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The group of people who are trying to divide the fediverse seem to have reached a new low.. They have a tool that lists how many instances block a particular instance, but it is highly manipulative.
For starters it is hand curated.. so they exclude blocks against their own instances and only includes instances they actually dislike.
Worse yet they curate a list ordered by "most blocked".. problem is they use the number of instances that block. They game the system by having large number of single-user instances. So instances in the top 50 may only be blocked by a few hundred people but still appear as if the blocks are significant....
This is why we need transparency, its why we need the https://UFoI.org
@freemo @ufoi I'm extremely new here but if one of the oft-repeated criticisms of what seems to be some kind of network of admins with a shared strategy of cooperative moderation that has gradually become quite large and influential (the name of which that I haven't yet clearly been able to identify - fedifence? fediblock?) is that it creates a walled garden and as such is anathema to the free and open principles of the fediverse, proposing a competing system of large coordinated cooperative moderation strategy but it's better because it's run how i like it not how they like it will likely result in an outcome that is not appreciably different.
The big difference with the UFoI is we dont deal in block lists, we deal with an allow list.. So its about creating communities not splitting them.
in that regard its an open-club anyone can join and the approval process is transparent. The rules by which one can join and are judged on are elucidated. So it is easy to judge if the cooperative follows its own rules and is truely acting in good faith....Functionally a pretty big diffrence IMO.
Again, that appears a formal difference rather than a functional difference. There will be a garden, and there will be a wall around it.
apologies, this train of thought continues thusly...
There is nothing inherently right or wrong with promoting this proposition as a design for a better walled garden but positioning it as an alternative to walled gardens appears disingenuous.
(end of thought-train, all change please, your patience appreciated)
yet another apology, I appear to have dropped the @freemo and @ufoi tags off my response. The training wheels remain a little longer it seems.
@mediocreape the diufference is that it is a wall with windows and an open gate... while there is some similarlity (an association), beyond that it is very different.. The fact that the difference is "formal" just means there are measures in place to help ensure those measures are executed, which doesnt make them less functional.
@freemo I think you misunderstand form versus function and are inadvertently arguing my case for me. I argue that the function of a walled garden is 'demarcate a space using a structure delimiting an enclosed inside and relative unenclosed outside'. The figurative windows and walls are indeed formal rather than functional, and holding the opinion that these formal addition make the garden more or less transparent according to what appears to be a 'publicly-accessible documentation' centric model of transpsparency do not change the essential walled garden.
@mediocreape The transparency comes in the functional how... All votes are recorded on git, an immutable repository with distributed backup.. So it would be impossible to fake the history without a public record existing to invalidate it... So it **forces** transparency.
@lxo @mediocreape @freemo @lxo makes a good point here. I think the "alternate walled garden" analogy is misleading. #ufoi is an agreement between gardeners that they will not build walls between themselves.
@aebrockwell @lxo @freemo As a cooperative code toward moderation, it is an agreement that gardeners will not build walls within the walls of the larger garden.
@aebrockwell @lxo @freemo The issue i have here is the painting of this group's moderation as inherently good due to an adherence to a ritual strucutre of centralised public documentation, another group's moderation as inherently ungood due to not adhering to that. It is a microcosmic example of the same mechanism by which western knowledge is reified as 'true' by mere virtue of being the product of western knowledge. However, based on the origin of the proposal in an academic instance, and the motto of said instance, this is practically inevitable.
Thats not what makes it good. What makes it good is a track record of being good proven out by transparency which adheres to good precepts and is held accounable for doing so
The argument is you cant call it a walled garden when the entrance is free to anyone to leave or exit and the process to do so is garunteed transparent
There's an interesting (but paywalled) editorial board opinion piece discussing social media platform problems at
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/12/19/elon-musk-twitter-destroyed-fix/
I reference it because, buried in after all the back-story is the following statement, which I like, and I think is also relevant in the context of this thread.
"What matters is that they’re set up to get it right, in aggregate, according to the public commitments they’ve made.
That starts with something as simple as platforms committing to transparency, "
This lines up nicely with the intent of the UFoI.
|Transparency is the most important feature of the UFoI, its the only reason all the other promises can work at all
@lxo Any moderation is a walled garden. he wall created is the same as any other moderated instance or meta-instance. Those who are judged to have 'knowingly violated the code of ethics' are placed outside the wall.
@freemo yet again, building walled garden with a transparent wall is a formal, rather than functional difference, regardless of enforcement.
I am reserving all judgement as to whether "your" or "their" walled garden is "better", so your arguments as to why it may be so aren't particularly relevant to this specific thread.
My sole contention is that, based on personal observation, your proposal attracts a degree of ridicule and pushback by virtue of appearing to claim to "solve" the problem of walled gardens by implementing the problem differently. My recommendation is as simple as it is impossible; relinquish the oppositional mindset. Let "them" talk however they will of you. The difference of experience within your garden will be the only rebuttal of theirs you ever need to make.