Meta can rage farm Mastodon without controlling it
Meta can introduce their signature rage farming to the Fediverse. They don't need to control Mastodon. All they have to do is introduce it in their app. Show every Threads user algorithmically filtered content from the Fediverse precisely tailored for maximum rage. When the rage inducing content came from Mastodon, the enraged Thread users will flood that Mastodon threads with the familiar rage-filled Facebook comment section vomit. This in turn will enrage Mastodon users, driving them to engage, at least in the short to mid term. All the while Meta sells ads in-between posts. And that's how they rage farm the Fediverse without EEE-ing the technology. Meta can effectively EEE the userbase. The last E is something Meta may not intend but would likely happen. It consists of a subset of the Fediverse users leaving the network or segregating themselves in a small vomit-free bubble.
Some people asked what EEE is:
But a counter is that much of that information is already public and can be scraped, they aren't gaining much on outside meta users that they aren't already able to do.
Best advice at the end of the day is that for social media, unless advertised on privacy, never post anything you dont want to be public. And for cases like lemmy, expect even metadata to be available for anyone interested.
I understand the wish to not interact with meta, even if its for privacy concerns.
But Im a firm believer that it is the user first who needs to make that decision, not the instance. But as I said, Lemmy being the only one of the big fedi platforms right now that doesnt have a feature for instance/domain blocking user level kinds of screws this up.
There is no technical way for the user to make this decision as data gets federated across instance databases, not users' browsers. I do run my own, which is what enables me to make this decision, and anyone agreeing with it is welcome to come along.
When you say that there is no technical way, you sre referring to users not being able to block instances right?
If it's that I don't think it is that difficult to implement, Mastodon already allows for that. And also the app "connect for lemmy" in its last update has given the option to block instances user level, I don't really know yet if it blocks all users from that indtance from appearing or only communities as I haven't tested it yet.
Regardless to say, if we can get the appropriate tools this definitely could be a decision for users to take, if we make it so that they can completely block any and all content coming from a big instance.
A user blockin visibility of content is very different from that content not being federated.