Kev Quirk, one of the admins of Fosstodon (a Mastodon instance), destroys Meta in an email exchange.
fosstodon.org
The exchange is about Meta's upcoming ActivityPub-enabled network Threads. Meta is calling for a meeting, his response is priceless!
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Because it’s what we’ve come to expect from large corporations suddenly joining the table of any FOSS project that is adjacent to their financial stakes. Coexistence is possible if they can profit from the software without assimilating it, but it also stands to reason that they will be pushing for new interoperability standards that benefit their own business model at the expense of users in some way.
The lowest hanging fruit would be something that allows them to associate Fediverse accounts with users whose marketing data already exists in their database, or providing a service to third parties that helps them tie their own databases back to Fediverse users. This would require some sort of hook that encourages the users to either associate their Fediverse accounts to an existing Meta service, or otherwise volunteer common PII such as email address that can be cross referenced. Maybe some kind of tracking cookie that accomplishes the same.
Keep in mind that this is just an example, it is not necessarily the exact angle they are pursuing. I’m not in the automatically defederate camp, but a healthy amount of skepticism is definitely warranted.
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Edit: Also worth a read: https://kbin.social/m/fediverse@lemmy.ml/t/83284/How-to-Kill-a-Decentralised-Network-such-as-the-Fediverse
If fediverse admins come back to us saying that they have figured out a safe way to federate with Meta, then we will know that Meta got to them (financially). Maybe that's why they want an off the record meeting?
The proverbial canary in the coal mine.
Wow so in your view anyone who just says "I think this isn't a big deal and it'll be fine" has been paid off?
Regardless of the fact that's something with absolutely no evidence?
And you're supposed to be the rational one here?
Some people on this thread have lost their damn minds.
Dealing with an enormous corporation with an extensive track record of exploiting similar scenarios and acting on bad faith...
Yeah, it's pretty rational to believe this time will also be reflective of their general modus operandi.
You've mounted an emphatic defense of Facebook based almost exclusively on the fact people in this thread don't know exactly the technical details of what fuckery they'll be up to this time. I'm left wondering if you have any understanding of people, history, or... context as a concept.
You have provided a good sounding board for others to illustrate just what the risks involved are. So, thank you for that.
Yeah, I'm "defending" Facebook by pointing out that people keep letting 2 + 2 = 57845789478945 and that many of the "risks" being talked about are simply imaginary, technically impossible and/or do not require Meta to start an instance to materialise.
The technical details rather matter when people are coming up with random nonsense and/or don't actually seem to understand the nature of the platform they're coming to the defence of.
I don't trust Meta. I don't like Meta. That doesn't mean I need to also accept as true random confabulations about people being paid off and data being scraped for ends that don't make any sense. There's been a whole heap of heat around this subject and basically no light.