this post was submitted on 16 Jun 2023

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an update to defederating from sh.itjust.works (beehaw.org)

submitted 1 year ago by alyaza@beehaw.org to c/support@beehaw.org

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hey folks, here's a quick update on our decision to defederate from sh.itjust.works! (and here's sh.itjust.works's side of this update)

we got in touch with the head admin over there, The Dude, and we had a pretty good chat about our concerns and reason for defederating. while immediate re-federation is just bluntly off the table with the rudimentary state of Lemmy's moderation tools, we now have a pretty good idea of the roadmap to refederating with them. we think we'll eventually be able to do this, although we don't have a timetable on when yet.

we're also now collaborating with him on how to move forward--and in the weeks and months to come we'll be pushing to expedite the process of developing some of the necessary tools. this decision has really helped us make connections that can hopefully realize those tools both on the desktop side and in apps being developed for Lemmy. we're also hoping to collaborate with other Lemmy administrators who have needs like our own, or just generally want more granular tools at their disposal.

we did also get in touch with the lemmy.world owner prior to defederating to share the concerns that prompted us to defederate[^1]--but we have not received any communication from him since it was levied, so there's no roadmap at all there as of now. we're always open to reconsidering and collaborating to end the defederation with him, but for now the earliest i can give you is "when mod tools are in a better state".

that's all for now folks. if any new significant developments take place we'll announce them as needed.

[^1]: we're only bringing this up now because it was just not useful information in the context of our announcement. it almost certainly would have been interpreted as some sort of callousness and/or brought unnecessary sectarianism and grief to him. at the end of the day he has his reasons and desires for running lemmy.world how he does, and we have ours for running Beehaw as we do. because of social and technological circumstances those are just incompatible right now, and that's fine.

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[–] hiperviper@beehaw.org 6 points 1 year ago

Thanks! You all are all-stars!

[–] Hotchpotch@beehaw.org 6 points 1 year ago

Thanks for keeping us updated!

[–] Quexotic@beehaw.org 5 points 1 year ago

Some days it feels like there's a shortage of nice people. Today is not one of those days. Thank you.

[–] Rentlar@beehaw.org 5 points 1 year ago

Thanks for the update. If any Github issues are brought up that would assist with getting the necessary moderation tools implemented be sure to broadcast them!

[–] Nougat@kbin.social 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Being here from kbin.social, none of this directly impacts me, but I am more than interested in seeing how this all plays out. This is a whole new dynamic, and getting to see how it develops is fascinating.

It seems to me that the whole point of a fediverse-based system is that different instances should defederate, if that serves the purposes and desires of the admins of a particular instance. I know that user accounts and their various configurations are currently locked to a single instance. (If you're from the Microsoft world, think of old NT4 domains where the PDC controlled everything, in comparison to Active Directory with multimastering.) At some point, tools will emerge to import/export your user configuration, making it easier to switch from one instance to another to suit your own personal needs better. And maybe a multimastering kind of thing can happen eventually, too, so you could take your ActivityPub-based account and log in with it to any instance.

at the end of the day he has his reasons and desires for running lemmy.world how he does, and we have ours for running Beehaw as we do. because of social and technological circumstances those are just incompatible right now, and that's fine.

Exactly. One is not better or worse than the other, they're just different, in some incompatible ways.

[–] livejamie@lemm.ee 3 points 1 year ago (4 children)

The part where things get tricky is that beehaw currently has ~15 of the top 50 communities across the entire fediverse and has become the defacto discussion grounds for gaming/tech/news/etc.

One could argue this goes against the whole concept of decentralized communication in the first place, and this may be a position beehaw doesn't want to be in.

Beehaw has every right to foster a tight-knit community that adheres to its desires.

But there also is a level of responsibility and custodianship over these large communities they foster for the betterment and adoption of the fediverse.

[–] DarbyDear@beehaw.org 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I definitely see your point, but I'm going to speak as one of the ones that would argue that it goes against the concept of decentralized communication 😉

I can appreciate that you think that there is a responsibility to the fediverse as a whole, but I feel like that responsibility comes second to the goals and intentions of the instance in question. As you suggested, Beehaw didn't request to become the go-to instance for gaming/tech/news. My idea of the fediverse response would be that, since Beehaw's technology community is defederated, then those instances should either spin up their own or go to another instance's. That may turn into a different instance's technology community becoming the de facto one, but that's a consequence that Beehaw has to accept with the decision to defederate.

I will say that this bumps into the issue of community collision - that is, communities with the same name and/or subject across multiple instances, and I admittedly don't have a good solution in mind for that right now. As it stands, I'm actually interested to see how all of this pans out - this is the sort of issue that only comes to light when a specific set of circumstances is met, and I think some precedents are going to be set throughout this process. It is also likely going to be a significant push for the improvement of moderation and administrative tools since that's the major limiting factor here, so I think this whole situation is an overall positive for the development of the fediverse as a whole.

[–] livejamie@lemm.ee 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I disagree I think it hurts overall adoption and the classic XKCD comic comes to mind: https://xkcd.com/927/

I respect your opinion, though.

[–] DarbyDear@beehaw.org 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yeah, I respect yours as well - I think this is just a difference in opinion about what the core focus of the fediverse should be. For me, it's that there are more granular instances that aren't beholden to others and can determine for themselves what they want their corner of the system to be while still having a connection to others.

If I understand you properly, you seem to be more of the mind that the fediverse is meant to be focused more on robustness and taking control out of one central authority, and the welfare of the system as a whole is tied to the aggregate strength of its instances.

Please correct me if I'm wrong and you would like to though, and thank you for the discussion either way! I mostly wanted to be an example of someone that doesn't think that's what the purpose is since you had mentioned there will be folks that disagree. In the end there is no right or wrong stance, just opinions on what's more important.

For the record, that XKCD is exactly what I was thinking about when I mentioned the community collision issue!

[–] Nougat@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago (3 children)

I'll throw in here, too.

If beehaw has become the defacto source for a certain topic, in the current state, lemmy.world and sh.it can both see that content. Their users can't participate in it, but they can consume it. If one of those users feels it's important enough that they want to participate, they can create an account at an instance that hasn't been defederated - it doesn't even have to be beehaw.

On the other hand, if the topic community at beehaw feels strongly enough, they can move to a different instance as well, one that maintains federation with desired instances. Reddit subs have split in pieces, or migrated to new subs, when some moderation drama happened; that concept can play in the fediverse, too.

I believe that it is a reasonable and good thing for instances to be able to curate the level of discourse available through them as necessary. I haven't been here long, so I don't know much of the history or details around the reasons for defederating, but my understanding is that it has to do with a difference of vision on account verification and moderation/administration. Part of the problem with Reddit (and Facebook, and MySpace, and Digg, and and and) is that it's a monolithic silo. Yes, users have capabilities to filter content at Reddit, and other places, but the general concept is more "one size fits all."

The fediverse has an opportunity to demonstrate how dynamic it can be, and this kind of defed situation is part of it.

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[–] morgiedama@beehaw.org 3 points 1 year ago

I feel like this is a healthy thing to do. We all want to enjoy the fediverse and being able to work with other admins where they may have been some problem users and create lasting working relationships towards a goal that would benefit everyone is a great next step for strengthening lemmy as a whole. Thanks for the update!

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