publicly accessible.
The day this instance federates with Meta is the day I leave. They, and any other big corporations, can fuck all the way off. We have seen where that path leads time and time again.
Well said, and same.
I think the majority are against federating with meta so we’re probably safe but same.
I’m sick of Meta
Please for the love of Internet connectivity as a whole: block anything remotely attached to Facebook, not just the instance, but in general Internet daily life.
Zuck should die forgotten.
It does not go against the point of the fediverse to do so, either. Why would the ability to do this be baked into the code if it was not the intent to use it in certain situations? This would be a perfect use.
I can see maybe certain instances wanting it for whatever reason, but I’ll be packing up and moving to one that blocks it if this one allows it.
Agreed. With the nature of the Fediverse, defederating with anything from Meta doesn’t really restrict access for those who actually wish to interact with them. They can simply join their next nefarious venture.
The drawbacks to interacting with a company that so obviously only chases profit above all else far outweigh any "benefits " of their content.
Ser Robin had the right idea: bravely run away.
I strongly support basically firewalling the fediverse from anything Meta/Twitter/MS/Google/ as a default behavior. They will 100%, without question make some sort of attempt to co-opt, corrupt, and monetize this ecosystem unless their interference is actively mitigated and corralled.
And sure, maybe there can be a collection of instances that do federate with Big Tech… but to be blunt, I’d look at those mostly as canaries in the coal mine.
I came to the fediverse to get away from Meta and Twitter and Google and the like.
So personally I’d prefer if they stayed out of here.
Defederate and preferably also defenestrate.
Well said 😂
From a post on Mastodon comparing privacy policies. Meta gonna pillage the village.
https://mastodon.social/@llebrun/110664586216685040
Ok dear gods whyyyyyyyyyyyy does a social media app need access to all that. Burn it down. Burn it all to the ground
Don’t federated with Meta
I don’t see why they would bother with the fediverse as it exists to be honest. To me it seems like a liability from their point of view. Not sure if they’ve spoken more about this but Facebook getting in more shit by having their users exposed to stuff that they don’t explicitly control doesn’t seem like something they’d want.
That being said, I feel like defederating with them if needed is a solid idea but their sheer size may make that decision difficult for instances that are looking to grow given that they’ve already amassed twice the accounts of the Lemmy fediverse in a few hours. Now not all growth is good growth like you’ve mentioned but there’s no partial defederation so either you leech on some of their userbase or you don’t.
I see some places going for growth if that’s an option which may not necessarily be a bad choice (unless they impose strict rules to follow if you want to federate with them) given that facebook has the capital to bury us with if they choose to so our compliance probably won’t have a very big impact on how things play out in the long run.
I know people will hate this but I think zuck is just a nerd with the money to do anything he likes but he’s not really very social and not really into sports or anything so like many of us he spends his focus on tech stuff and science fiction.
He obviously kinda loves the idea of the metaverse, and yeah Facebook is riddled with problems but they’ve never really done any of the really immoral and anti competitive things bill gates Microsoft did so I think it’s jumping the gun a bit to instantly jump to EEE - it’s possible he just genuinely believes the future is going to be a federation of open source protocols and he simply wants to live in that future.
That said there’s a lot of problems inherent in letting any big company gain any form of dominance over open social networks especially one as frequently socially problematic as meta
If we could ensure 100% compliance with a meta-blockade then I’d be for it.
However, that isn’t going to happen and any instances that do federate with Meta will be the part of the Fediverse that exists to billions of people. Those instances will become the dominate instances on the Fediverse for people who want to get away from Meta but still access the Fediverse services. Lemmy, as it stands now, is only a few million people at most. We simply do not have the weight to throw around on this issue.
It is inevitable that commercial interests join the Fediverse and the conversation should be around how we deal with that inevitability rather than attempting to use de-federation as a tool to ‘fix’ every issue.
Agreed, defederation seems to currently be used for any instance that doesn’t follow the allowed values that all instances must have. This is absurd and directly counter to the whole point of the fediverse in the first place. It’s supposed to be linked to everything, and every instance can have wildly different rules and styles. At the end of the day all that should be largely transparent to a user who can sub to anything across the fediverse with a single account.
Defederation needs to be reserved for actively harmful instances, which isn’t just memes you don’t like or hosted by a “big” company.
Big companies are actively harmful. Just read the example of xmpp and Google that is posted everywhere.
A good read about that with an historical perpective : https://ploum.net/2023-06-23-how-to-kill-decentralised-networks.html
An important reminder of the right play here. If we are to keep the fediverse out of the hands of enshitification, we need to stay away from letting corporates play the game. Don’t federate.
“I also understand how that could be seen to go against the point of federated social media in the first place…”
Federating with Meta is different from federating with individuals. It’s like letting corporations be treated the same as natural persons for the purposes of voting in political elections and exercising other civic participation rights.
Natural persons may have a variety of motivations for federating. Corporations have only one: to increase profit.
And please don’t say “federate now, revisit later if needed.” Recall the fable about the scorpion and the rabbit facing a raging flood. Said the scorpion, “oh please, rabbit, let me ride on your back as you swim across.” Rabbit said “no, you’ll sting me and I’ll die.” Scorpion said “no I won’t; we’re both in danger; I have children at home; we both want to live.” Rabbit said “okay, if you promise not to sting me.” So scorpion climbed onto rabbit’s back, and halfway across the flood, scorpion gave rabbit a lethal sting. Rabbit asked why, and scorpion shrugged; “you knew what I was when you let me onto your back.”
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I don’t get how this is even a question. Most people are here because they want to get away from corporate social media. It’s like asking a person who managed to leave a cult if it was okay for them if they build a church on their plot.
