Beehaw on Lemmy: The long-term conundrum of staying here
Yesterday, you probably saw this informal post by one of our head admins (Chris Remington). This post lamented some of the difficulties we’re running into with the site at this point, and what the future might hold for us. This is a more formal post about those difficulties and the way we currently see things.
Up front: we aren't confident in the continued use of Lemmy. We are working through how best to make the website live up to the vision of our documents—and simply put, the vast majority of the limitations we're running into are Lemmy's at this point. An increasing amount of our time is spent trying to work around or against the software to achieve what we want rather than productively building this community. That leaves us with serious questions about our long-term ability to stay on this platform, especially with the lingering prospect of not having the people needed to navigate backend stuff.
Long-time users will no doubt be aware of our advocacy for moderator tools that we think the platform needs (and particularly that we need). Our belief in the importance and necessity of those tools has only hardened with time. Progress of those tools, however—and even organizing work on them—has been pretty much nonexistent outside of our efforts from what we can see.[^1] In the three months since we started seriously pushing the ideas we'd like to see, we’re not aware of any of them being seriously considered—much less taken up or on the way to being incorporated into Lemmy.
In fact: even within the framework of Lemmy's almost nonexistent roadmap and entirely nonexistent timetable on which to expect features it has been made clear to us that improving federation or moderation on the platform are not big priorities.[^2] We have implicitly been told that if this part of the software is to improve we will need to organize that from scratch. And we have tried that to be clear. Our proposal is (and has been) paying people bounties for their labor toward implementing these features, in line with paying all labor done on our behalf—but we've received mixed messages from the top on whether this would be acceptable. (Unclear guidance and general lack of communication is symptomatic of a lot of our relation with the Lemmy devs in the past few months.)
Things aren't much better on the non-moderator side of things. The problems with databases are almost too numerous to talk about and even Lemmy's most ardent supporters recognize this as the biggest issue with the software currently. A complete rewrite is likely the only solution. Technical issues with the codebase are also extensive; we've made numerous changes on our side because of that. Many of the things we're running into have been reported up the chain of command but continue to languish entirely unacknowledged. In some cases bugs, feature requests, and other requests to Lemmy devs have explicitly been blown off—and this is behavior that others have also run into with respect to the project. Only very recently have we seen any overtures at regular communication—and this communication has not hinted at any change in priorities.
All of what was just described has been difficult to get a handle on—and having fewer users, less activity, and more moderators has not done a whole lot to ease that. We honestly find that the more we dig and the more we work to straighten out issues that pop up, the more pop out and the more it feels like Lemmy is structurally unsound for our purposes. (One such example of what we’re working with is provided in the next section.)
In summary: we believe we can either continue to fight the software in basically every way possible, or we can prioritize building the community our documents preach. It is our shared belief that we cannot, in the long-term, do both; in any case, we're not interested in constantly having to fight for basic priorities—ones we consider extremely beneficial to the health of the overall Lemmy network—or having to unilaterally organize and recruit for their addition to the software. We are hobbyists trying to make a cool space first and foremost, and it's already a job enough to run the site. We cannot also be surrogates for fixing the software we use.
PenguinCoder: A brief sketch of the technical perspective
I've said a few words about this topic already, here and here. Other Beehaw admins have also brought some concerns to the Lemmy devs. Those issues still exist. To be clear: this is a volunteer operation and Lemmy is their software; they have a right to pick and choose what goes into it and what to put a priority on. But we have an obligation to keep users safe and secure, and their priorities increasingly stifle our own.
In the case of this happening for open source projects, the consensus is to make your own fork. But:
The problem with forking Lemmy is in starting from all the bad that is inherently there, and trying to make it better. That is way more work than starting fresh with more developers. IE, not using Rust for a web app and UI, better database queries from the start, better logging/functions from the start; not adding on bandaids. A fork of Lemmy will have all of Lemmy's problems but now you're responsible for them instead.
We don't need a fork, we need a solution.
To give just one painful example of where an upstream solution is sorely needed: the federation, blocking, and/or removal of problem images.
- You post an image to Beehaw.
- Beehaw sends your content out to every other server it's federated with
- Federated server accepts it (beehaw.org is on their allowlist), or rejects it (beehaw.org is on their denylist)
- If the server accepts it, a copy of your post or comment including the images are now on that receiving server as well as on the server you posted it to. Federation at work.
- Mod on beehaw.org sees your post doesn't follow the rules. Removes it from beehaw.org. The other instances Beehaw pushed this content to, do not get that notice to remove it. The copy of your content on Beehaw was removed. The copy of your content on other servers was not removed.
- The receiving federated instance needs to manually remove/delete the content from their own server
- For a text post or comment that's removed, this can be done via the admin/mod tools on that instance
- For a post or comment including a thumbnail, uploaded images, etc; that media content is not removed. It's not tracked where in Lemmy that content was used at. Admin removal of media commences. This requires backend command line and database access, and takes about a dozen steps per image; sometimes more.
There are dozens of issues—some bigger, some smaller—like this that we have encountered and have either needed to patch ourselves or have reported up the chain without success.
Alternatives and the way forward
If possible the best solution here is to stay on Lemmy—but this is going to require the status quo changing, and we’re unsure of how realistic that is. If we stay on Lemmy, it is probable that we will have to do so by making use of a whitelist.
For the unfamiliar, we currently use a blacklist—by default, we federate with all current and newly-created nodes of the Fediverse unless we explicitly exclude them from interacting with our site. A switch to a whitelist would invert this dynamic: we would not federate with anybody unless we explicitly choose to do so. This has some benefits—maintaining federation in some form; staying on Lemmy; generally causing less entropy than other alternatives, etc. But the drawbacks are also obvious: nearly everything described in this post will continue, blacklist or whitelist, because a huge part of the problem is Lemmy.
Because of that we have discussed almost every conceivable alternative there is to Lemmy. We are interested in the thoughts of this community on platforms you have all used and what our eventual choice is going to be, but we are planning on having more surveys in the future to collect this feedback. We ask that you do not suggest anything to us at this time, and comments with suggestions in this thread will be removed.
As for alternatives we’re seriously considering right now: they’re basically all FOSS; would preserve most aspects of the current experience while giving us less to worry about on the backside of things (and/or lowering the bar for code participation); are pretty much all more mature and feature-rich than Lemmy; and generally seem to avoid the issues we’re talking about at length here. Downsides are varied but the main commonality is lack of federation; entropy in moving; questions of how sustainable they are with our current mod team; and more cosmetic things like customization and modification.
We’re currently investigating the most promising of them in greater depth—but we don’t want to list something and then have to strike it, hence the vagueness. If we make a jump, that will be an informed jump. In any case logistics mean that the timetable here is on the order of months. Don’t expect immediate changes. As things develop, we’ll engage the community on what the path forward is and how to make it as smooth as possible.
[^1]: Other administrators have probably vocally pushed for these things, but we’re not aware of any public examples we can point to of this taking place. Their advocacy has not produced results that we're aware of in any case, which is what matters. [^2]: Perhaps best illustrated by the recent Lemmy dev AMA. We’ll also emphasize that Beehaw’s admin team is not alone in the belief that Lemmy devs do not take mod tools or federation issues particularly seriously.
A few high level notes about this post, given some of the discussions and behavior in the informal chat post by Chris the other day:
Thank you for all that you do
This is understandable but leaving platform is a big decision and the technical reasons are not really clear. Or at least they are not really crystal clear from the posts I have read. As end users we don't really have much of a choice except to trust you.
Personally one example I have is the lack of moderation tools. I have read numerous times that it was a problem. But I do not know what it means practically speaking - what is missing exactly.
You do not have to explain it and I am not asking it of you. But I just want to say that I feel like there are details that sound to be very relevant to your future decision but are yet undisclosed. Or maybe I just missed them
Thanks for all the work into making Beehaw what it is today. I joined during the Reddit exile and I'm happy to have found this community. I hope it continues to thrive
Some of the moderation issues that we've talked about in the past are linked in the OP post. I will say that it has only gotten worse over time. I cannot think of a single moderation feature which actually fully works. That is how bad I think things are. They're all broken in subtle ways. Yes, even reports are broken.
Given that it's still a newish project I do not find it abnormal to have broken features though I understand that it must be frustrating to have to deal with issues like that.
If a benevolent user were to work on fixing such bugs perhaps the problem would get solved ? Maybe once the new contributors catch up, one of them will make development in that direction ? Or do you believe there is really no hope for the project in that regard ?
Well, under any other circumstances, I would absolutely agree. Many users for other projects do, and have, volunteered their time, money, and blood (both in a metaphorical and a somewhat literal sense) so that a project can survive and live. However, that's just not the case here.
More then enough end users have tried to make the switch to become engineers, developers, bug hunters, the full works. They have offered up their time, their blood, their money, and their minds trying to help Lemmy get off the problems it currently sits on. There isn't a bereft amount of people, both experienced and inexperienced, unwilling to help, in fact, there's probably too many spoons in the pot.
What I'm trying to say is that, it's not problem with the helpers, it's a problem with those who need the help, because it appears that those who need the help don't really want it in the first place at all.
Sorry if I missed it, but do you have a specific example where the proposed help was denied by the maintainers? A case where they clearly acted against it such as a merge request denial, prematurely closing the issue or explicitly telling contributors to not contribute on that?
I see there is an issue here: https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/issues/3275
This issue was too large so lionir asked it to be split and linked two related issues like https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/issues/3662
So far I am not seeing anything like maintainers refusing the help - but perhaps this happened in private side channels or something like that?
I might have missed it too, but I don't see what's the core issue. I understand that the lack of moderation tools can be very frustrating, but Lemmy is open source and anyone can do a PR with improvements.
If the devs discard them for no reason or are rude I would understand the "they don't want any help" argument, but I saw no example.
Creating another social media project is just splitting efforts and I'm not sure if the amount of work is not being underestimated by a big margin.
It may be new, but there has been a huge surge in users and the jank has gone from “annoying” to “liability” now.
I feel the technical reasons are pretty clear. The media example alone is a great one. If someone drops illegal media onto one instance now, every admin has to take a ton of steps to scrub it from their instances. Through no fault of their own!
We hear every instance people say “we need moderation tools.“ Well, we don’t have them. I’m not mad at the developers, it has been a crazy few months and it’s not like any of these people are getting paid to do this. But it doesn’t matter what the intention is. If the tools aren’t there and are needed, eventually something has to give. There is too much burden on the admins of instances as it is. I’m not even talking about the financial side either!
doesn't this fix the issue with media? https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/pull/3897
I'm sad to see how dire the situation is on the moderation and admin side of things, but I just wanted to say best of luck and wish you the best no matter what you decide.
The communities in this instance are occupying a good portion of my subscriptions (quality content most of the time) and I'll definitely miss them if you end up leaving the fediverse.
Hi, just wanted to say I think you're really cool and keep up the good work :-)
I think ultimately y’all need to do what allows you to create the community you (we all really) want, even if that means ending the instance and moving somewhere else. It is not a moral imperative to use Lemmy and this was always a risk.
Lemmy has been a great experiment and there was a lot of momentum with the modest exodus that happened from Reddit, but if development is not going the way it needs to go, then we can’t stay here. Simple as that.
I was unaware of the Herculean effort it took in order to remove unwanted media from other instances. That is not just an inconvenience, that is a potentially huge liability. It’s also one more reason why I don’t host my own instance (despite the fact that I probably know enough to get it started, but probably too little to stay out of trouble lol). 
All of this is to say I support whatever decision you make. As long as Beehaw continues to exist I want to be a part of it, and I trust y’all to steer the ship accordingly.
The Lemmy dev AMA really shook my faith in the future of lemmy itself. That being said, I'll support and stand behind you, regardless of what you decide. If we make a new platform, I'll follow, if we choose to stand our ground and make the best of it, I'll help do my part. I believe in Beehaw and I'm proud to be part of the community.
Thank you.
Do you have a link to the AMA?
It's linked in the top level post
There was an ama? Do you happen to have a link or know which subinstance it was on?
It's linked in the top level post. Lemmy.ml, one of the two pet instances for the Lemmy devs
Yes it is! This is what I get for passively reading threads while watching tv.
I'm also quite unnerved by the responses to @Gaywallet@beehaw.org in regards to the promotion of instances that spread bigoted ideas and harrass other instances on join-lemmy.
The complete disregard seems to run counter to the ideology that beehaw is built on. It becomes clearer to me as time goes on that beehaw and lemmy have very different (and in some cases opposite) goals and priorities in mind. I for one would be completely onboard for a switch. I've admittedly used beehaw and lemmy in general less and less as the moderation issues and shift of tone in conversations have increased.
I think the admins and moderators of beehaw have been doing a wonderful job with the hand dealt regardless.
Yeah those responses are... Pretty bad, and even trend towards almost making me think he's intentionally refusing to acknowledge the nature of the question
Yes I'm with you there. It reminded me a lot of the common reactionary strategy of purposefully misinterpreting a question in to make the question asked sound unreasonable. Trying to paint it as though promoting them equally with all the other instances is a neutral action/position.
As an admin of furry.engineer, pawb.fun, and pawb.social (our lemmy instance) i have to concur. After just a few months, i’m just… tired.
Keeping the hardware happy is easy and fun, but moderation is nearly impossible. Also the waves of reactionary argumentative users from instances with open sign up are getting out of hand.
I’m about ready to switch to whitelist federation personally, but would need to build said whitelist. I will monitor and see where beehaw goes from here, because if our moderation team agrees, we will probably take similar action.
I have no faith in the lemmy devs to take these issues seriously. Has anyone looked at kbin to see what is different in terms of moderation?
@ada@lemmy.blahaj.zone had some thoughts, I saw, some time ago, about KBin mod tooling. They were not flattering
That is… discouraging.
For some background: I am a hardware and sysadmin junkie. my server rack is a homelab for learning and reinforcing skills around systems administration, virtualization, and now kubernetes. All this bad faith behavior on lemmy is killing my ability to focus on learning, and mastodon has nowhere near the same number of bad actors. Not sure what it is about a link aggregation service that attracts these people.
If things continue the way they are, whitelisting federation or shutting down will likely be our options.
Don’t get me wrong, i adore the idea of folks logging into the server in my basement and hanging out, I just don’t think that outweighs the current stream of bigotry, hate and CSAM being passed around.
Kbin is a newer app, but it isn't any further along than Lemmy in terms of moderation tools. It is only now just getting an API to allow any kind of automation tools. For the past month spam has been a problem on the main kbin instance and the developer has openly said he hasn't been able to keep up with it.
Popping in late to say that the guy running kbin has said that a huge update is coming by the end of month, and one of the things that’s getting fixed is admin tools across federation. With luck, kbin will be less of a mess soon.
I am so tempted to say F-it and just start my own ActivityPub Fediverse project to replace Lemmy. It's such a daunting commitment, though, and we each have our lives to live. I wish the admins of Beehaw all the luck and success in what they're having to wrangle with. It's too bad the Lemmy maintainers are so unwilling to work toward fixing the clear major pain points of the software.
Well, I am sure many are tempted.. I am waiting to see if a berson decides to carry the ring so I can offer my axe :p
If I didn't have a full-time job and a family, I'd probably already have begun. I would offer my bow! :D
Tell me about it. But uhh.. have my beer mug instead? There's nothing I want to do more right now than make a better service (subjective of course) for Beehaw's use. Time and obligations prevent that from being a quick enough solution though.
And for the early phases of a FOSS project like this you kind of need a benevolent dictator who already has the project started
Yes; but Benevolent is the key phrase where. Not just a dictator for the code.
Mmmhmmmmmmmmmmm. My inclusion of the word was not merely rote practice of the BDFL model lodging itself in my brain. I have some strong feelings about how code is a form of communication, and that the software you develop is intrinsically mapped to the ways you approach person to person interactions. Case in point, the very best software platform for Beehaw would be one whose developers felt the ideal platform would involve be(e)ing nice. This mentality would cause a developer to put heavy phasis on good moderation tools, ones that can give clear, meaningful, and thoughtful reasonings for moderation actions being taken as well as easy ways to parse these mod logs to learn the sorts of social norms the community does and doesn't tolerate.
Given all this the development of the software would be open to listening to diverse perspectives in feature requests. And I mean diverse perspectives in terms of "this group is vulnerable to online attacks"
I'm tempted to read the whole codebase to start a merge request to implement some modicum of mod tools. Things like deletion propagation, including uploaded media so stuff like GDPR deletion requests can be properly executed would be great, since this would enable or facilitate "admin purge" alongside it. I'm not that well versed in rust but I've got my fair share of experience coding. I'll see how regular post propagation is done and see how deletion is treated (I feel like the solution might be something that instead of truly deleting the data it delets the content but leaves the records on the BD marked for deletion so it propagates correctly, and then after some time an automated task finally deletes them.
If you want I can update you after forking and creating the merge request to work on. IF I begin this, it would be helpful to have some critique.
I personally believe that scratching the whole this is too excessive, there are ways to modify the backend codebase with forks and merge requests if the core developers are open to pull requests. If they are not the project already died lmao.
I'm checking their federation activities on the docs, it seems like user removals do federate but mod removals dont? I'll check the code when I get out of work :). It might be interesting to look there. https://join-lemmy.org/docs/contributors/05-federation.html
Second edit: It seems like image logging is already developed databasewise. There was quite a lot of discussion on this issue and it was merged a while ago. Frontend tools need to be developed also, but it's a start: https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/pull/3927
You are a hero we need, but do not deserve. Thanks for any and all work you're doing! If Lemmy can be fixed, I'd love to see it and maybe even help in some small way. If the maintainers are not willing to accept PRs, especially in a timely manner, then I agree, it's not going to survive long.
As already stated in the edit, there are already contributions for user and image purges that are being merged, several accepted merge requests in the last week, so the community IS working and the devs are receptive. It seems like the code is developed as two separate servers, one for lemmy and the other for the image manager, and it interacts with any client as a REST server. Then, it connects into ActivityHub through a high level API that I have to check yet, but the functionalities people are asking don't seem to be impossible to implement tbh. Admin / mod tools need to be implemented first as valid endpoint operations and then be exposed to the outer API so clients can then implement an interface for actual users to do stuff.
The gist of it is that all these kind of stuff takes time, and the amount of people that is up for contributions is not that high, and when lemmy exploded this july, the priority was server stability.
I've played with some ideas, but turns out the ActivityPub protocol is extremely difficult to implement in strongly-typed languages, at least from my experience. Anyway, whoever picks this up, here's my sword!
Yeah, that just reinforces why I would probably choose NodeJS.
This is a conundrum I've had as well. I really wish I could spend my time creating a better Lemmy backend from scratch. But it seems like a massive commitment. If I would know that others would rally together for the same cause, I may go along with it though.
The way things like this tend to be done at scale is to rewrite one part at a time, however you can break it up.
Yea I'm not entirely sure how you'd do that with Lemmy at the moment... As stated in the post, it may literally be less work to start from scratch with the better knowledge we have today of the requirements.
I've been thinking about this as well. I've been evaluating crystal, lua, js, or python as potential implementation languages
As someone who's very proficient in Rust, I actually think it's the perfect language for a backend API. But the Lemmy code (from my tbh limited experience with it) seems quite verbose and cumbersome for the amount of features it needs to support. I have also been tempted by the thought of a Rust rewrite. The features needed honestly don't seem that complicated.
Part of the problem I'd like to solve for is that Lemmy is hard for outside contributors to contribute to which is a function of both the verbosity you called out and the weirdnesses that can come to the uninitiated with Rust
I know that Rust can have a bit of a learning curve, but it is also extremely reliable, especially when taking contributions from all kinds of people as different changes are unlikely to slowly break each other over time.
I would for example be extremely cautious when it comes to dynamically typed languages like Python. If you think bad Rust can be verbose or complicated, you've never seen bad Python. It can devovle into a mess very easily due to the lack of static analysis.
Also Rust has great performance which is important for keeping operational costs low. Corporations running Python just eat that cost because it's nothing compared to an engineers salary but operational cost will be everything when it comes to a volunteer run service.
Having tried to do this in Rust, the ActivityPub protocol is not very Rust-friendly. There's a lot of weirdness, like how objects can have multiple types at once (aka
@typeis an array) and how JSON-LD allows for basically any format to be passed as long as an appropriate context is passed (and thejson-ldlibrary has a lot of limitations from my experience including lack ofserdesupport and no framing). I've tried looking at how the ActivityPub implementation Lemmy uses works, but from what I can see it just ignores these problems entirely, which at least seems to be working out for them right now.Thinking about it more, I'm convinced JSON-LD's completely dynamic format is what's making this so difficult.
Even though Java is my bread and butter, I'd probably choose NodeJS simply because the resource footprint is so low.
Low compared to what? Rust is super performant compared to node.
Um...compared to...Java. Hence why I prefaced with that.
Take a look at Elixir or Erlang, they seems particularly well suited to an application on the scale Lemmy clone.
How hard would it be to fork the Lemmy code (+ perhaps one client), at the cost of breaking compatibility?
You should read the OP here. Forking the Lemmy code would do exactly what they say: you get all the garbage/baggage, and now you own it. If I were to write an ActivityPub Fediverse Reddit-like web-app, it wouldn't be in Rust.
Taking up Gaywallet's offer to share my feelings.
I'm angry. Everywhere I go on the internet, I encounter some form of prejudice and hate. Every social media website that I've tried, I've had to tolerate intolerance towards marginalized people. Every attempt that I've made to speak up about this is met with apathy. You just gotta learn to deal with it.
I'm tired. I've joined countless online communities, searching for a place where I can feel at home. I want to find a community where I can share, grow and build. I haven't found it yet, but Beehaw is the closest thing I have found so far.
I'm hurt. Seeing the reactions to these posts has been both disappointing and reassuring. One of the comments that I found to be hurtful was calling Beehaw a "walled garden". Walls protect things, you know? It's hurtful to see this type of labelling and name-calling used to dismiss the very real concerns of real people.
I'm fearful. As a result of all the negativity and toxicity I have encountered, I am afraid to speak up. Every time I make a post or comment, I do so with the expectation that someone will try to find a way to discredit my experiences. I am constantly thinking of ways to defend myself against attacks.
I'm hopeful. From my short time here on Beehaw, I've seen some encouraging things. The admins and mods on Beehaw are actively contributing. The posts and comments I have seen from them are thoughtful, sensible and genuine. It's reassuring to see that they seem to be a good bunch with their priorities in the right place. I look forward to seeing all of the things that Beehaw can achieve with this collective mindset.
What Cambridge Analytica unleashed 10 years ago spread like second-hand smoke to all the platforms and society at large, and it works. There are copycats all over the place now and the whole world has become more hostile. Professional psychologists / psychiatrists endorsing these media techniques was one of the worst things to happen to humanity. The damage may take centuries to heal.
“Chaos and disruption, I later learned, are central tenets of Bannon's animating ideology. Before catalyzing America's dharmic rebalancing, his movement would first need to instill chaos through society so that a new order could emerge. He was an avid reader of a computer scientist and armchair philosopher who goes by the name Mencius Moldbug, a hero of the alt-right who writes long-winded essays attacking democracy and virtually everything about how modern societies are ordered. Moldbug’s views on truth influenced Bannon, and what Cambridge Analytica would become. Moldbug has written that “nonsense is a more effective organizing tool than the truth,” and Bannon embraced this. “Anyone can believe in the truth,” Moldbug writes, “to believe in nonsense is an unforgettable demonstration of loyalty. It serves as a political uniform. And if you have a uniform, you have an army.” ― Christopher Wylie, Mindf*ck: Cambridge Analytica and the Plot to Break America
Sounds like taken straight out of 1984 (published 1949).
You might want to check out Tildes too. I don't know if it's exactly what you're looking for, which I think is a community where you form relationships with others (hasn't been my experience there [nor here]), but its main focus is less noise, better content (as in both posts and conversation). It's less about jokes or raking in upvotes and more about having something meaningful to say.
I haven't encountered that much of any kind of hate speech or your average internet assholery so it might be at least a place to check out.
It's a bit dry and slow content wise so I don't think it'll end up being anyone's one stop shop for everything social media.
Our website came to fruition because many of us started on Tildes. We were upset with the way minorities were being treated on that website. I spoke out vocally about it, and was told in no uncertain terms that meta-discussions like that were not going to be tolerated. Tildes is better than most, but it still has issues that are not in alignment with what we are trying to accomplish here.
I don't know if they've gotten their act together after that or not but I haven't come across stuff like that. Or maybe I'm just ignorant and a bit blind to that stuff. Most of your typical internet negativeness I've seen has been about Starfield but even that is kinda whatever bickering.
Either way, I'm not suggesting that Tildes would be replacements for Beehaw, just another avenue to check out once in a while.
They have not. It's really below the surface and only shows up every once in awhile in threads about minorities. It's a big reason for the entire concept of how we structured our rule system (lots of rules lawyers there), because it was very clear that there is a small subset of strongly opinionated rather privileged users on Tildes who come out of the woodwork to share their ignorant viewpoints. The easiest way to explain it is to vaguely call them all privileged male rationalist centrists - they are often not explicitly bigoted but they are often blind to the privileges they have been afforded and how the system oppresses others.
A hard topic to talk about without specific examples but I'll take your word for it and keep an eye out when scrolling over there.
If you're really curious you can search my post history on Tildes. I'm not interested in digging up the past or casting shade in any way, just mostly want to provide context on the platform and the problems I've experienced there.
It is disappointing how unconcerned the Lemmy devs are with the lack of mod tools on this platform. Honestly if Beehaw decides to move away from Lemmy, I'll probably follow and stop using Lemmy altogether. Beehaw's all that's really keeping me here.
Not prioritizing moderation tools doesn’t make sense to me, either. A database that’s crummy (but functional) is an important issue, but one that seems like it can wait. Moderation tools cannot wait.
Community building is what Lemmy is supposed to be for, right? Any instance, regardless of its goals or ideology, needs good moderation in order to thrive (what’s considered “good moderation” will vary widely from instance to instance, and that’s fine. You know what I mean, though). Even an instance that prides itself on minimal moderation needs powerful, flexible mod tools to deal with things like spam and cp.
The less obvious technical parts are important, of course, but users don’t love or hate an instance because of the back end. They care about how it’s moderated.
Bear in mind that I know nothing about programming, moderating, etc. Take that into account when considering my comment.
That's often the problem with how software is perceived by a user. Simple functionality might introduce complexity in already existing functionality effectively breaking it at the scale it is supposed to support. The technical aspect of a piece of software will always seem secondary for the end user, regardless of the functionality it appears to be second to. That's only logical. You don't care about a certain metal's properties when you buy a knife, you care about the kind of cuts it can perform.
My issue with the project is that it's mostly written in a language that I am not familiar with, and much of the scale it's built to support is over a protocol that is also new to me. I can't really judge whether the issues (especially content removal and how actions are synchronized between separate federated instances) are a database issue, a protocol issue, a sub optimal approach to the complexity or even just doable in the current context.
Designing and implementing properly and fully working transparent software is always hard. And in new protocols and contexts is even more so.
You are correct though, these things are not important for the people who use it. What is important for the users is how the piece of software can, and if it can, allow for the use they want to make of it.
Aaaaaaaand this is where my lack of experience shows itself. Thank you for the explanation!
I think it’s kinda funny that a conversation about Beehaw’s problems resulted in a a great Beehaw post. Elsewhere, I probably would have gotten several comments calling me an idiot, or at best, an insulting and condescending lecture poorly disguised as an explanation. Instead, you took the time to educate me on the issue. I appreciate that.
This interaction made me really happy. I miss when we could talk to each other online like this. Some people treat each other like they are so dumb for not knowing something but we have the power to help each other and learn together within reason and personal boundaries of course and this is such a shining example.
Well, that's just my experience with building software. Not sure if it has any educational value as such..
It's pretty common for people who are not part of the design/implementation to underestimate the difficulty and the complexity, to mistake reluctance or delays as incompetence or indifference. It's also quite common even for people who are part of the design/implementation to underestimate the complexity or already implemented assumptions that have to be adjusted, which almost always leads to defective software. Add to that the fact that it is an open source project currently at 0.18.4 version and you can explain all of the issues without attributing ill intend to anyone.
Getting nasty comments when you repeatedly point out that you are not familiar with the process would just be unfair. Besides, it's the user experience (moderators/admins/hosts are users too) you are commenting on, making a completely valid point about the importance of moderation in building a community.
I really wish it wasn't built on rust so I could actually be helpful :-/
Isn't Lemmy open source, though? Someone could step in and implement mod tools
In theory yes, but the backend's written in overly verbose and honestly fairly terrible Rust, which isn't as widely known or easy to learn as, well, pretty much any other language they could have picked.
Rust in general seems like a bit of a poor choice for the backend; just about anything like Javascript / Typescript (eg. Node), Ruby, Python, or Go would likely have been better. Yes, sure, Rust is capable of being fast, but something like Lemmy isn't going to be CPU-bound (unless you do something really stupid) and much more important is how you use and set up your database – as can be seen from how incredibly poorly Lemmy performs at the moment. The memory safety benefits of Rust are nice, but I'm not convinced they're critical for a project like Lemmy, which at this point would benefit more from a more widely known and easy to learn language.
Yeah, like... I'm not on beehaw myself, but if beehaw goes, I'd probably end up leaving myself. One of my biggest complaints about Lemmy in general is the lack of special interest communities. There's politics, porn, general news, technology news (which is mostly complaining about That One Guy), Linux discussion, general memes like you'd see on Twitter or Reddit, and a trickle of more niche memes. There's a complete dearth of content for niche communities like individual games or special interest hobbies, because the userbase is simply too small to support a healthy special interest community. If Beehaw migrates off Lemmy, it will take a big chunk of that already too-small userbase with it, and the problem will be exacerbated even further. If that happens, I don't know if it's worth sticking around.
I'm pretty protective of my online privacy so I have a tendency to make alts rather than allow disparate interests to be correlated to the same user (I'd rather have 3 accounts than a single account that show that I'm a person with my hobby with my career living in my city), so I've scattered my lemmy alts all across the lemmyverse (less beholden to instance downtime or an admin trying to correlate users).
At this point, lemmy doesn't even have much in the way of communities on some mainstream topics: sports, lifestyle/advice, food, cars, fashion, television, film, music, local issues in major population centers, etc. I mean, back in the 2000's, these were topics that were mainstream enough that they were able to publish printed magazines or even newspapers for newsstands, but we can't even get a critical mass of commenters for many of these topics on lemmy.
Yes, linux/FOSS and video games and tech are relatively niche interests that do have robust discussion here on lemmy, but that's mainly a function of who tended to adopt use of the platform. Is lemmy going to be like Hacker News or Slashdot in that it never makes the jump to the mainstream?
The biggest tragedy of moving off Lemmy for me is that I love having Sync to browse Beehaw from my phone. I'm a mobile user and I really like having a native app to enjoy a community like this. 😭
What we move to could still have an app ... I'm using Liftoff and Connect, they both do ok, and I'm guessing adapting to another app (or good mobile web frontend) wouldn't be as painful as you think!
I've been thinking the same thing for this, but Liftoff
All the admins here have given me plenty of reason to trust that you'll make the right decision for Beehaw, whether that's staying or moving. This is a good place and I'll stick with you no matter what you decide.
All I can say is it would be a big, big loss.
Beehaw made me believe in the idea of building a healthy network, especially in the beginnings.
I remember the day I asked Chris to federate with us, we used allow-lists, and maybe this should have been the way to go, considering how much trash has happened in the meantime.
I totally agree with your criticism about the state of the platform itself, slow progress, missing and broken mod-tools etc. unfortunately it seems that development cannot keep up with the speed of growth and the associated demands.
So, imho, you make the Fediverse a better place that's why I hope you stay ;)
I would like to echo this. Without getting into specifics, beehaw was one of the few spaces taking a nuanced take to a political topic that pretty much kept me from descending into the despair of thinking there was a lot of heartless people out there.
It helped my level of cynicism and I can’t overstate how impactful that’s been.
The thing is, when Beehaw is no longer in Lemmy, it will be a regular VBulletin, phpBB, Discourse, etc. community. Nothing wrong with that.
The question will be: if the change is made, will the users follow? Because a lot of users in this post https://lemmy.ca/post/4990126 have said that they prefer Beehaw to stay in Lemmy because it is a Reddit alternative. It is big risk.
We are not and never intended to be Reddit or a Reddit alternative. This is clearly laid out in our docs. We are trying to do something fundamentally different, and are not interested in users who just want Reddit but elsewhere.
ultimately: if it fails, it fails. our metrics for success here aren't size or longevity, really—they're just bonuses.
Well, we have stated that we are not trying to be reddit. There are more reddit-like alternatives than the more traditional forums that are possibilities.
We entirely expect that if we move away from Lemmy, we will lose people. Will that be for the better or the worse? Nobody can know as nobody can predict that future. It's a very difficult position.
I'm a simple man. Where Beehaw goes, I follow.
I have had enough of attempting to engage others in good faith, and assuming everyone is an rational actor.
Beehaw is a community that chooses to be excellent to one another, and to not be garbage human beings. I'm on board with that. Fuck the toxicity everywhere else. I'm with you and will die on this proverbial hill.
Honestly, I'm happy to join if beehaw move on to something like a forum and not-federated. IMO (which may sound selfish to some but) I join beehaw because of the vibe and the rules that I'm happy to follow. I'm not really joining beehaw because I want to use it as a Reddit replacement, but I want to interact with the community. I feel like Beehaw identity doesn't really tie to lemmy or on specific software.
So whatever if it federates or not will not really affect me much. I only speak for myself, of course. For others, it might not be the same case. I feel safe commenting and talking in beehaw own community, so... whatever the decision, maybe I'm happy to stay/follow with beehaw. Thank you for the transparency and hard work you all put into beehaw :)
I'm still a fairly new member, and for the most part, Beehaw has required the least amount of pruning to create a timeline of content I actually want to see. Being on the sidelines and hearing how the Lemmy devs have reacted to various issues, it sounds like they are very emotionally immature and most likely will drive the platform to be "open" in their own interpretation.
I appreciate the hard work that the mods and admin team here do and it seems like the goals of Beehaw and Lemmy have become antagonistic towards each other. I still haven't seen any really good implementations of the fediverse in general, so I have no loyalty to that ecosystem.
I think you guys know what you are doing and are smart enough to pick the best platform if that will ultimately make your lives easier. I don't think Beehaw should feel like a job (and especially should not require the hours of a job), so I'd support moves that would actually make it a fun project. On Lemmy, it seems like there are a lot of barriers keeping the project from being enjoyable.
I would charitably put it that the Lemmy devs built something small that could provide a minimum viable product for a small Reddit like system without really putting any thought into how a large system would actually work. I also don't think they understand how to scale up such a system.
The devs seem perfectly happy with small communities that don't need much moderation, but that won't cut it if Lemmy goes through another growth spurt.
Most of this web dev stuff is out of my area of expertise, but this? I felt this in my soul.
Late to this discussion, but speaking as a Reddit refugee and a very average user, I'll follow beehaw wherever it goes...
...but I will probably also fire up my nearly-forgotten kbin account as well.
The fediverse is far from ready for the challenges that it faces but I'm very interested in its development and future. I really think it or something like it is what the internet is trending towards. I'm quite lucky being in some of priveleged categories so I don't face the level of harassment many fellow beeple do very day.
I think we have a good thing going here and it's so freeing to read and comment without having to read past all the usual hate and bad behaviour.
So Im happy to lurk in one place and be myself in another. Do what you guys have to do. I'm in.
Thank you...that means a lot.
Wow. This is a lot.
First off, I want to thank all the devs, admins, and mods, for all the time they have put in on Beehaw. I cannot even begin to fathom what you folks go through and the time you have put in to give us this space. All I can give you is a few bucks and my heartfelt appreciation.
Now to the heart of the matter (now I've got that Don Henley tune in my head.): If the developers of Lemmy are not serious about mod tools, then yeah, time to book. Moderation is kind of a no-brainer when it comes to running a successful community, especially one built on the vision and values established here at Beehaw. If we have to go with a non-FOSS solution for a bit, I'm down, as long as the spirit of this space remains intact. That is non-negotiable to me. I'm so done with mainstream social media, that if anything happened to this space, I'd just settle for my Firefish account, and just be done with everything else. Hell, I may just retreat to Discord where a bunch of my gaming buddies are.
But as long as long as Beehaw exists in some form, I'm there.
I appreciate the support. We are doing our due diligence to find a better path for Beehaw. It may not be perfect, in the eyes of every participant, but it will be better.
I'm sure I'm saying nothing new with all the comments here, but I thought I'd comment anyways:
I don't think it would be the end of the world for Beehaw to migrate to a new non-federated platform, and I would probably maintain my account there as well. I honestly think Beehaw and Lemmy might both be worse off for it though.
When Beehaw defederated from Lemmy.world and sh.itjust.works a while ago I made a second account to browse the defederated side of Lemmy; but I've found I rarely use that account anymore. The number of bad (and often hurtful) takes I've seen coming from the wider Lemmy community are exhausting and I can't be bothered to look through them most of the time.
Right now I feel (aside from all the work our overworked admin team deals with) Beehaw is in the perfect sweet spot. It has the welcoming and protective environment, which I feel is absolutely necessary; and it has activity from select instances that helps keep it interesting and fresh.
I think if Beehaw left Lemmy, I would miss activity from the friendlier instances, and I'm sure they would miss the activity from Beehaw as well. If Beehaw left, I genuinely think the whole of Lemmy would be just a little less safe and a little less friendly.
Having said that, it sounds like the current model is simply unsustainable, and maintaining the integrity of all of Lemmy is not your job. I hope you can find a solution that makes everyone happy while still maintaining your sanity.
My personal suggestion would be to contact the admins of some of the friendlier instances and maybe try making a shared suggested whitelist that just has confirmed friendly instances with admin teams you trust. Each instance could obviously alter their own whitelist, but it could be a good starting point for any new instances who are looking for safe instances to federate with (pending approval).
Good luck to you all in navigating this issue
Whatever does end up happening to Beehaw, o7 (salute) to all the hardworking mods and those working to maintaining Beehaw.
Personally, I wouldn't mind if Beehaw changes forum software. I first came here to check out Lemmy on what looked like a safe instance, yes, but I stayed because I appreciated the calm community. I stopped participating when the Reddit migration happened, however, and Beehaw got more attention than before from other instances, and posters who don't appreciate Beehaw's policies. TBF however, recently I've gotten into more traditional forums, so perhaps I'm biased. But I believe that Beehaw is more than a Lemmy instance.
Yeah, I'm old so I tend to gravitate towards forums by nature, lol ... it's a mature and proven way of working, though harder to maintain momentum on compared to an aggregator like this
I wouldn’t mind using a forum. Hell, it’s how I spent most of my time on the Internet when I was a kid.
I'm grateful to people who build safe spaces, whether online or IRL. And I'm sorry when they struggle to find the tools they need.
If you decide to switch to another plateform that fits your needs better, I'll follow you.
I'd rather not see Beehaw split from Lemmy but if you feel you have to then I for one wouldn't mind seeing it using a phpbb board.
Glory to the old forums! /old grumpy mode
I would love for beehaw to stay on lemmy, not necessarily for federation but for my personal ease of use. I understand your issues however and would not be opposed to moving to another base. My main concern would be the availability of an (or possibly several) open source app to participate on the platform, because platforms that are browser-only/PWAs I end up not using on my phone because it never works right for me. And if I don't use them on my phone, I don't use them at all. So for me the main advantage of beehaw on lemmy is being able to use apps like Eternity, Jerboa, and a host of other options to browse and participate in it.
Mastodon and Lemmy share the same issue. The people who created them don't seem to be very great, or honest people. They both seem to go against what I understand Beehaw to stand for. Look no further than Mastodon merging with Meta. I've always been concerned about that. It's fine to have different ideals but when they are politically or financially motivated and will cause great harm to many people that are already on the lower rungs of society it doesn't feel like these places will hold up overtime and I believe we will see this devolve to become similar to twitter and that's what I see from the creators of both places. A lot of people don't seem to start out where I do and I've been outcast plenty for it but at least it was better here. My starting point is who made this, what are their intentions vs actions, and will I be safe both short and long term. That is what I care about and all signs point to no for both with lemmy and mastodon. Being disabled means it's hard for me to get out and socialize safely for a myriad of reasons and this project means a ton to me. It's given me a place to brave the intense toxicity of the current internet and chat with some cool people. Whatever happens thank you for showing me there is humanity left in the world.
Where did you read that Mastodon is merging with Meta? If you're talking about Threads being launched, I am pretty sure that all the drama was about whether any Fediverse/ActivityPub instance, whether it be Mastodon, Misskey, Firefish, would federate with Threads. Even Lemmy instances like Beehaw could choose to federate with Threads, but probably the compatibility would not be great.
That said, I do think it's important to find an instance with federation policies that match what you're looking for. If Beehaw wants to isolate itself and be its own thing in order to protect its users, I'm sure many people will appreciate that, perhaps even you! I'm on the fence whether that's what I'm looking for, myself.
The federation conditions leaked were basically: "We pay you, and you moderate your instance according to our conditions", essentially making any instance federated with them a paid vassal. "Merger" is not technically correct, but it's in essence what would happen. And Gargron not only signed their NDA, he's been vocally friendly to this, it's clear he wants to make a Twitter successor out of his instance. He imposes his will on changes regardless of community will, the recent introduction of search against the wishes of most of Mastodon because "it's what's expected of social networks" and literally suppressing comments against it have left me with an overwhelmingly negative opinion of him and killed my trust in "his vision" of the Fediverse. Not sure where to go from there though.
Okay, your explanation makes sense. I still don't think saying that Mastodon would merge with Meta is even close to correct, as there are a lot of other instances besides mastodon.social and mastodon.online, but I at least understand the sentiment now.
FWIW I left Mastodon shortly after I tried it because I have the opposite opinion of you; he didn't implement search fast enough! I actually liked Twitter before that one guy took over. But I also understand those that are looking for a quieter, more private place.
I'm very sad to see this. The saddest thing is the state of development I guess and this is just the fallout. I do hope that you will try an allowlist at first (at least before deciding to leave the fediverse altogether) and maybe struggle through until things get better (I do believe they will get better; software development is just inherently not a super fast process).
FWIW I actually think Rust is the perfect language for the backend. It's just that the quality of the code in Lemmys backend isn't great (from my limited experience). You can write bad code in any language. What you really need are professionals that are good at coding (unfortunately this is rare even among professionals). (Humbly) I am one such person. If you are serious about trying to start a better Lemmy alternative from scratch, I'd love to be involved in the backend discussions.
Perhaps Beehaws issues could be something a new development community could gather around. My perception is that you have a lot of non-technical people who would be great at project management, requirements analysis, UX design and that sort of thing. This is kind of what Lemmy has been lacking from the start.
I am not part of Beehaw, but that's only since I admin another instance. I could see myself having joined Beehaw if it wasn't for that. So again, if you are really serious about a potential new development, I'd love to be in on it.
Right now I disagree. Rust is a bad choice for this community because not a lot know rust so extending and fixing it means a lot of people are having to learn a new language with entirely new ways of making software. It's not just a language switch it's a programming concept switch.
Hugs, y'all. Do what you feel is best. <3
I've been on Discuit more than Lemmy, but honestly? If Beehaw defederates or switches to a different platform, I'm more likely to visit Beehaw on a daily basis than I have been. I just prefer well-tended walled gardens. I grew up with forums being the way. Smaller communities feel the best. Even when the software base is good, the community management part is ... complicated with the fediverse.
Are we looking at a return to regular old forums then? phpBB baby!
I would unironically be fine with that
Honestly, I do miss the days I spent entire days posting on forums.
I spent a whole lot of time in the early 2000s on places like fohguild.org and new-celica.org.
I honestly miss the accountability. Start being a dick on the forums? Banhammer.
pOwEr TrIpPiNg MoDs
I always liked phpBB based forums.
Burning Boards! Thank god I made all my early internet mistakes before archive.org existed.
The reason I don't like forums as much anymore is that, unless they added the feature recently, there's no way to see the "top posts for the day/week/whatever" on a forum. It's whatever is currently being responded to, good or bad. This is what reddit did better than forums and it's what lemmy also does. Removing that makes browsing far less interesting to me and means I'll come to the site much less frequently, if at all.
Then that means you're mainly a consumer, not a creator. The Reddit-style is geared more towards link sharing and consumption, so it makes sense you want to know what the "top" posts are, to get the most important news or juiciest memes or w/e.
Whereas a forum is geared more towards lengthy discussions, some of which can persist over months or even years. Forums aren't really a link aggregation medium. You don't vote on topics so there's no question of "top" posts. Which is great because even niche topics get visibility, and the lack of a points/karma system means there's no incentive to post low-effort junk or reposts.
I see Beehaw as a community geared towards quality discussions, not a link-aggregate or another Reddit clone, which is why I believe a traditional forum will align with Beehaw's goals a lot better.
I used to spend loads of time on forums (mostly for metalheads), and also the late and great Barbelith.
Let the forum follow the function.
I think you will find this conundrum on any software you switch to. FOSS is hard, and needs a big enough community of motivated people with the right skills to make a project successful. People are largely doing this work as hobbies; it's hard to fund such projects. Doable but hard.
The most obvious alternative to go for is the Reddit code base which was open source and has been forked as Saidit. This is the most likely place to find something mature enough and feature rich enough for what you may need but again whether things will progress is another conundrum as who else is maintaining or using that codebase?
Lemmy and any other project like Kbin will need people and work to get it where you want, not just suggestions and a list of requests. The problem is not a lack of interest in achieving what you want from Lemmy, it is realistically that it is a small project team with a big task on their hands and Beehaw are not it's only users.
Ultimately Lemmy may not be the software now to do what you want for your community. Federation may also not be the right thing for a community of your ethos. Maybe the simplest solution is complete defederation and build the community in an environment you can completely control, even with the limits Lemmy current provides with it's software. Come back to the fediverse when you feel the software matches the ambitions, but in the meantime build the community you want.
That's essentially the white-list idea, which I agree may be the way to go. Which would be unfortunate for my account, but I guess I could always make another account in Beehaw.
I agree with this one. I love FOSS software. But (much like many hobbies), hobbiest stuff generally is a patchwork quilt of skill, ambition, and people's time off (or lack thereof, as uni, bf/gfs, and then families come into the picture). Regardless of whatever you do, there will be problems. For what it's worth, I think a whitelist is probably a reasonable start vs the attrition of starting from scratch on a new FOSS software, losing content and users, and then find similarly annoying issues on the new software. Even closed source is gonna have annoying shit saddled to it.
This is it and what they've always really wanted in my eyes, but the userbase here and in their communities still values federation so they don't want to actually make that jump.
The rules and culture of this instance demands centralization, not federation. They might as well just make their own site.
I don't love the drama and FUD about the platform and devs.
I got to be honest. I really don't care about the federation part of Beehaw and would be quite happy to see it move to a non-federated solution. I mean, how is it even possible to comply with the GDPR when using federation?
GDPR is not an issue per se - we can delete people's stuff easily. Can't delete it from other people's computers, that's all.
This already applies to email and online archival tools - Lemmy is not much different in that regard. What is on the internet stays on the internet - all we can do is ask for it to be deleted.
Yeah, I worded that badly. I meant from the pov of the user. If I want my posts deleted, how am I even supposed to know how many copies there are out there?although I do see your point regarding archives.
Thing is; you don't know and we can't guarantee that. If you delete or 'purge' something from an instance you're on that uses Lemmy, the content will eventually be overwritten by placeholder text. That should be federated to other instances.
Lets take a walk through the Lemmy codebase. First, let us look at the base level of how does Lemmy federate when deleting a local user or sending a request to have another instance delete a user. That can be done via an API call so starting there, looks like theres a struct to delete a user in
persons.rsin the api_common crate.pub struct DeleteAccountHmm okay now where are the functions that call it? Searching for
DeleteAccountshows us it's there indelete.rsand a function calleddelete_accountis there too. Looking at that function it seems to do a few checks first, verify your session token, verify your password, then if selected to purge content it will run the function to purge_user_account otherwise justdelete_accountwhich only marks it to be removed in the database and hides content from the public.Searching again, we find the function
pub async fn purge_user_accountin another file,utils.rswhich seems to perform those actions! Removes your avatar and banner images, deletes your comments and posts on the current instance, and removes images submitted by you if it was an image post/URL. Not any uploaded in the post body, not in the comments, not as a emoji/response to someone else. Any of those are just... dangling. Then the functionPerson::delete_accountfrom another source file, person.rs is called and that appears to be the same one called when just doing a delete vs purge. This delete function for person, updates your 'row' in the database to have no email, username, avatar, banner, or bio text. Then marks the column asdeleted. A database scheduled task runs daily to overwrite that content ifdeletedis set to true. No data was actually deleted yet, just some profile settings overwritten eventually.Back in
delete.rsit looks like finally, the data in theDeleteAccountstructure is sent in an activitypub request to other instances to remove your user. Theactivitypub DeleteUsershows Lemmy will run a view verification checks, then do the same thing as the above paragraph on this instance.purge_accountvsdelete_accountwith the same caveats of orphaned images and content. Your account is gone! Your content is not... and until Lemmy tracks where images or files are at and how they are associated with a user...References:
https://github.com/LemmyNet/activitypub-federation-rust/blob/main/docs/08_receiving_activities.md
https://github.com/LemmyNet/activitypub-federation-rust/blob/main/examples/live_federation/objects/person.rs
https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/blob/375d9a2a3cf9c023ac6ac832d98f1b456fb9e2ce/crates/api_crud/src/user/delete.rs#L14
https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/blob/375d9a2a3cf9c023ac6ac832d98f1b456fb9e2ce/crates/db_schema/src/impls/person.rs#L66
https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/blob/375d9a2a3cf9c023ac6ac832d98f1b456fb9e2ce/crates/apub/src/protocol/activities/deletion/delete_user.rs
https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/blob/375d9a2a3cf9c023ac6ac832d98f1b456fb9e2ce/crates/apub/src/activities/deletion/delete_user.rs
https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/blob/375d9a2a3cf9c023ac6ac832d98f1b456fb9e2ce/crates/api_common/src/utils.rs#L699
That's not even touching on backups, caches, CDNs, etc etc
Agreed! I don’t feel like I’m missing out on anything by being defederated from whoever we’re defederated from. I would definitely check out wherever Beehaw moved to, if it came to that.
Thanks to the Beehaw team and all your hard work!
My only input is that any potential migration could be called "Bexit".
Oh come on, "Beexit" was right there! 😂
I felt like that would sound too much like beak-zit tbh.
Lean in to that, fam. I'm visualizing a flag sporting a toucan beak with a red dot in the middle over the word BEEXIT. Every revolution needs a flag.
My biggest thanks to your continued transparency and will to keep us informed on what's going on in the upper offices of the hive.
If Beehaw eventually moves, I'll likely follow, but I fully acknowledge how scary that "restart" could be.
An outsider point of view
Lemmy started as a passion project and been growing slowly over years and then out of nowhere a small group of developers had to not only adjust to new influx of people, but also a barrage of ideas, suggestions and comments on what they should prioritize. I'm not sure how much experience different people here have with open source development, but the amount of changes in 3 months Lemmy developers managed to do is impressive to say the least. And there will never be open source project that manages to satisfy everyone.
Fundamentally people assume that with open source project all ideas will get implemented either by developers or if someone does the work and makes a pull request. But like with every other project the maintainers are allowed to have their own vision and not implement everything someone asks for or have different priorities or specific structure in mind.
Beehaw always tried to create something where they have complete control over everything. And that worked with federation when they were one of a few "big" instances (some people might not know but Beehaw is 21 months old, opened on 2021-11-12), but once influx of new users came in the existing tools weren't enough to have the level of control they wanted. So they clsoed the doors on new users and isolated themselves and at the same time angered a big portion of fediverse users for taking advantage of new user influx but the cutting them off from the rest of the fediverse.
I'm not sure if people checked the posts where Beehaw listed features and tools they want and a lot of them are super tailored to Beehaw vision which is not in step with federated Lemmy as a whole.
I don't think that the Beehaw vision and fediverse can coexist as they have diametrically opposed ideas.
As another outsider, I disagree. All the ideas and suggestions from the beehaw team seem like things that would benefit the whole Fediverse (or other lemmy instances at least). I'm curious what suggestions you think are incompatible?
Take
Why should Beehaw get a report for something not done on their instance? Instance rules only apply to that instance activities.
Or
That is fundamentally anti federation suggestion.
What? we never requested this
We also didn't ask for this. Please stop putting words in our mouth.
We're not anti-federation and we really don't want to entertain a discussion of just what "federation" means.
Those are quotes from Beehaw admin taken directly from the links in this post.
Source #1: https://beehaw.org/comment/1018508
Source #2: https://discuss.online/post/12787
I'll have to chat more with Lionir about item 1, because I've seen and resolved reports that came from off instance users of Beehaw users misbehaving on their instance (or another they were browsing).
For source 2, that was referring to various tools which exist on other federated software.
Either way neither of these are incompatible or new requests within activitypub and calling them against the principles of federation is an ideological discussion, one not suited for this announcement thread.
You'd still like to know if you users are causing ruckus elsewhere, especially since that may escalate to defederatation in the worst case. Also instance rules can apply to external communities too since they are saved locally. Thus admins are responsible for all content, not just local content.
I disagree. The alternative is total defederation. Being able to "soft" defederate in certain ways could be useful as a less extreme version of defederation. Right now it's very binary. Even Mastodon has more granular controls I believe?
Why though? If the user is not breaking your rules, what reason do you have to know that? See that's where the fundamental idealogy of fediverse and Beehaw splits. Beehaw wants total control over every single aspect of their users and fediverse allows to create micro communities that are all tied together and moderated on community level.
And I disagree with you, but that's allowed. There is a difference between giving users choice and giving instance admins that ability to remove the users choice.
P.S. I'm not sure if it's coincidence that your views align with Beehaw, but feddit.dk is another instance with huge amount of isolation with 533 instances defederated.
I just told you, having users that are reported a lot is a defederation risk. Also the reports may actually indicate problems that also break instance wide rules and you'd never know.
I don't think it's very isolated actually. I implore you to take a look at the instances on my block list. It's not instances you'd want to have an influence on votes. Basically all "normal" lemmy instances are not denylisted.
And again that's the mindset issue, not software issue. If user X did something on Instance A, there is no comprehensible reason for Instance A to defederate from instance X. Ban the user X for breaking your instance rules and move on.
Going to stop this conversation here - you have strong opinions on how moderation should be handled. We get it. This conversation is ideological and won't go anywhere from here. Please cease.
Spammers have been a bit of an issue recently, and federated reports would help them get removed quicker I think
True to some extent IMO. The HB instance does this on their announcements/meta community, so apparently it might be possible unless HB added that feature into their codebase themselves
Sure, but that's just shifting the issue to instance level instead of dealing with it on community level.
They run custom fork.
I'm trying to be nice, but two full time paid people did not manage to do much in 3 months if you mean May, June, and July regarding the Reddit API change period. It seems Rust is their main focus and in the middle of all this they decided to start a new front-end in Rust. When dozens of new front-ends were being developed by eager newcomers, including replacements like Photon that even have admin and moderation interfaces.
I've checked their listed features and tools, and I have no idea what you are talking about. They are features that Lemmy needs. What exactly do you mean that Beehaw is "super tailored"?
I do not have any solutions but want to thank and show support of the admins for the continued thoughtfulness and transparency about the issues the site faces.
I am surprised by the ELI5 on how Lemmy federation works. I guess I assumed it was somehow P2P, not a mass entanglement of duplicated content, which as mentioned is a nightmare for problematic and/or illegal content.
I don't know how the creators expected Lemmy to grow with each instance's storage and hosting costs also growing exponentially as the fediverse expands.
i'm unsure if this is a "failing" of Lemmy specifically or just a general design choice of ActivityPub federation but yeah it's not ideal, i would say. beyond the huge issues if anyone posts anything that needs to be mandatorily reported it means we have like 100GB of images (mostly from federation--and mind you, while still not federating with lemmy.world which is huge) and growing. for smaller nodes of the Lemmyverse i honestly have no idea how sustainable that is.
I appreciate the transparency through all of this. It's nice to know about the problem while there's still some time to handle it. To be honest - I probably would not follow Beehaw to any new non-federated platform. Its nothing against Beehaw (I love this community and its admins) but I'm just not convinced that we could ever attain enough regular users to keep critical mass on the niche topics I follow. That's the real advantage of Lemmy - all (well-behaved) instances get to share their user base.
Unfortunately, I also understand why staying on Lemmy might not be an option. Same with forking or using another Fedi software. Either way - I trust y'all to consider all the options and make the best choice. 🐝💙
I wrote a big ol post that didn't post apparently. Anyway, I assume you have been looking at Postmill. If beehaw move I'm likely going to follow. Tbh without the fediverse, I would likely engage more often. I find that I dislike conversing with federated users because they come from a place with a different ethos. As a result I still have to deal with crap.
I think a lot of people would. Being federated means that every comment on every subject gets sent out to every instance beehaw is federated with, even if you delete it. That feels less like sharing a feeling with a community and more like spraying it out into the internet.
There exists ActivityPub library implementations in golang, just sayin'. It's a big lift to start anew but at least the low end protocol is there and golang is a good mature language for productivity and security.
DB is going to be to bottleneck and I'd build on ScyllaDB (or Cassandra) in a heartbeat. ScyllaDB on a single node is quite well behaved and auto-tuning, but from there these two can scale globally with scaled writes everywhere. I always architect with active/active in mind because at some point for some reason you need multiple sites even for just disaster recovery.
Based on some quick and dirty research this morning, this seems to be the most mature AP library
Ah, fellow runner..
Less dirty search (doesn't even classify as quick), more recent, better documented, with some testing, without the console logs (lol what). Take a look.. There are actually quite few attempts, depending on what stack you are searching for and how you search.
If you do choose to move away from Lemmy, would you consider implementing the same or mostly the same API in whatever you move to instead? I'm working on a client and it would be nice to be able to support connecting to Beehaw without additional work.
That seems like a big ask given that the admins mentioned they don't have the resources to start from scratch and a Lemmy fork wouldn't fix the issues. There is almost no possibility of this happening, my friend
Wouldn't have to involve either of these. I'm thinking possibly an alternative would have similar endpoints that could be adjusted. If they can't or don't want to that's fine, but I think interoperability across decentralized social media is a worthwhile thing to keep in mind, even if that isn't in the form of federation.
I'm in favor of either option, honestly. A whitelist or complete migration to something else.
When I joined, I wasn't looking for a drop-in reddit replacement. I'd actually deleted my reddit account a few weeks before all the craziness went down because reddit and social news in general has a very bad habit of becoming toxic as shit.
Now, I get that I'm in a minority here. People left reddit and wanted something to replace it, but I don't know if Beehaw was ever the right instance for that specifically.
While I don't particularly care one way or the other about federation or the "Fediverse", what does worry me is whether or not the platform Beehaw migrates to is better maintained than Lemmy.
If moving to something new and relatively untested, there's a big risk that other, equally as important, development issues might crop up, especially if the dev team is relatively small.
I'm also curious to find out whether UX will be similar (eg. content aggregation with voting and whatnot) or if it'll be something closer to older forums, though I'm aware you don't want to really say anything until you're decided, so I guess answers to that can wait.
Anyway, I'll be interested to see what happens. Take your time, figure it out, and we'll see what happens over the next few weeks.
We will not move from the US civil war (i.e. Lemmy) to world war 3 (i.e. apocalypse).
Lol, that's good know. Thanks for the reassurance!
Alternatives or not, I think it’d be very beneficial to document concept of operation that you want. That way you can either take pieces of these conops and tell lemmy devs what you want, or if you have your own project this will be its conops and you can guide developers towards features you need.
At first I thought this might be an overreaction to be perfectly honest. But I just read through some of the Dev responses in the AMA... what the fuck is the issue with removing exploding heads from join-lemmy??
The other questions on the development itself weren't awesome but wow that comment chain about join-lemmy is something else.
I could overlook the CCP support if they keep it on their instances but funneling people into an instance like that... I'm not sure how to feel about Lemmy either TBH.
I'm really sorry for the difficulties you're facing now. I totally understand the frustration of feeling you're fighting the platform when all you want to do is provide a good experience for your users
At the same time though, I don't think we could ask for a better team to be helping push the Threadiverse forward. Thank you for all the effort you're putting in
I also think I owe an apology for offering help in the past and then flaking, to put it mildly
Wishing you all the best, wherever this takes you
I would prefer whitelist federation to moving. I would prefer whitelist federation period, actually. Thanks for all you do. Please feel emboldened to make the job easier on you.
Unfortunately whitelisting doesn't always work - the spam that came in today from troll accounts on "good" instances proves that. Unless that instance also follows the same new user approval process, posting etiquette and moderation goals as Beehaw, and unless that instance also has an active admin at all times to deal with bad accounts and unsavory stuff, there's no point in federating with them - or anyone for that matter - as it stands right now, Beehaw is quite unique in the Lemmyverse and I don't see any other instance like it. So personally, I think traditional forums would be a better fit for Beehaw.
Computer Science student here.
Forking Lemmy does fork its bad habits but doing so would at least give us the option of making direct improvements to the mod tools.
From what I've read, causing deleted content to get deleted quickly is a smaller change. Advertising that shortened deletion delay and giving the admins a "these keep our shit, yeet their federation privileges but check again every day and notify me when that changes" script wouldn't be too hard to create.
We might even be better off ignoring the Lemmy codebase for mod tools altogether. If we outright ignore cross-platform compatibility, we can make a mod tools API independent of Lemmy-proper that does what's needed and a JavaScript-controlled interface to sit on top or a separate toolset altogether.
I'm pretty busy right now but I rely on Beehaw for decent social media. I'd be willing to put a bit of time into it.
I'd be curious what the roadblock is in the dev process here, is it a lack of volunteer devs writing pull requests, or not enough people allowed to review and approve/deny those pull requests
some of both has been my observation tracking the Lemmy github
I've been enjoying my time on Beehaw and Lemmy at large. I'm astounded that removed content isn't also marked for removal on other instances. That moderators have to duplicate each others efforts is actually nuts. That opens up every Lemmy instance to an insane risk of abuse.
I will stick around to see whats next for Beehaw. I have to say though, the reason I enjoy Lemmy specifically is that it is so much more readable than Twitter or traditional forums ever were. The nested structure of comments is not something I'll easily give up.
That is not exactly correct.
Content does get "marked" as "deleted: true" or "removed: true", and that gets federated to other instances... you can see it (🚩) in the JSON for the content. Lemmy just relies on the UI to "hide" the content until a database function gets triggered to actually delete it. It's up to each instance whether it runs that function, and how often it runs it (IIRC by default it keeps content for 30 days).
The idea is that users can un-delete, and mods can un-remove content.
Moderators don't "have to" duplicate efforts... but some instances can keep deleted or moderated content for a long time, or even forever... which is much longer than a user might want their deleted content to be kept, or an instance might want to keep mod-removed content.
Thank you for the clarifications!
From the AMA you linked it sounds like the Lemmy maintainers are just two and are unable to deal with all the missing features. They made it sound like it might stabilise in the future and they are still trying to make it scale.
I read their reply as this : there are many things to implement and moderation is not a priority compared to other features. Do you know if someone made a PR about adding more moderation features? Was it accepted or turned down?
Yeah, the whole "this is THEIR software and we're just a few hobby people" struck me.
Aren't the Lemmy devs in a pretty similar situation? I wouldn't be surprised if individual instances got more donations than the Lemmy project itself. (And to be clear, I don't expect any of that is a living wage for someone.)
"Starting from scratch" is usually a pretty naive suggestion for a large project that seems to be functioning well in large scale production.
I do get that there are problems, especially from a moderation perspective. But that's one scope of a much larger project.
Pointing fingers seems less productive than pull requests and/or patience. And I'd be surprised if there were other, open software available that has the same functionality outside of the fediverse.
I know of the issue with decommissioned servers, which has been resolved. I've seen the instances crashing less and less over time. I've experienced the software responding faster and more reliably. So I've seen some amount of progress. The project isn't dead. In fact you can watch what they're doing at their GitHub link. It's very, very active.
This is honestly where I'm standing as well, having gone through dev processes before, it all takes more time than everyone assumes. The issues brought up sound like features that need added, but the good news is this is Open Source, so anyone with the know-how can build it. I'd even argue Rust is an excellent approach for the backend, being very similar to C. So what's missing, the dev able and willing to commit hours to developing that change, a reviewer to handle the pull requests, or has someone developed it and the pull request is being gate kept?
As much as I understand and agree with the issues presented, I think we need to remember that we're moving at the pace of Open Source, not a funded private company.
Exactly, and well said.
< Spongebob text > But what if we just start completely over? \
Honestly, I expected lemmy to be pretty crunchy for the next 5+ years. Any sub-5 year old platform is gonna have issues scaling and having features built out. But particularly foss ones, which are pretty much always cash strapped and running off goodwill and enthusiasm- like much of the early internet. I for one, like it :)
If you decide to move and leave all the cack behind, I'm in.
I'll probably be more involved and would even be willing to chip in with a small subscription. That or registered users may also keep a lot of the trolls away.
That all sounds reasonable. I'll likely come with you when you make the move.
Anywhere very far away from tankies, please. I'm tired of being harassed by them anywhere I post a comment. They're nazis/fascists in disguise.
FYI replace "blacklist" with "deny list" and "whitelist" with "allow list".
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blacklist_(computing)#Controversy_over_use_of_the_term
this is the verbiage used by Lemmy which is why it's used here but also, speaking as a black person: i really don't care at all about the terminology used for this. it's like 2,000th on the list of important things that affect my life. even granting that it was more important: i certainly do not care about the "correct" term to use in this context, where it is a completely irrelevant and unimportant detail and talking about it in any way detracts from actually important conversations. please don't do this, thanks.
That same article in your link already states that the etymology is rather unclear and could have alternative explanations. And i am quite certain that Alyaza was not meaning to use those terms in bad faith.
This is a strange thing to get upset about.
Not for some people. This is hurtful language for a lot of people. As a white dude I'm not really in a place to speak to its importance but I can definitely speak to that being dismissive of it is a privileged stance
I understand your point of view but disagree. Regardless, if the wording change conveys the same meaning without the potential to cause offence - then the change makes sense.
I am well aware of the post requesting moderation changes from a few months ago, and on the informal post I suggested the AutoMod tools people have began developing could help. However, hearing the myriad of other issues you're facing, it does sound as though my suggestion would be a band-aid solution at best to a system that need changes from almost the ground up, but perhaps it could buy time to get the other changes developed.
Whatever direction your team decides to take Beehaw, I will be(e) happy for you, even if I don't follow it to the new service.
I wonder if this says something about federation in general. Is there a point? Do community instances really want to interact with that many other community instances?
I genuinely do not care about federation at all, and from my experience here and on mastodon, it causes far, far more harm than good.
Internet communities must be moderated. There needs to be tools for having control over what happens in those communities. And the way the fediverse seems to operate is antithetical to that, which is a serious problem.
Good luck with whatever you decide to do, but I won't be following to a new platform
Just a random data point. This is my first time logging back into my beehaw account in a long time. Beehaw was my original lemmy instance and I really enjoyed the foundational ideals and communities the founders envisioned. I logged back in today because even on my main account on another instance, I'm so tired of all the terrible bigotry that I see in my all feed.
I personally really like the Lemmy interface as a user especially in an app, mobile browsing or desktop with certain browser add-ons. I know as a someone with their own instance (not my main account ref earlier) that the mod,sysadmin and dev work to keep it running is a lot. I too have database issues that I am super frustrated by. The mod tools are pretty much non existent.
With that said, I think that the whitelist may a viable option. The content needing moderated is likely mostly from federated instances. If beehaw were to isolate it's community or whitelist to a few trusted instances one would imagine the mod work would be lesser even with the minimal tools available. Purge the old content and continue forward as a community isolated but together in their goal to create a kind and friendly community.
Just my thoughts. I appreciate you beehaw admins.
Use an allow list and make federated moderation a required agreement.
Short term: If you take down a post from the origin, set it up so that it submits an email or whatever. Follow back with federated servers within a week.
Long term: Advocate for this in the project. Gather support and consider forking a long term solution, unless a better platform presents itself.
This is a hard as hell problem but to be honest automated federation is not good in my book. I had so many problems with it in early mastodon to the point of building the first allow-list server, i'm not surprised to hear similar issues here.
I love the transparency. Is Kbin’s source code not a viable alternative? I’m also familiar with raddle but I don’t think it’s federated. The devs for kbin seem to at least not have semi-abandoned it.
From my understanding they feel that Kbin is still too young in development and has similar issues (lack of modding tools namely).
The devs for kbin are one person called Ernest and a bunch of people who stepped in to help him when the reddit exodus happened. The vibe is it's more like an open beta.
If the next platform won't be a fediverse/ActivityPub platform but an entirely new social network or another protocol, I hope there will be a way for existing beehaw.org users to migrate. I don't want to lose access to this community.
We will come up with the best plan(s) that we can to make this as smooth a transition as possible.
Will you also come up with a plan to be compatible with third party lemmy clients?
Most of them are pretty immature right now, so I'm still using the web client. But the web client is far from great and I can't wait to switch to a native app. It would be really nice to be able to use that app for beehaw, and not just the other lemmy instances I use regularly (and will never stop using, because there are communities that will probably never exist here... for example I don't expect beehaw will ever have a community for the small regional city I live in).
I support any move, and would follow-- and probably be more active.
So after some thinking about it, I assume you guys are probably looking at postmill as a possibility. I would absolutely come along for the ride. Absent the fediverse, I would probably post more often tbh.
Thanks for giving such a comprehensive overview. I would definitely miss Beehaw if it went but I totally understand the rationale of it happens. Can't say I would 100% follow but only because I keep forgetting to browse all of the apps I have at the moment, without adding one more. Depends how much of a mess Lemmy becomes I guess.
Wow, there really are serious moderation issues. I can see what that's a huge amount of work to deal with.
With the spam and garbage coming from the rest of the fediverse, I wouldn't blink if beehaw went fully private and refused to federate with anybody else. I'm on board with whatever the admins think will work.
If nothing else, I think it's healthy to have a variety of sites like this. Not just different admins and servers, but different developers and infrastructure. Don't let some people control it all.
Can't you move to kbin or another platform that federates? Activitypub means even non lemmy instances can federate
My understanding is that kbin is even less mature than Lemmy.
Also, OP stated that they've weighed up all available options (which would obviously include kbin) and to please not suggest things in this thread, I guess because of getting bogged down in semantic arguments rather than discussing the community aspect.
All this time I thought Beehaw was like Kbin in that it communicated with Lemmy instances but wasn't itself Lemmy. Any way of making this a reality, or maybe that'd be too much of an overhaul at this point?
Frankly, from what I have seen, kbin would actually be a downgrade when it comes to the issues we're facing.
The admin of blahaj (I forget her name, which I feel bad about in this current moment) has said it's considerably worse
Is there a document somewhere describing the moderator tools you need and the use cases that aren't being satisfied?
Some of the posts linked in the OP include such a list but honestly, feel free to name any moderation feature and I'll tell you how it's actually broken in some fashion.
I really feel like Lemmy or whatever replaces it needs to treat moderation as a central feature. Not something nailed on as each disaster happens. (Which is not meant to throw shade at your efforts, it's aimed squarely at the people who designed the back end)
I really want the fediverse to thrive and it sounds like that's not going to happen with the current maintainers.
Sorry to not provide solutions, I really hope you can find a way forward.
Every platform with multi person interactions needs moderation as core features. All the performance tweaks in the world don't matter if no one wants to use your platform because it's unpleasant to interact with other people on
just to start
If we chose a non-federated platform to move to, then it is possible to add ActivityPub (i.e. federation stuff) at a later time. However, it would require persons that are skilled enough to do it. In my estimation, this could be several years away if we chose to move to a non-federated platform. IMO, there are too many 'ifs' involved in order to give a more precise answer.
Maybe this is the solution. Build our community and culture on non-federated community software first. Build up Beehaw to have people we want to be around and the sort of people that *want to Be here. Sure it'll be small and only a few Beeple, but would foster a culture for us. Then once work is done on the federation aspect, query the community and see if they (at that time) want to be a part of the Fediverse with Beehaw. So what if that's a few years away from this exit...
I'm on board with something like this, yes.
(on the off chance anyone here's using a client that does not show it, i am not from Beehaw and just federating from the outside, just for some context, and it's almost 5AM so expect some half-sleepy rambling)
Honestly something along these lines might just be what the Threadiverse needs. I believe the current threadiverse "culture" is really just a carbon copy of Reddit, with all the downsides, and facing same eventual fate as any other Reddit alternative that came before it.
Mastodon is in it's current state (and it's definitely not without it's own problems by the way) due to the existing culture it had before any of the Twitter migrations it endured. The people that vibed with that culture stuck, the ones that didn't went elsewhere.
If, after a few years of refinement on the threadiverse side (perhaps with actually usable software being built since then) Beehaw suddenly decides to enter back into the picture with a sold userbase and a high quality culture of it's own (and an AP compatible forum software that has proper moderation tooling), it's norms might take over a substantial part of whatever's left of the existing Lemmy community (I'd bet it's gonna be not much more than the stubborn FOSSbros), and any future migrations since then will result in people who don't vibe with that culture skipping over the 'verse (perhaps because they want a freeze-peach platform they can spout whatever they want on), and only the people who can adapt will self-select in.
I always expected a split to happen in the 'verse between the Reddit-style free-for-all folk and the strict moderation folk, but my prediction always assumed that the tools would get built by this point. Considering that doesn't seem to be happening any time soon, this is the next best thing I can hope for. Well, that or the threadiverse fades into obscurity as a failed experiment (hey, remember prismo? me neither) and as something to look at for future AP implementers on what not to do, with most of it's userbase either moving to other platforms or towards other fedi implementations that adopt groups (I believe both Pixelfed and Mastodon are working on them, and the *keys already have Channels (though those don't federate and are local only))
I love what the Fediverse and de-federation claims to be. At the same time, I am very wary as moderator or admin of such an instance, without proper tools in place. Yes, some call that censorship but the fact of the matter is, people suck. We cannot have a free-for-all space for anyone and everyone with no moderation and zero centralization. That's why we can't have nice things. People will do and say whatever the want and can in order to make a buck or gain internet karma points. It's the reason the US has to have business regulations and the reason user content needs moderation. Without those things, people do what the think is right and best *for them; instead of the whole collective. I don't user mastadon for the same reason I don't and didn't use twitter. I don't think that short form quick "wit" and move on to the next thing. I like long form. I want good discussion. I don't have to agree with you, or even like what you're saying; if it's respectful and not a fallacy, I'm happy to have that conversation.
I know you didn't mention it in your comment but to head off the crowd I can hear grumbling about their right to free speech, please read this. I don't want Reddit, and I certainly don't want Voat. Over the years I've migrated from many a platform to many others. The biggest issue I have with that is not even oh no this is dead, move on but rather the data my data that I lose by doing so.
Thank you.
This might be the best option.
A question about federation (if Beehaw decides to go the non-federated software to federated path), is ActivityPub the best option to re-federate the new Beehaw (if it happens)? It's too big and maybe you could reinstate federation with a different protocol and then, if it all goes well, incorporate ActivityPub.
ActivityPub is a beast of a protocol and requirements. There's no getting around that, federating at any level with AP would still be an undertaking. However almost every AP software out there, does their own thing in some capacity with AP and not just the baseline specifications. Lemmy does their own thing, sometimes a bit 'wrong' and sometimes different than others. For that matter, Mastodon also does some special things and ignores other standards outlined. Essentially, every service using AcitivityPub does so in their own flavor and disparate software doesn't speak to others well or correct. Mastodon servers talk to each other how they expect and understand, but the same AP blob sent to a Lemmy instance; Lemmy ignores some of that or doesn't handle it. Same with Lemmy sending or answering an AP call from a different type of software. NONE are 100% compatible as you'd expect or hope.
From a dev point of view, there's a relevant XKCD to this. And we all know it.
But at the same time, I've been thinking a lot of what you're saying here for quite a while regarding Lemmy in particular, and the modern Fediverse as a whole. I don't think the federation mechanisms used, even the federation strategy used, is scaleable to the type of userbase needed to get what many of the users are looking for from Lemmy.
Flipside, we all know that it's going to be pulling teeth to get people onto that new platform. That's why I never pulled the trigger on writing my take on it.
I really enjoy the community here on Beehaw, even though I mostly lurk and rarely post/comment. I do support Beehaw and will stay even if the platform changes. That said - and I speak only for my own experience here - I don't subscribe to any categories outside of Beehaw itself, just because (a) I know how the fediverse can be, and (b) there's a LOT out there, and I like the simplicity of a smaller community. For those reasons, adopting a whitelist would not impact my experience on Beehaw much, if at all. Wanted to say this in case it resonates with other users. Thanks for all you do.
I don't even have an account on this instance, but I'd dare go so far as to say that if you leave then so am I. The main lemmy feed (our instance is federated with basically everyone that lets us- except the usual suspects) has become just more reddit.
I'm not gonna pretend that I'm not a reddit refugee but I've had one foot out the door from that platform for years. I liked what Lemmy was, but now it's just more of the same. I really like the sub-50-people community we built on our instance, and I love that I can interact with beehaw from this instance. I would be sad if I had to split this in 2, or 3 or 4 depending on how many other cool instances end up leaving over these same issues.
If beehaw were to migrate to a non-federated platform, what app do you expect them to use?
This is addressed in the OP:
That has nothing to do with what app to use
The 2nd quote does.
They are investigating, and don't want to list anything because it's all up in the air.
If they listed alternatives, the discussion would be based about them, the pros/cons etc. They also explicitly state they don't want suggestions.
This seems like a formalised information post about previous discussions, rather than anything concrete.
Whatever backend/service they use will also dictate the app used to access it.
For example, if it's a forum based software then jerboa isn't going to be able to interact with it at all (as jerboa is specifically for lemmy).
They're suggesting all separate platforms, neither would be kbin/Lemmy, so any Lemmy apps being comparable are out of the question.
So unless they plan on developing their own app, which I doubt they will, there really are no foss alternatives with apps. This is why I brought this up. It'd be website only.
This is why I'm asking what app will be used, the answer is simply none.
Whatever your decision will be, I will be here experiencing it with you.
I'm confused by the issue concerning the fact when you delete a rule-breaking post from your instance, it persists on another. Is it still visible on your instance or something?
It gives the wrong impression about what's okay, and it means that your space appears unmoderated on federated instances
I was on the fence when this post was made.
Now, not as much.
I think it might be a good idea. No. I think it is surely a good idea if the community wants to maintain the "nice place to be" feeling.
I have noticed multiple instances of unnecessary mudslinging that brought back feelings of Reddit over the past fortnight. Entire threads of users just telling eachother to fuck off and throwing insults out left and right. None of those users were local users.
I am not interested in having communities for everything. I don't want to ever need to report someone. If defederation is what it takes to avoid bots and trolls and crypto scammers and, most importantly, make things sane, safe, and healthy for moderators taking time out of their days to keep this service going...then so be it.
I know I've ended up more of a lurker lately. That's not due to any particular ill feelings about beehaw or lemmy at large though. I think I just entered a bit more passive, consuming phase. Maybe falling back a bit to the old reddit habits? Mostly browsing for interesting new things.
Anyway.
This is probably due to me discovering Beehaw and Lemmy at the same time, but for me they're probably a lot more connected than I'm guessing they are for you old timers.
For me it's like.. the cozy corner of Lemmy you know? My home base while venturing out to other instances' communities. I'm definitely most likely to actually post or comment around here just because I like it here (though not exclusively however).
So.. now this place will most likely go dark in a while. What then?
This won't and can't be my home base by then and that's making me feel like.. should I start looking for a new home already?
Anything I produce with this account will either go go away or at least be locked down. Nor sure what happens to the federated copies of comments and posts on other communities when an instance shuts down.
So.. I don't know. It's starting to feel a bit like this account is nearing its end of life which makes it feel a bit odd to be actively using it.
A bit like chalk on the sidewalk while watching rain clouds come rolling in.
I.. don't know what my point is really.
I guess it feels a bit like it's time to start cultivating a new account, mirror my subscriptions and start using that instead, even for posting here. I don't know.
Anyone else feel something similar?
Given the specifics of Beehaw's nature I'm surprised it's not whitelist driven already.
Perhaps there should be some set of common ground rules - an accord of sorts - that sites could sign on to and that would establish your white list.
I'm not in any way tied to Lemmy specifically. I like the concept of voting posts up (and down), threaded comments, etc. But just like many different types of social services reside on top of the ActivityPub protocol, I would like to see something still working with ActivityPub. That was not really mentioned. But for me its about the UI and not Lemmy itself.
It is The Problem. Human Nature. If there ever was a solution it is too late. Vaya con Dios
Fix for bug with federation of admin actions, does this help you?
https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/commit/50589115e04a5d572627cfced97f41115df6e149
https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/issues/3980
https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/pull/3988
They seem to be taking it seriously, even considering making a hotfix for it despite v0.19.0 coming soon
edit: and now they've tagged a release candidate for 0.18.5 with this fix in it
IDK if you saw it but 0.18.5 was released a while ago and it fixes federation of admin actions, which is one of the things you mentioned. https://lemmy.ml/post/5712032
I would hate to see you guys leave the Fediverse