People keep parroting that Threads will kill us all but won’t explain how it could happen to the fediverse. As in, actual steps. Because Flipboard federated and I’m not flooded with news posts. Mastodon is used for Nazi instances and I’m not flooded by Nazi content, even if the maintainer don’t block that particular instace due to not knowing it exists.
No, XMP is not a valid example. It requires specific people to be on that specific platform for you to connect with them, like iMessage and WhatsApp. The fediverse is nothing like that.
Can someone explain exactly how EEE will happen? Technically? Other than FUD?
EDIT: thank you all for the replies, there’s definitely some good points that are worth considering that I couldn’t find elsewhere.
Threads will want to implement post reactions to maintain parity with Facebook.
Threads expands the ActivityPub spec to include reactions.
Now, every other instance will not be compatible with reactions. Users complain they cannot see reactions.
Admins have two choices now:
Refuse to implement reactions because they are not part of the spec. Users leave and join threads.
ActivityPub adds reactions to the standard, all instances must now support reactions. Meta has now started dictating the spec.
I feel the XMP fears do have some sentiment, and it’s really a matter of how the broad username interprets these issues (including the Thread users which would be family and friends).
I don’t think so. There are tons of ActivityPub implementations out there already that don’t even support all parts of the official spec (Lemmy can’t display attached images, for example). There are also implementations that have tacked on additional functionality beyond the official spec (again, Lemmy’s downvotes).
It’s a very flexible protocol that allows developers to pick and choose what features they want to implement in their services.
i just want to point out that, in the same way XMP is not a valid example of EEE, neither is Flipboard a good example of a massive megacorp federating. Flipboard’s algorithms have never incited violence in Myanmar and that makes 100% of the difference.
my concern is not EEE, and I agree that i don’t get why that’s the focus.
my concern is that we are dealing with Meta—an absolutely massive, soulless corporation which has shown dozen upon hundreds of times that it will prioritizethegrowth of its shareholders’ paycheck well before the afterthought of caring if its algorithms end up wreaking addiction and violence.
call that FUD if you want, i call it learning from well-documented experience.
Again, you’re not actually making an argument about meta doing anything to make the fediverse worse than it is, you’re not even arguing that metas actions in those other situations are directly applicable and will happen here, you’re just saying “look at these bad things that Meta did before, sure other bad things must happen”.
That is the literal textbook definition of a FUD argument.
Let’s flip this around: Show me a thing that Meta has touched that hasn’t turned to shit. Why risk the same fate when we don’t have to? What is meta bringing to the table that would warrant foolhardiness on our part?
See the opposite of FUD is naivete, hubris, make-believe, not something one wants to be engaged in either.
Huh, if only there was an example of Meta existing on a decentralized platform where I could choose to visit them and interact with their stuff but I didn’t have to.
Oh huh, would you look at that, turns out this little decentralized network called the worldwide web has been running it this whole time!
But in the scenario of lemmy / mastodon, you only ever interact with your chosen frontend / instance and it only communivates to facebook through activitypub not through the general web standards. Even if facebook were to just embed a bunch of js code as an activitypub text feed, your chosen instance would still have to choose whether or not to render it by default, or to give you the option, or to block it entirely.
It’s like people don’t want to email people with Gmail addresses because Google at some point killed off XMPP*, in fearing that email altogether would be killed off.
which it didn’t even do, XMPP was a terrible protocol by itself already.
Waving a pithy saying around in place of an actual argument, doesn’t make it any less of a FUD argument. I mean can you even name 14 open source projects that facebook has destroyed? Or just 14 bad vibes you’ve gotten?
There’s no good product that Meta has ever touched that’s been made better after their involvement. Why go for bat for a company that has consistently shown it’s goal is to make things worse for the end user?
I’m not going to bat for them, I’m just not spreading FUD and getting whipping myself into a panic over a non issue.
Again, I urge you to stop using FUD generalities like “they have the midas touch of poop, everything they touch turns to poopy”, and present an actual grounded explanation of how federating with them will cause an actual problem.
Well look, I don’t have enough insight into the design or backend for Lemmy or mastodon, but Facebook has heavily invested into their network, and likely aims to grow.
How could they do that? All of this seems blockable on the client end (meaning I’m not good/shitty enough to work at Facebook) but imagine:
an algorithm takes a selection of high ranking fb posts and cross-posts to Lemmy, far faster and more frequently than regular users. Oh, you’ll need to login to read.
threads could wholesale repost other users and their comments, but behind a threads login wall
Basically do some scummy behavior using our public statements, questions and comments, all to get more attention devoted to what’s happening on their site (and its associated ads).
an algorithm takes a selection of high ranking fb posts and cross-posts to Lemmy, far faster and more frequently than regular users. Oh, you’ll need to login to read.
So what? The Lemmy meme communities make posts way faster and more frequently than any other communities. Did I solve that by demanding my instance admin not federate with those instances or communities? No, I just unsubscribed from them.
And if Threads send encrypted / locked posts to Lemmy that cant be read on Lemmy clients then you just defederate from them then.
threads could wholesale repost other users and their comments, but behind a threads login wall
So? How does Threads forcing their users to sign in make your experience using Lemmy any worse?
I thought your second point was ~ ‘Lemmy instances shouldn’t federate with meta because you don’t want them getting your data’, not, ‘it doesn’t matter whether or not we federate because they can scrape that data off Lemmy anyways’.
And yet you haven’t explained “how”, you repeated a few buzzwords. If they want to “steal data” they are able to by simply creating their own instance.
What specifically will they do / can they do, to tank the fediverse?
Others have given technical ways fb can eee, but I’m more concerned about rapid uncontrolled growth and corporate political sanitization.
Say you have a community dedicated to pointing out corporate greed. Your community federates with threads and wow it’s really taken off suddenly you have gone from hundreds of up votes to tens of thousands of them. Wow this is great, but huh, why has my post about Facebook only got 3 up votes. Huh why does the word communism spawn a 200 comment chain of alt righters yelling. Why is there an obviously sponsored post at the top. Why is everyone saying “unalived” and using 🍉 instead of 🇵🇸.
It’s just not in their interest to be a normal part of the fediverse. It’s in their interest to compete with mastodon. Mastodon is not competitive because it doesn’t have billions of dollars in its budget.
EEE works the way it always has. Add features not present in Mastodon that only work on threads. People want those features and join threads, Mastodon users are missing out. Long time Mastodon users create a second Threads account so they can interact properly with their friends, and eventually abandon their old Mastodon account.
I used Mastodon but the same applies to firefish etc, any fediverse technology that will interact with threads. It probably won’t impact Lemmy.
People keep parroting that Threads will kill us all but won’t explain how it could happen to the fediverse. As in, actual steps. Because Flipboard federated and I’m not flooded with news posts. Mastodon is used for Nazi instances and I’m not flooded by Nazi content, even if the maintainer don’t block that particular instace due to not knowing it exists.
No, XMP is not a valid example. It requires specific people to be on that specific platform for you to connect with them, like iMessage and WhatsApp. The fediverse is nothing like that.
Can someone explain exactly how EEE will happen? Technically? Other than FUD?
EDIT: thank you all for the replies, there’s definitely some good points that are worth considering that I couldn’t find elsewhere.
Here’s an example I can see happening.
Threads will want to implement post reactions to maintain parity with Facebook. Threads expands the ActivityPub spec to include reactions.
Now, every other instance will not be compatible with reactions. Users complain they cannot see reactions.
Admins have two choices now:
Refuse to implement reactions because they are not part of the spec. Users leave and join threads.
ActivityPub adds reactions to the standard, all instances must now support reactions. Meta has now started dictating the spec.
I feel the XMP fears do have some sentiment, and it’s really a matter of how the broad username interprets these issues (including the Thread users which would be family and friends).
I don’t think so. There are tons of ActivityPub implementations out there already that don’t even support all parts of the official spec (Lemmy can’t display attached images, for example). There are also implementations that have tacked on additional functionality beyond the official spec (again, Lemmy’s downvotes).
It’s a very flexible protocol that allows developers to pick and choose what features they want to implement in their services.
i just want to point out that, in the same way XMP is not a valid example of EEE, neither is Flipboard a good example of a massive megacorp federating. Flipboard’s algorithms have never incited violence in Myanmar and that makes 100% of the difference.
my concern is not EEE, and I agree that i don’t get why that’s the focus.
my concern is that we are dealing with Meta—an absolutely massive, soulless corporation which has shown dozen upon hundreds of times that it will prioritize the growth of its shareholders’ paycheck well before the afterthought of caring if its algorithms end up wreaking addiction and violence.
call that FUD if you want, i call it learning from well-documented experience.
Again, you’re not actually making an argument about meta doing anything to make the fediverse worse than it is, you’re not even arguing that metas actions in those other situations are directly applicable and will happen here, you’re just saying “look at these bad things that Meta did before, sure other bad things must happen”.
That is the literal textbook definition of a FUD argument.
Let’s flip this around: Show me a thing that Meta has touched that hasn’t turned to shit. Why risk the same fate when we don’t have to? What is meta bringing to the table that would warrant foolhardiness on our part?
See the opposite of FUD is naivete, hubris, make-believe, not something one wants to be engaged in either.
Huh, if only there was an example of Meta existing on a decentralized platform where I could choose to visit them and interact with their stuff but I didn’t have to.
Oh huh, would you look at that, turns out this little decentralized network called the worldwide web has been running it this whole time!
You don’t have to if they visit you themselves
But in the scenario of lemmy / mastodon, you only ever interact with your chosen frontend / instance and it only communivates to facebook through activitypub not through the general web standards. Even if facebook were to just embed a bunch of js code as an activitypub text feed, your chosen instance would still have to choose whether or not to render it by default, or to give you the option, or to block it entirely.
It’s like people don’t want to email people with Gmail addresses because Google at some point killed off XMPP*, in fearing that email altogether would be killed off.
That’s a pretty good example actually. React has been a boon to webdev imo, and I love using it. Yarn too.
Don’t forget the less sexy stuff like watchman
Waving a pithy saying around in place of an actual argument, doesn’t make it any less of a FUD argument. I mean can you even name 14 open source projects that facebook has destroyed? Or just 14 bad vibes you’ve gotten?
omg you think im pithy ☺️
There’s no good product that Meta has ever touched that’s been made better after their involvement. Why go for bat for a company that has consistently shown it’s goal is to make things worse for the end user?
I’m not going to bat for them, I’m just not spreading FUD and getting whipping myself into a panic over a non issue.
Again, I urge you to stop using FUD generalities like “they have the midas touch of poop, everything they touch turns to poopy”, and present an actual grounded explanation of how federating with them will cause an actual problem.
Well look, I don’t have enough insight into the design or backend for Lemmy or mastodon, but Facebook has heavily invested into their network, and likely aims to grow.
How could they do that? All of this seems blockable on the client end (meaning I’m not good/shitty enough to work at Facebook) but imagine:
Basically do some scummy behavior using our public statements, questions and comments, all to get more attention devoted to what’s happening on their site (and its associated ads).
So what? The Lemmy meme communities make posts way faster and more frequently than any other communities. Did I solve that by demanding my instance admin not federate with those instances or communities? No, I just unsubscribed from them.
And if Threads send encrypted / locked posts to Lemmy that cant be read on Lemmy clients then you just defederate from them then.
So? How does Threads forcing their users to sign in make your experience using Lemmy any worse?
No need for an antagonistic tone here, just conversing with you.
I think this would be a problem now for people like me who enjoy browsing all, where the feed would get overwhelmed by facebook-sourced content.
And I don’t like meta as a company, so it shouldn’t be a surprise that many people do not want to provide any data whatsoever to them via threads etc.
Except that you’re posting publicly and there is absolutely nothing that prevents Meta from scraping all of your lemmy activity as it is.
Precisely my 2nd point.
I thought your second point was ~ ‘Lemmy instances shouldn’t federate with meta because you don’t want them getting your data’, not, ‘it doesn’t matter whether or not we federate because they can scrape that data off Lemmy anyways’.
How could a company that sells data misuse or sell our data? It is the people who are wrong because I am not capable of critical thought
And yet you haven’t explained “how”, you repeated a few buzzwords. If they want to “steal data” they are able to by simply creating their own instance.
What specifically will they do / can they do, to tank the fediverse?
Others have given technical ways fb can eee, but I’m more concerned about rapid uncontrolled growth and corporate political sanitization.
Say you have a community dedicated to pointing out corporate greed. Your community federates with threads and wow it’s really taken off suddenly you have gone from hundreds of up votes to tens of thousands of them. Wow this is great, but huh, why has my post about Facebook only got 3 up votes. Huh why does the word communism spawn a 200 comment chain of alt righters yelling. Why is there an obviously sponsored post at the top. Why is everyone saying “unalived” and using 🍉 instead of 🇵🇸.
I highly highly recommend reading this post: https://ploum.net/2023-06-23-how-to-kill-decentralised-networks.html
It’s just not in their interest to be a normal part of the fediverse. It’s in their interest to compete with mastodon. Mastodon is not competitive because it doesn’t have billions of dollars in its budget.
EEE works the way it always has. Add features not present in Mastodon that only work on threads. People want those features and join threads, Mastodon users are missing out. Long time Mastodon users create a second Threads account so they can interact properly with their friends, and eventually abandon their old Mastodon account.
I used Mastodon but the same applies to firefish etc, any fediverse technology that will interact with threads. It probably won’t impact Lemmy.
I’ve also yet to see a technical explanation for how defederating would have the slightest effect on hindering whatever plan they have.
Not having to participate in the decline.
Whole point of fediverse was to get away from all that shit, why let them crawl in?