PM_ME_VINTAGE_30S [he/him]

Honest question: Why does it matter if he’s a transphobe when choosing which Fediverse software to use?

1. Because some people have actually financially supported him. I’m not trans, but I would be devastated to know that my money went to feed someone who wants to destroy me.
2. I already have trouble convincing transgender people in my social circle that Lemmy as a software is safe for them to use even with the variety of trans-inclusive servers like yours, and will be safe and inclusive in the future.

A great example of (2) is the fate of PolyMC. Thankfully, the other developers forked it into Prism, but transphobia put that whole project in jeopardy for a bit.

The software is FOSS and anyone can make their own instance.

IMO that’s why I’m not immediately dropping my account and running for the hills, but it’s still not good. Most people don’t have the technical skills or the interest in learning them to run their own instance.

I really want to understand what I might be missing.

IMO it’s that even though he does not personally control how Lemmy instances are run, and even though we do have a good degree of robustness to transphobia because the software is FOSS, it is still both morally and technically ill-advised to have a transphobe at the helm of an open-source software project.

Hello from Lemmy!

I like this, but I think that upvotes correspond to things people enjoy, which may or may not be of high quality. I.e., shitposting subs would probably be rated “high quality” when, like… it’s literally the point to post shitty content.

Also, as stated, that means we have to sum over the entire time history of the community. We would probably want to limit the time history of what is summed over, subject to a maximum for subs with high post counts (like the shitposting subs.

IMO it’s a great suggestion, but I think it needs to be part of a weighted combination of factors.

I absolutely think we can approximate it, and MAU furnishes a flawed example of such an approximation.

Okay but how do we quantitatively and unambiguously devise a metric for quality? More importantly, how do we come up with a satisfactory approximation to that metric? I’m open to ideas.

Short answer: No.

Long answer: Threads, like Mastodon and the social media website formerly known as Twitter, are microblogging sites. While Mastodon users do show up here once in a while, I don’t get their posts unless they actively post in a Lemmy community.

So if your instance decides not to defederate from Threads, and you choose not to block Threads using Lemmy’s upcoming individual instance blocks, you might see their users occasionally comment on stuff. If I recall correctly, it’s pretty difficult for Mastodon users to post on Lemmy for technical reasons that will also apply to Threads.

I do think that quality of life in the wider Fediverse could dip once Threads users are allowed to participate and Threads content is allowed to spread. However, I think that the impact on Lemmy will be small. If it isn’t, we have defederation and soon individual instance blocking to help us filter out the crap.

Because the code for Fediverse sites is free and open source, I think that the Fediverse will exist for the foreseeable future. However, Meta could make it worse. If their past behavior is any indication, i.e. basically all of it, then that’s probably what they’re going to do eventually. At the end of the day, if Threads is too irritating, someone will start an instance of something that is defederated from them.

Personally, I’m not exactly thrilled by the prospect of Meta (or any corporation) joining the Fediverse (or any other aspect of public life), but I think we’ll be okay. I am concerned for people in marginalized groups who will have to deal with the toxic community that Threads has allowed to fester. However, there was a big stink about this a couple months ago where some big instances pre-emptively defederated from Threads. Now might be a good time to make an account on one of those instances.

Regardless of what happens, you will not be literally forced to go to Facebook or Threads. In the absolute worst case scenario, i.e. Meta takes over the Fediverse, you join or host an instance that doesn’t federate with anyone.

I’m an anxious person myself so I know this is hard to internalize: you’ll be okay. We’ll get through this.