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> 1194 words, 32 paragraphs, about 4 minutes to read (300 wpm).
> First published on 2020-11-16.
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This post will require a lot of in-knowledge to understand. It's okay if you have no idea what I'm talking about.
When someone tries to explain the fediverse to someone who doesn't know what it is, chances are they'll be saying that it's like traditional corporate social media, but with these differences:
open source
federated (and what that means)
lots of LGBT people on it
Those things are true. But I don't believe they make a difference to how people interact with the site on a fundamental level.
What do you do on Twitter Dot Com? You scroll down and look at other people's shitty posts. Sometimes you even press the buttons on them. What do you do on the fediverse? You scroll down and look at other people's shitty posts. Sometimes you even press the buttons on them.
It's the same feedback loop and it creates a very similar feel and environment. After all, that loop is exactly what Mastodon and Pleroma were designed to replicate.
Federation is touted as a good thing which splits users into separate communities organised by topics. Communities then have to try a little harder to reach across to each other. It's never stated, but the implication is that there's a whole spectrum and variety of communities, and that they're somehow equal in some kind of democratic society.
In reality, what happens is that 5 very different, distinct, and clearly identifiable varieties of communities emerge. Please see my diagram:
(Despite the assumptions one might make from the "political compass" format, these are distinct quadrants with solid borders, not sliding scales across the lines.)
(That chart does not include the 5th segment on it. The 5th segment is the centrists. My commentary about them wouldn't fit in the space.)
The centrists just use the social media as a social media. They talk about themselves, and others, and what they saw on the news. They don't get involved with the drama between the quadrants. They're likely blissfully unaware of it. They just want to grill for god's sake.
It's a simple life, and in my opinion, one to be envied.
In the red zone, we have the likes of hellsite.site, who post more about the network itself and engaging in blocking warfare against the latest suspicious user and the latest suspicious site, than actually making posts and using the social media for a reason.
Let me try to put this another way. They're trying to create a safe space online, which is a laudable goal. I can appreciate a safe space. But the problem is that they're so focused on trying to curate the perfect social media that they haven't thought about what they're going to do once they actually manage to create that space. They're too caught up in the inter-site hellscape. And if the only thing that they post about is commentary on drama from the spaces they're excluding... is it really a safe space, if the war is the only thing visible?
Of course, the social media utopia that they aim for will never exist. Blocking sites doesn't work: there will always be something more to block. Instance allowlists get closer, but they'll still never be perfect. There will always be that one user on that one site that did something bad and now everyone hates them. But they're part of an allowed site. Can't get rid of them entirely. What to do? Ah yes, aggressively subpost about them on your timeline. _That'll_ solve the problem! Finally: a safe space!
While this war continues, there will never be anything but the war to post about. They are fighting for nothing. If they win, which won't happen, it would just be over. The reason they exist would have ended. They are fighting because they exist to fight.
The red zone is a very tiring existence, and I'm pleased to be rid of it.
In the purple zone, the only fucking thing they know is technology and "freedom". Christ. How awful.
Obviously the blue zone is abhorrent.
The green quadrant is where I find myself nowadays.
If you run a fediverse site that other people can join as members, then there are exactly two reasons to blanket block another site for all your members.
At least 2 users on the other site are harassing at least 2 of your own members, and the moderators on the other site are not helping.
Or, the site is dedicated to hosting hate speech.
Otherwise... what's the point?
The thing is that many things make up a fediverse site.
The site's rules
The moderators
The people on it
The people and their behaviour is the most important aspect of any site. If you as a moderator are considering blocking a site, what you are doing is depriving your members of the choice of who to interact with. Mastodon has powerful controls in the hands of the users. Users can block people, users can block entire sites. They can do this themselves. They don't need you to do it for them - unless there's a bigger problem of uncontrolled harassment.
Uncontrolled harassment is the only use case for a domain block. Did you see one specific person on another site who is being annoying or has really terrible takes? Of course, we've all seen that one person. But WHO THE FUCK CARES. If they aren't specifically being annoying at your members, just live and let live. They can exist in their own world. You don't need to care about them. If they're being specifically annoying at one of your members, then choosing how to interact - or not - should be in the hands of the member, not you.
You don't need to play god with what your members see. It's the internet. It's a scary place. We all know about that, and we can deal with it ourselves. The only way to make a truly safe space is to close federation and have approved _membership_, and vet individual _people_ before inviting them. In other words, a classic forum, or if you prefer real-time communication, a chatroom. Is this what you want? Then make it, instead of trying to make the fediverse fit your whims.
It's all so tiring and I'm sick of it.
Hopefully you can now understand why I block people on sight who post meta drama or block commentary. My life has been much improved for it.
I'll still recommend the fediverse to other people looking for a new social media to join, but I'll try to direct them into "centrist" spaces rather than the spaces I ended up in, because the discourse and effort of the red zone is not fucking worth the zero upsides it brings.
If I ever get the desire to create my own social media platform, I'm making a fucking medieval castle social media, which will probably be called Castledon.
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