@freemo I would be more interested in have the discussion in the open.

@ejg The discussion WILL be int he open, we just need to refine the draft enough that it makes a good first impression.. the intent is to put it on a git instance and open it to **everyone** to submit feedback and vote before enacting anything.

@freemo @ejg considering the knee jerk reaction that started this entire brouhaha in the first place, I don't think this is a bad approach..

@dashrandom

Yea while an open forum will be an absolutely vital step before enacting the UFI I think it is critical to first curate a group of people interested in it in private, get a decent first draft, and ensure there is some degree of support before going public. Only to counteract the irrtional nonsense flying around.

That said we already have a decent following brewing so i think when we do go public with it in the next few days it will be well balanced and give us a chance to make sure everyone is heard all the same.

@ejg

@ejg

1) First, was this sufficiently proofread so people don't totally freak out about a word of place and use it as a quote forever as "true intentions?"

2) Are there unnecessary and superfluous embellishments that could and must be trimmed to concisely and succinctly make the intended idea come across?

3) Are the fundamental ideas really sound? Is this really going to solve the problem, or just move the issue around for a while? Is this really workable in the opinion of interested parties who have had to actually deal with social systems for a while? Is this idea as "tight" as it can be made?

For the purpose of expediency to present something that offers better and doesn't look like a half eaten chicken sandwich offered to a vegetarian, a few days of eyeballs on it privately won't harms the larger public discussion of it. It isn't being done in secret and it isn't skulldugery to be dropped without discussion or consent unlike the actions it is trying to address.

So yeah... It'll be public, just give people a chance to scrape the ugly off before it's presented.

@freemo

@Romaq

Well said and I agree, the public forum will be critical and notthing is final without public discussion. We just want a good starting point is all.

@ejg

@Romaq @ejg @freemo

Although you intended this as a commentary on this particular proposal, these are good points to consider for *any* editing effort. Working in the open is laudable, but so too is presenting work of sufficient thoughtfulness and quality to be worth serious attention.

For instance, I think this is a fantastic set of questions that every author of a scientific paper should review and ponder while preparing their manuscript. (Maybe only the first two sentences of #3.)

@ichoran

I'm in the unfortunate position "life happens." My wife will be leaving soon to be with her adult daughter, so we are preparing. I'm also spending time together with her while her adult son is visiting with us for American Thanksgiving. Otherwise I'd have spent the time necessary to seriously chew on the document. I don't think the presentation (grammar, spelling, tone) is as serious a matter as the process behind it. I plan to cover the "dressing," to me that's easy stuff.

"Does this make sense in this context? Will it *REALLY* help? Can we *SUSTAIN* this?"

That's really the burden before presentation, and I wish I could devote the time necessary. But "life happens."

@ejg @freemo

@ichoran

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/APA_style

I wish I could afford a meat grinder using APA. I'd put in the beef and have nice, low-fat ground burger patties come out the other side, ready to cook and eat.

Unfortunately, I don't know if such a beast exists at *ANY* price. Maybe https://www.grammarly.com/plans can do some on the "free" side. I'll have to look at that tomorrow.

So much life comes so fast, and it's annoying this project becomes necessary in the first place. What's this compulsion for humans to act so human?

https://youtu.be/s1ysoohV_zA
Human, The Human League

@ejg @freemo

@freemo this seems to mostly add a layer of bureaucracy to the process of de-federation.

Those that are not in the UFI could be seen as bad actors.

This would penalize those that choose not to join the UFI, or that get expelled because they chose to de-federate from an instance, after a judgement went the other way, because they felt it was necessary to protect their community.

@freemo This could serve to pressure those to stay federated to instance thay feel are not moderating their community, instead of pressuring those who are not moderating their community to improve.

@freemo I do feel that dog-piling and bad-faith reporting is a problem in a lot of social network spaces. It would be nice to see beter tools and recourse on identifying and combating those forms of harassment.

@ejg The idea here is that the UFI itself wont need to be universal, but its due process log will act as a tool for those in and out of the UFI...

Any claims against or for servers in the UFI will be logged and the evidence logged and transparent.. So if an instance out of the UFI want to decide for themselves they still have access to the evidence and can make their decision in an informed way.

@freemo an opt in 3rd party/independent/community driven reporting tool/space where claims could be logged and investigated might be something I would be more interested in. This could be a good tool to help identify forms of harassment that are not easily captured by the built-in reporting tools available. (Dog-piling, bad-faith reporting, etc.)
And still be a place to appeal against disinformation, or unfounded claims.

@ejg Any such tool would be central to the UFI ideally (We can use gitlab at first)... So id support it too.

That said the problem is these people arent very rational.. providing evidence alone wont help. There needs to be a "protective bubble" of solidarity as well, everyone just saving their own ass when one instance is attacked is not sustainable. Too many good instances have been lost

@freemo I still feel that this has the potential to apply social pressure in the wrong direction (so to speak) and pressure admins to allow the more marginalized members of their community to be exposed to harassment in an effort to stay in the UFI. Protections against that should be built in from the start. Bad actors have a knack for weaponizing tools that are suppose to keep things civil. So thinking about how this could be abused/twisted could help avoid pitfalls.

@ejg the beauty of the UFI is there vcan be more than one.. if they feel marginalized, leave the community, create your own federation with the same or similar or different rules

The UFI doesnt need tto be one monolithic entity but it is meant to "group" servers that have the same code of conducts as eachother.;

@freemo if someone isn't vibing with the community or doesn't agree with the rules, of course they can move instances. But if those who are already marginalized (or anyone in this instance) are being harassed. A moderators response shouldn't be to have the harassed leave the community, but to take appreciate action against the harassers. That may include de-federation. It should be a final resort, but I wouldn't want social pressure preventing an admin from taking that step if needed.

@ejg I agree with you entierly... harassment is against the rules. If someone is being harassed they shouldnt be marginalized and kicked out, the server should report the other for harassment and they should be kicked out of the UFI

@ejg The idea is that if someone is not moderating their community then they can be czalled out for it and will be kicked out of the UFI... thats why we have a evidence based due process... as long as there is evidence then they wont last in the UFI.

@ejg The intent is to make sure that those not in the UFI are **not** seen as bad actors.. I explicitly left out any concept of assuming non-UFI members were bad actors. The idea is that if you arent in the UFI people in the UFI can judge on an inndividual basis how they want to handle you

And yes it adds a layer of beurocracy, but the intent of that layer is to ensure blocking is done in an informed and evidence based manner

@freemo

> I explicitly left out any concept of assuming non-UFI members were bad actors

Some form of explicit menten that non-UFI members are not assumed to be bad actors might be good to include.

@ejg Great idea, agreed.

@ejg I changed the last paragraph to this, better?

The solution, therefore, is to ensure due process, enable discussion and to do so in a transparent fashion visible to all parties and with all sides having a chance to present evidence. While good-actor instance shall remain unified and federated amongst each other, any instances that have not shown to be good-actors by joining the United federation of Instances (UFI) are not under any special protections, they should be allowed to be moderated by instances however an instance sees fit. However non-UFI members should not be assumed to be bad actors either simply because they are not members of the UFI.

@ejg

Ignore that last version, here is a better one I think:

The solution, therefore, is to ensure due process, enable discussion and to do so in a transparent fashion visible to all parties and with all sides having a chance to present evidence. While good-actor instances shall remain unified and federated amongst each other, any instances that have not shown to be good-actors by joining the United federation of Instances (UFI) are not under any special protections, they should be allowed to be moderated by instances however an instance sees fit. However non-UFI members should not be assumed to be bad actors either, simply not being a member of the UFI should not imply a certain prejudice on its own.

@freemo A large backlash could be a sign that the proposal may be heading in the wrong direction or is otherwise stepping over a line.

@ejg I am fine with a backlash, but i wannt to make sure the backlash is once the idea is refined enough... people often wont take a second look if initial impressions arent good.

@ejg

See my response earlier as not all who participate one way or another are necessarily acting in good faith at the moment of public rollout. "Best foot forward" is only fair to the ideas of the document to be publicly released and discussed.

@freemo

@ejg We can create a provision where they are allowed to silence said instannce (not defederate) temporarily until the hearing is settled.. easily solves the issue.

Keep in mind an instance has to go through an approval process to get in, this means they are checked to see if they have a history of such problems.

@freemo

*The existing problem* that I see, was JoinMastodon unilaterally and non transparently turfing QOTO from its list despite QOTO at all times meeting its publicly stated requirements. On top of that, not having any receipts on how and why when questioned. Really is a violation of trust.
And that drastically effects new signup if JoinMastodon is represented as an authoritative list of where new people could go. When it is seemingly more just some guys friends list and is not actually done on its owns stated & advertised criteria.
There are all the public criteria for being on Join Matstadon then there are the double secret reasons
(some servers, in this case QOTO are excluded because :P<blows raspberry>. )

What is thus needed is a replacement for Joinmastodon, or an improvement in JoinMastodon.
One of the improvements might be that each server must tell us (potential new signups) what other servers on that list they block and why. other UI improvements is how to find server that suits the new user would also be possible.

===========================
As for mandating that servers don't block others. NOPE.
It is perfectly true that I have strong expectation that any @member@QOTO is likely basically immune to radicalization. (we've all met stupid a lot of times before, even stupid dressed up in academic clothes.) And given that QOTO so clearly says it doesn't block instances and has csv files to make it easy for individuals to make their own garden walled.
Then yes we, the members of QOTO are just fine with no blocks and we knew that coming in.

I don't agree that generalises to all servers and people. If someone wants to be on a server that clearly defines itself as a walled garden ... then that is not a second class server, its just one delivering things/features that I don't personally want or need. I do however respect that some people may well want or even need that.

I am even more than happy to make sure all new signups that want such a thing know where to find it.

@freemo
Also note while my initial statement above was in the public timeline. And I thought it belonged there.
It really has nothing to do with any proposal, it is me discussing the nature of the universe as I see it.
AKA me doing/living QOTO. (AKA if what I said is wrong smack me, I promise to enjoy learning from it.)

I also value the point (Someone else approx made) of preserving maximal degrees freedom for inter server argy bargy to resolve moderation. Moderation is going to get much harder, for some servers when the purposeful but clever not entirely good faith rules lawyers turn up (and start toeing lines in bad faith), and then bush lawyers any set rules we have against us. High functioning Stem severs may be up for that, I suspect the rest of the fediverse will enforce, Wheatons law, more by gut feels. I don't want any 'rules' in their way. The issue is the sign up list, and perhaps(?) secret block lists, so none know how much or little they signed up for.

I am also willing to participate in any closed forum, know how not to, drama drama.
but in all likelyhood will always have my own opinion. I rarely reach just the same conclusions on such topics as anyone else, but frequently decide there are no hills worth dying on.

@AlanOutback The thing is if any member of QOTO shows sympathy for radicalized ideas and starts expressing hate speech they would be kicked pretty quickly... Interestingly enough I've never seen a good-actor come here and then suddenly turn bad.