_jayrope

_jayrope

jrp@hub.kliklak.net

Composer, musician, mixing & mastering engineer, much in performance arts/dance, conceptual & free music • instrument & radio maker

Homepage:: https://jayrope.com

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 10:01:47 +0200 last edited: Mon, 18 Sep 2023 10:04:16 +0200

_jayrope

jrp@hub.kliklak.net

TBS, The Bad Space, now added furry instances to their block list, mainly because there was a quarrel between a person running TBS and some furries. That's of course wrong and will render TBS useless in no time. Maybe we don't need a watchdog. Those things always seem to end in cancelling out diversity.

https://furry.engineer/@silvereagle/111061785659244565

show all 22 comments

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 10:24:38 +0200

Dante Scanline

dantescanline@autonomous.zone

@jrp i think there are some basic assumptions you have to state and fulfil to have a useful shared blocklist, but no project i've seen for fediverse has come close.

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 12:34:15 +0200 last edited: Mon, 18 Sep 2023 17:36:20 +0200

_jayrope

jrp@hub.kliklak.net

@Dante Scanline 🏴 The problem with such things is, that they might wash out an initial declared friendliness and openness of the fediverse over time. Normalos taking over. Less conscience for the good things in life.

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 12:38:02 +0200

Dante Scanline

dantescanline@autonomous.zone

@jrp i dont really understand what you mean?

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 13:04:56 +0200

Hans

hans@hubzilla.hopto.org

There will never be a global blocklist I think. People running instances can hardly predict what it means for them.

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 17:15:31 +0200

Scott M. Stolz

scott@authorship.studio

@｛Hans｝

There will never be a global blocklist I think. People running instances can hardly predict what it means for them.

The biggest problem with most content blocklists is that they wind up becoming subjective instead of objective. Or they wind up being used as tools for personal vendettas.

I use spam and malware blocklists on the server level because we don't want that content on our servers. Malware and spam have specific definitions, so there are fewer false positives.

But when it comes to content moderation, someone could wind up on the blocklist just because two people have a personal squabble or someone wants to suppress what is being said. And many times it becomes political, rather than rules-based. People should not be exempt from rules against issuing threats just because they are on the "correct" side of the political aisle, for example.

For that reason, I prefer to have our own blocklists based on our website's policies.

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 18:04:02 +0200

Hans

hans@hubzilla.hopto.org

The best one is your own. I wrote rbl's in the past so yeah, I know what it is

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 18:47:06 +0200 last edited: Mon, 18 Sep 2023 18:47:15 +0200

_jayrope

jrp@hub.kliklak.net

@｛Hans｝ @Scott M. Stolz I'd think, that lists like TBS exist, because people do not have the ressources to do that themselves. In that regard those those things will never disappear in times, where it gets easier to host a social media while the people hosting wouldn't be able to run an Apache server from the command line (i can't)

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 19:22:42 +0200

Scott M. Stolz

scott@authorship.studio

@_jayrope I would say that it is harder for larger hubs/instances to moderate than smaller instances.

As long as the administrator or moderator logs in regularly, it isn't that hard to moderate a smaller instance. Unless the content is on your own server, you don't really have to take much action. Users can block other people themselves... or simply not visit those sites in the first place.

The way the fediverse works is that you have to follow someone to see their posts. There is no algorithm shoving content in your face. And for comments, you simply block the person who annoys you and they are gone.

Blocklists come in handy in three areas: spam, malware, and illegal content. But, content blocklists based on what is "acceptable" wind up being problematic because it becomes a matter of opinion.

Small instances may need some guidance on how to moderate an instance, but it isn't that hard.

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 20:22:25 +0200

Hans

hans@hubzilla.hopto.org

@Scott M. Stolz @_jayrope I slowly start to believe in having some rating system per user. Sure, that could get bad too but a bit like exchanging keys between to people. If others not know the other side they might have doubts connecting.

Not an easy problem tools like approving likes/comments might also help out

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 20:28:39 +0200

Scott M. Stolz

scott@authorship.studio

@｛Hans｝ Bluesky has an interesting concept. Basically, anyone can set up a service that labels or flags content. People choose which ones they want to subscribe to. So if they want to subscribe to an NSFW flag list, posts flagged as NSFW would be muted or have a warning on them.

This puts moderation in the hands of the people and leverages shared efforts to moderate at the same time.

With such a system, the admin only has to worry about spam, malware, and illegal content. The user chooses what they want to see.

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 20:35:02 +0200

Hans

hans@hubzilla.hopto.org

@Scott M. Stolz That can be risky in some countries. If a user on a host I have is not behaving they will hold me responsible (in Germany) afaik

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 20:36:52 +0200

Bill Statler

billstatler@forum.statler.ws

The Bad Space started out as an inadequately-edited list and is evolving into something worse. The idea of top-down control of a fediblock list was flawed from the start.

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 21:07:19 +0200

Scott M. Stolz

scott@authorship.studio

@｛Hans｝

That can be risky in some countries. If a user on a host I have is not behaving they will hold me responsible (in Germany) afaik

But you have control of that. The user is on your system. You can suspend or ban them for their behavior. if they are doing something illegal, you have full authority and the ability to remove them from your site.

What you don't have control over is users on other servers. And most blocklists concern behavior on other servers.

Tue, 19 Sep 2023 10:05:20 +0200

Hans

hans@hubzilla.hopto.org

@Scott M. Stolz True all...

But, suppose the person will post a picture where abuse of kids is shown. It will spread throughout the fediverse before you know it or someone points you to it.

Tue, 19 Sep 2023 17:01:25 +0200

Scott M. Stolz

scott@authorship.studio

@｛Hans｝

But, suppose the person will post a picture where abuse of kids is shown. It will spread throughout the fediverse before you know it or someone points you to it.

Unfortunately, that is the same with any social network, email, or messaging app.

That is why I said that I think that blocklists that deal with spam, malware, and illegal content would be a good idea. Such a post would be illegal content.

But there are several things that can be done even without a blocklist (or if the blocklist missed it).

Do not cache images from other servers. That way the image never winds up on your server.
Ban your local users who participated in the conversation.
Block the user (from the other server) who posted it so that they cannot communicate with your server.
Report it as required by law so law enforcement goes after the person who posted it.

I think blocking illegal content with a blocklist would be great. I would subscribe to those.

But I don't believe in blacklists based on "politically correct" speech or particular worldviews... or that includes blocks because there was a verbal war between the furries and someone else.

Tue, 19 Sep 2023 22:11:47 +0200

Jupiter Rowland

jupiter_rowland@hub.netzgemeinde.eu

@Scott M. Stolz How do Friendica, Hubzilla and (streams) handle images attached to Mastodon posts as files? Do they have to download them, or do they "hotlink" to whichever server the post came in from?

As for blocklists, having only one for everything is bad. Having only one for everything with no notes whatsoever what the respective instances have to be blocked for is even worse.

Tue, 19 Sep 2023 22:18:21 +0200 last edited: Wed, 20 Sep 2023 08:22:43 +0200

_jayrope

jrp@hub.kliklak.net

@Dante Scanline 🏴 Sorry, late reply. I believe, that widely used block lists like TBS actively destroy diversity. To exclude certain unfriendly humans from discussion - when necessary - it seems always better for each server to run their own rules, and for each user to run their individual block and mute options. In the long run, that keeps both diversity up and users with special safety needs as reclused as they want to be.

Tue, 19 Sep 2023 22:53:32 +0200

Dante Scanline

dantescanline@autonomous.zone

@jrp there's a lot of purely obviously nazi/horrible servers out there and if i had an incoming feed of those to block from a small group of people i actually know and trust i would use it. that's a lot of 'ifs' though required to make it useful

Wed, 20 Sep 2023 02:29:15 +0200

Scott M. Stolz

scott@authorship.studio

@Jupiter Rowland

As for blocklists, having only one for everything is bad. Having only one for everything with no notes whatsoever what the respective instances have to be blocked for is even worse.

I agree. I would rather have multiple choices and the blocklists should be for a specific purpose, such as blocking illegal content (which includes unsolicited commercial emails, malware, abuse, and worse in my country). And there needs to be notes.

Although, for truly illegal content, reporting it to the authorities and their web hosting company usually results in it being taken down at the source. No need to blocklist them in that case.

Wed, 20 Sep 2023 02:42:03 +0200

Scott M. Stolz

scott@authorship.studio

@Dante Scanline 🏴

there's a lot of purely obviously nazi/horrible servers out there and if i had an incoming feed of those to block from a small group of people i actually know and trust i would use it. that's a lot of 'ifs' though required to make it useful

Having specific types of blocklists moderated by different people would be useful. Then you have a choice of which ones to use and you can evaluate the quality of their blocklist. This is similar to how we have multiple realtime black holes (RBH) for spam (unsolicited commercial emails). You pick which provider you use.

I am wary of a single all-purpose blocklist, but blocklists that specialize in certain types of content would be useful.

Wed, 20 Sep 2023 04:48:16 +0200

Bill Statler

billstatler@forum.statler.ws

Scott M. Stolz wrote:

"Having specific types of blocklists moderated by different people would be useful. Then you have a choice of which ones to use and you can evaluate the quality of their blocklist."

Yes, this is what I meant when I was complaining about "top-down control of a fediblock list". We need a broad marketplace of fediblock lists, from which individual instance admins (and even individual users) can choose.

The only thing I've seen that came close was a simple list of the 500 most-blocked instances. You could sort it by "votes". This is only aggregate information, and doesn't tell you why you might want to block an instance, but at least the data is "bottom up" (provided by actual admins) and not imposed from above.

I wonder if one could implement a web of trust model for blocklist sharing?

Mon, 25 Sep 2023 06:05:31 +0200

Bill Statler

billstatler@forum.statler.ws

I wonder if one could implement a web of trust model for blocklist sharing?

Oh. Of course someone has done something much like this:

Fediseer

This is a FOSS service to help Fediverse instances detect and avoid suspicious instances. Please check our FAQ for further questions. You can find the official GUI at gui.fediseer.com This Fediseer is focused around anti-spam verification. We make no judgement on the content of the guaranteed communities other than they have been verified to not be...