Something about starter packs that I think gets lost when they're discussed on Mastodon:
The power of starter packs is not in some centralised mega list of say "Black people in tech," curated by some central authority. The power is in a million tiny "Black techies I follow" lists curated by everyday users.
Check it out. I'm on some lists.
https://clearsky.app/mekka.mekka-tech.com/lists
And yes, I'm on some lists I don't want to be on, that people use to block. And I mostly don't care.
1/N
The losers that think being trans means being white and trans, hopped over from Mastodon to BlueSky, and put me on their "transmisogyny list."
But Black trans people, and white trans people that aren't racist and can see Black people, put me in their starter packs.
I don't want to be in community with the fashy white trans people that don't like Black trans people. I prefer the white trans people that like the Black and brown trans people.
I don't like everybody. It's OK if they block me.
Something else interesting:
ClearSky, the tool for inspecting blocks, list membership, etc, is built by a Black developer.
BlackSky, the tool and moderation community for Black ATProto users and apps, is built by a Black developer.
Black developers are building on Blue Sky.
Shout out to everyone who will read this, and instead of saying "How do we get them to build for Mastodon/Activity Pub?" Will froth at the mouth about fake federation and the inevitable corpo takeover.
@mekkaokereke
"Shout out to everyone who will read this, and instead of saying "How do we get them to build for Mastodon/Activity Pub?" Will froth at the mouth about fake federation..."
Forgive me but, wouldn't anyone aware of the history be entitled AF if they asked, "Hey, I wonder if we can get them to build these tools for us?"
I don't feel entitled to ask anything of people who walked out of my life when I chased them away. I own my mistake and live with the consequences. It sucks, but...
@kims @mekkaokereke I don't at all want to speak for Mekka, but since I just wrote about this too, it's worth taking a moment to consider the mindset on Fedi that believes Bluesky is bad, but refuses to acknowledge any of Fedi's flaws. The idea that anyone who leaves is flawed and we're better off without them.
That's a fatal mistake, and it's being made constantly.
@mttaggart @kims @mekkaokereke @ecosdelfuturo It’s pretty obvious to me that the Fediverse needs a more welcoming alternative. Maybe a Mastodon fork with a different set of developers that are more open to contributions (OpenOffice vs LibreOffice comes to my mind). But, of course, who has the time and resources to do that is the major issue.
@vrruiz @kims @mekkaokereke @ecosdelfuturo Perhaps a fork run by an organization that has a paid Trust and Safety team for moderation, with clear terms and conditions. Maybe even a legal entity that can be sued for breach of contract to address harms.
I'm being cheeky, but if you want to fix Fedi, professionalize it.
@mttaggart @vrruiz @kims @mekkaokereke @ecosdelfuturo
I know you're being cheeky, but you're actually touching on one of the core problems. Put the software aside for a minute. Let's ignore the notion of forks and just talk about governance.
You want an organization with a professional paid trust and safety team.
@gatesvp @mttaggart @vrruiz @kims @ecosdelfuturo
This is the troublemaking I'm most excited about seeing on the Fediverse. Tech and protocols are boring and incremental. But finding a new way to pay for shared safety? That's transformative.
There's no central franchise for Chinese restaurants, and no copyrighted recipe book. Yet Orange chicken is basically the same everywhere.
There's no central official donut shop recipe. Yet pink boxes and donut shop supplies are cheap for everyone.
@gatesvp @mttaggart @vrruiz @kims @ecosdelfuturo
Other communities have figured out how to pay for collective goods.
Right now, safety on Mastodon is incredibly inefficient, because it's not shared. It's like the opposite of caching. We moderate the same antisocial people over and over again.
I won't rehash all my thoughts on this, but I believe it involves subscriptions, and distributing payment for labor both for infra developers and for moderators, and more smaller instances vs a few big.
You're acknowledging that this current moderation setup is is inefficient. But it's obvious that the response is a human one, not a technology one.
But @mttaggart & @vrruiz are talking about technical challenges and forking of code bases. But isn't more humans or more money.
That's why I'm asking about funding and corporate structure. If you can't tell me what you want to pay and what you expect to get out of it, then every change is doomed.
@gatesvp @mekkaokereke @vrruiz @kims @ecosdelfuturo I don't see how you can construe my comment to be about anything but more humans and more money. I said we need to professionalize instance management.
@mttaggart @mekkaokereke @vrruiz
Who is the "we" in that statement?
The world already has Social.coop, which is a pretty professional setup for an instance. With a clear governance structure and a clear funding source (paid membership).
If you don't want a member-funded Co-op, then what do you want instead?
How much money do you want to spend?
Who do you want to give it to?
@gatesvp @mekkaokereke @vrruiz Social.coop is cool. But nah, I ain't getting dragged into the trap of being on the hook for the whole solution just because I offered a valid criticism.
@mttaggart @mekkaokereke @vrruiz
Notice how you're not answering the really simple questions? I didn't ask you to be on the hook for a solution, I asked you for your parameters for success.
What do you pay?
Who does the money go to?
If you can't answer those questions, then you're just going to be a forever critic. You're going to be angry at everything, you'll just keep moving the bar.
This is a community space. It needs community involvement.
How do you want to be involved?
Please stop trying to re-engage Taggart. He said what he said. And I'm the OP.
In my opinion, the right solution is socio-technical. Just adding humans won't get it done. Just adding money, or just adding tech won't get it done either. We need all 3.
I like the efficiency and focus of The Bad Space.
I like the direction IFTAS is headed in.
I like BlueSky's composable moderation and starter packs.
I like Nivenly's co-op and moderation and mod community mindset.
@mekkaokereke @gatesvp @mttaggart @vrruiz @kims @ecosdelfuturo
I could see lots of different models here, has anyone done "Moderation As A Service"? Or, advertiser supported moderation? It's an effort, and efforts should be funded somehow.
@Okanogen @mekkaokereke @gatesvp @vrruiz @kims @ecosdelfuturo Very early days, but yes: https://about.iftas.org/
It'll be interesting to see what happens with Mastodon's crowdfunding efforts for T&S.
@Okanogen @mekkaokereke @gatesvp @mttaggart @vrruiz @kims @ecosdelfuturo this is something I had in mind when writing my vision of T&S on the Fediverse last year: https://renchap.com/blog/post/evolving_mastodon_trust_and_safety/
We are (slowly) moving in this direction with our work on « Fediverse Auxiliary Service Providers » for fediscovery.org, it opens the door to moderation providers.
@gatesvp @mttaggart @renchap @ecosdelfuturo @kims @Okanogen @mekkaokereke @vrruiz kinda makes me wonder if we should have a governance body like the Creator Accountability Network for the fediverse. If our networks are decentralized, moderation should be as well.
@Okanogen @mekkaokereke @gatesvp @mttaggart @vrruiz @kims @ecosdelfuturo is there a useful distinction between “maas” and “curation”?
@IPmonger @Okanogen @mekkaokereke @mttaggart @vrruiz @kims @ecosdelfuturo
There is. The basic goal of a MaaS provider would be something like this site: https://about.iftas.org/
Dealing with content that is either illegal or obviously dangerous CSAM, DMCA notices, unlicensed bots, spam content, non-consensual photos, etc.
Curation is for things that are legal, but not necessarily supported by a particular community. For example, the posting of AI-generated content.
@gatesvp @Okanogen @mekkaokereke @mttaggart @vrruiz @kims @ecosdelfuturo how does MaaS deal with jurisdictions having conflicts over legality?
@IPmonger @Okanogen @mekkaokereke @mttaggart @vrruiz @kims @ecosdelfuturo How does Twitter or Facebook do it today? You have experts in those jurisdictions and you let them apply rules appropriately. That's way more than most instance providers can do today.
Look, you're asking a reasonable question if we're dealing with a well-funded organization. But the whole reason we have this discussion is that we're not there yet. When something like IFTAS has a $20M annual budget, then they can answer
@gatesvp @Okanogen @mekkaokereke @mttaggart @vrruiz @kims @ecosdelfuturo this is why I don’t see the difference between MaaS (ala IFTAS) and curation. I’m not sure how a government would treat IFTAS any different from a person choosing to curate a social media feed. They seem to be functionally indistinguishable…
@IPmonger @Okanogen @mekkaokereke @mttaggart @vrruiz @kims @ecosdelfuturo
As someone who was a Trust & Safety professional for one of the largest media companies in the world, I would like you to take my word for it when I say that government agencies do understand this difference. These are competent agencies, not brainless sock puppets.
@gatesvp @Okanogen @mekkaokereke @mttaggart @vrruiz @kims @ecosdelfuturo It may be that you are correct, but that is of small consolation because “just trust me” doesn’t really resonate well in USA politics at the moment…
Look, if your base assumption is that government agencies are inherently useless sock puppets. Even in modern Rich economies. Even for concerns that cross party lines, like CSAM... Then there's not really much I can say that's going to contribute here, right?
If you think your neighbors are a bunch of useless tools out spreading CSAM, then any detailed discussion I give you is just going to be written off. I'm just some internet random, what could I possibly know, right?
@IPmonger @gatesvp @mekkaokereke @mttaggart @vrruiz @kims @ecosdelfuturo
Nobody is forcing you to use any specific social media, me boy. Go find one that accepts you.
@Okanogen @IPmonger @gatesvp @mekkaokereke @vrruiz @kims @ecosdelfuturo Wow! What a shitty response! Maybe think about why you're so opposed to making your social media choice more welcoming.
@mttaggart @IPmonger @gatesvp @mekkaokereke @vrruiz @kims @ecosdelfuturo
I dont think you understood what i was saying.