Just started Lemmying today. Have lots of questions. Someone mentioned mod logs, so I went down a rabbit hole reading mod logs. The only reason I left reddit was because many mods are dicks. But reading the logs, it seems mods ban people and censor like crazy here too. Isn’t Lemmy supposed to be more free and open? How is this different from Reddit? I honestly don’t understand.
It’s different from Reddit because if you don’t like the way your instance is moderated you can just use another instance and still see content from another
Unlike on Reddit, where if you don’t like a subreddit you’re totally unable to…
Wait hang on
(I think it is the natural endpoint of putting people in a position of power, then asking them to do a thankless job and interact with the worst the community has to offer day in and day out without reprieve and expect them to remain cheerful and evenhanded the entire time. I don’t think Lemmy has any particular advantage in that regard, except that it is younger and moderators have had less time to turn bitter.)
I was talking about instance level stuff, for example I’m on Lemm.ee but I can still interact with lemmy.world, but yeah there isn’t much difference on the community level other than communities being able to have the same name if they’re on different servers
Yeah. Lemmy’s structure makes mod abuse much easier. That said, it is easier for groups to leave if they disagree with mods and admins, like with what happened with StarTrek.website.
Okay. I don’t quite understand instances yet, but I think I see what you’re saying.
Instead of one central Reddit, imagine hundreds of mini-Reddits each with their own users, communities, rules, culture, etc. Now connect them all together so the users on each mini-Reddit can read/post/comment on any of the others. That basically how this works; each Lemmy instance is a mini-Reddit in a sea of peers.
May I suggest…
I’ve been saying that day 1 new here is very overwhelming. I’ve been suggesting a whole “new to Lemmy” wiki, which explains all the normal questions. Until then, I reccomend this community.
Also…don’t call us Lemmings. Some people do it, and I’m trying to stop them. I prefer fediversians.
The lemming ship is long since sailed. I don’t love it but fediversians may be worse lol
Well, unless they blocklist instances. It’s sad that operators would rather tear at the fabric of the fediverse than to allow users on their instances to get exposed to opinions that they don’t like.
See, thats the balancing act. I feel like it’s smart to say “well sign up to the smallest instance you can find”, that way the owner won’t care.
But I feel that runs the risk of that instance can disappear at anytime. Which I assume would make your account inaccessible.
We need to make defederating on an instance level not an option. If I want to block a community, or a person, I can. Why block everyone else from seeing something I disagree with?
Now I fully get why instances need to block an individual. If some guy came on here promoting nazism, sure. I get that. Ban him.
But me, not doing anything wrong can’t communicate with any instances that Lemmy.World has deemed me not needing to see…
Because some instances that aren’t managed well can just have tons and tons of spambots signing up constantly such that it’s not practical to ban individual accounts. Especially since most admin and mod teams are small on Lemmy. There are also literal nazi instances that exist just to go out and harass and threaten minorities or people they hate. While you could ban all the users it’s a lot easier to just block the whole instance.
So while I agree with you that it’s overused, I don’t see how completely disallowing it can work. Not sure what a better solution would look like though.
This naively assumes there aren’t malicious or extremists instances hell bent on brigading others in the fediverse. Without defederation, they can keep spinning up accounts to bypass individual bans until mods are overwhelmed.
Every instance retains their respective right to block who they deem a risk whether that’s an individual or instance. As an individual, you are more than welcome to create a separate account on another instances if you disagree with your current instance rules or bans, as is the nature of the fediverse.
Each community has rules which are outlined on the sidebar, so, generally, moderation follows those rules and when content is removed, the reasoning is generally publicly available on the modlog.
When I mod something, I specifically add a reply indicating why it was removed, this is because I fucking hated the whole reddit:
Removed
Removed
Removed
RemovedRemoved
Removed
I’ve been hearing arbitrary ban in reddit, also heard the same complain here but it’s mostly from individual that have comment with thinly veiled vitriol. Still, there’s a few incident with power mods, but iirc it’s been resolved. Might pop up in the future though.
The culture here is a bit different due to the nature of self hosting, sometime admin get called power tripping but then it’s their server and people who contributed to the cost have no problem with the rule being set up and enforced.
I got banned by reddit by an AI automod. The messages had nothing wrong with them.
My thing is vitriol should be allowed. Some people deserve vitriol. Same for trolling. Sometimes trolling is funny. Mods get carte blanche to decide what goes. I’m not trying to pretend to be Mr Rogers to keep from getting banned.
the good news is that if you dislike/disagree with any decision by a mod or admin you’ll always still have the option to either:
- Instance Hop🐇
- Host Your Own Instance🤗
I disagree. I don’t want a community full of vitriol. I come on Lemmy as entertainment, and reading through a bunch of angry people’s rants is not fun to me.
I like that there are communities moderated in a way that creates an environment I enjoy. And I’m pleased that there are communities out there for you to discover that are full of vitriol.
You and I are never going to have every single community meet our preferences and that’s ok.
It’s “free and open” in the sense that you can create your own Lemmy instance and rule it how you wish. Other people are under no obligation to interact with you though.
Likewise, different communities have different norms and strictnesses. Follow the rules of their home or make your own.
If you don’t find instances or communities that have a level of moderation you appreciate, you could still start your own imstance with your own/no rules and federate with the Lemmy universe.
However, if ‘your’ rules are too controversial, you might not find other people willing to engage with your communities and other instances might even decide to block your server.
I feel that people and discussions on Lemmy are less toxic compared to Reddit. With less toxic I mean less insults, less provocations, less trolling etc. and more (from my perspective) valuable and deeper discussions instead. And a generally more supportive and open-minded attitude.
Main reason is probably that a large part of Lemmy users is quite homogeneous: left leaning, IT focused, rather young people etc. You always have to bear in mind that opinions here are not necessarily representative for the society as a whole.
Regarding trolling: I personally rarely appreciate trolls and I’m happy that mods are setting certain boundaries in the communities I engage with.
left leaning, IT focused, rather young people etc
It would have been more balanced but all the right leaning people ended up on those torn-down and neutered fedivervse bastardizations (Gab, Truth etc) that don’t even bother to federate. And even if they did, I doubt that many lemmy instance operators would have the integrity to not childishly “fediblock” them.
Has nothing to do with having integrity. We don’t need the ‘balance’ of nazi racists, we’re good.
As always, it is quite an experience to drop into the different self-organized bubbles for a quick peek.
IDK, I think most are like good HOAs.
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The rules are openly posted for you to see before you join a community / buy property under an HOA.
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decent Mods/HOA people are going to manage things in accordance with the posted rules and goals of the community/HOA, even when it doesn’t align with their personal feelings
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one could certainly argue for effective mechanisms to remove mods/HOA people if they are not representing the goals of the community. One person complaining should not be enough to remove a Mod/HOA person or there cease to be any sort of moderation.
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Some people want a heavily curated community/HOA. Some people absolutely do not want their neighbor letting their lawn go wild with multiple cars up on blocks leaking oil and confederate flags, and they specifically want an HOA to prevent those things from happening. There should be a mix of communities/HOAs with different intensities or moderation so that people can search out and find what fits them. Or go solo to create their own community / buy into a property with no HOA.
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you are obviously savvy enough to find a community’s rules and skim the mod log to see how the rules are followed. Don’t buy into an HOA that doesn’t align with what you want / don’t join a community whose moderation philosophy isn’t want you’re looking for.
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moving into a decently managed HOA where neighbors get along and agree with the HOA for the most part, then hollering about how all HOAs are terrible power-hungry assholes is a great way to not make any friends with neighbors. Contrast that with reviewing HOA rules, meeting a few neighbors to gage how the HOA actually operates before buying, then declining to buy if the HOA doesn’t match your needs is the much more reasonable and civic-minded approach that leaves everyone happier in the end.
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Content moderation isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Just be glad Reddit and Lemmy are transparent about it unlike certain Musk and Zuck-owned websites…
Wtf where’s the tendies
Mods are mods, doesn’t matter where you go, they cannot be escaped.
Been this was since BBS and IRC.
😩😩😩
Mods here are horrible. They are the worst.
Source: am mod
But it’s easier to circumvent horrible mods by migrating to a different community or instance.
Depends on the instance.
Not in !casualconversation@lemm.ee
The perceived position of power will always attract a certain type of people, so yeah, you’ll see this here too.
How is this different from Reddit? I honestly don’t understand.
The basic principle of the mods has been copied from reddit, and the mods here are former reddit mods. The 2 saddest facts about lemmy.
Therefore lots of mod problems are the same. They got the power, you got nothing. They are higher beings. They never justify or explain themselves. Modlogs are minimalistic and not helpful.
The biggest problem with reddit mod abuse is they remove every post that isn’t a low effort repost. For example in r/blackmagicfuckery they once removed a 3d renderer someone made in Microsoft excel which was OC made by the person who posted it but allowed the blatantly reposted and uninteresting “scientists think it’s possible to run doom on 10 billion crabs” ass shit post.
