A newsletter about #privacy, #technology, #policy, #strategy, and #justice.
Currently at @nexusofprivacy, but looking for a new home and so checking out infosec.exchange
@daveley Great question. A rew reasons:
- mastodon.social’s so big that the Local and Federated timelines aren’t very useful.
- smaller instances (even if they’re not special-interest focused) are more likely to have a good community.
- many other instances have “silenced” mastodon.social (because of its long history of moderation issues – or just because of the volume), so people on other instances are less likely to connect with you.
All that being said, I wasn’t trying to say that mastodon.social was terrible - it’s the advice that’s horrible. It’s just that for most people it’s not the best place to start.
@sibrosan The server rules on your server explicitly prohibit transphobia.
So why do you see enforcing the rules by not federating with another server that’s got a long history of transphobia as “bias”?
@sibrosan Like I say, opinions differ.
Why do you think so many trans and queer people – who are very likely to be directly impacted by transgressions of the rules – come to a different conclusion and advocate preemptively blocking?
See the “We’re here, we’re queer” section of https://privacy.thenexus.today/should-the-fediverse-welcome-surveillance-capitalism/#were-here-were-queer for more on that perspective.
@sibrosan Or, if an instance that’s about to launch has a long history of discrimination, hate, violance, abuse, and contributions to genocide, you can announce your intention to defederate from them even before they launch.
Like I said in the post, opinions differ!
@drwho Not necessarily. In the short term, the huge split in the Republican party means that the NDAA’s already not a slam-dunk, so throwing gasoline on the fire with FISA activism could potentially have an impact. It also adds to pressure on Speaker Johnson, who’s under a lot of fire from Republicans for how badly he’s handled this mess.
And even if they do the short-term reauth (which I agree is more likely than not), it’s still very much an open question as to what happens next – it could be anything from GSRA or PLEWSA (with significant reforms) to a straightforward longer-term reauth with minimal reforms as a “compromise” to the odious FFRA (which *broadens* the scope). So pressure now is also a preparation for the next battle.