"Is Mastodon becoming an echo chamber?"
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In the year 2026, it is the height of bad faith to argue that moderating online community & maintaining spaces that are free & honest & not controlled by techno-fascists is somehow regressive.
We are living with the results of their online takeover. How are you going to act like people are overreacting when they say they want to choose carefully which types of interactions belong in the spaces they are in?
How are you going to pretend it doesn't matter? Online manipulation helped give us the global rise of fascism.
Insisting that we may not exercise our own discretion in our association with others online is insisting people expose themselves to potential harm & surrender to the outcomes desired by bad actors.
It is just too goddamn late for this show of naivety to be convincing.
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E em0nm4stodon@infosec.exchange shared this topic
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In the year 2026, it is the height of bad faith to argue that moderating online community & maintaining spaces that are free & honest & not controlled by techno-fascists is somehow regressive.
We are living with the results of their online takeover. How are you going to act like people are overreacting when they say they want to choose carefully which types of interactions belong in the spaces they are in?
@artemis online community moderation arose (truly, for real) out of feminist praxis and the pushback against it is similarly situated
the fundamental claims- that consent matters, that we owe one another something, that you may not just cause harm and wander away- are the antithesis of grabby, aggressive, scarcity-based individualism
and some people, mostly men, act like their very lives are at stake in finding themselves expected to share responsibility for norms and upkeep and impacts
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Bad actors will always try to hijack "diversity" to force us to accept actual enemies into our camp.
"AI", as it exists now, is a tool of our enemies: they use it to enshrine bias into employment processes so it no longer requires a bigoted human in the loop. They use AI to devalue the work of writers, researchers, coders, artists & more. They use AI to automate decisions of who should be bombed, who should starve, & who should be erased/ignored/& excluded.
Calling us bigots for not welcoming enemy propagandists is fucking rich.
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How are you going to pretend it doesn't matter? Online manipulation helped give us the global rise of fascism.
Insisting that we may not exercise our own discretion in our association with others online is insisting people expose themselves to potential harm & surrender to the outcomes desired by bad actors.
It is just too goddamn late for this show of naivety to be convincing.
Bad actors will always try to hijack "diversity" to force us to accept actual enemies into our camp.
"AI", as it exists now, is a tool of our enemies: they use it to enshrine bias into employment processes so it no longer requires a bigoted human in the loop. They use AI to devalue the work of writers, researchers, coders, artists & more. They use AI to automate decisions of who should be bombed, who should starve, & who should be erased/ignored/& excluded.
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@artemis online community moderation arose (truly, for real) out of feminist praxis and the pushback against it is similarly situated
the fundamental claims- that consent matters, that we owe one another something, that you may not just cause harm and wander away- are the antithesis of grabby, aggressive, scarcity-based individualism
and some people, mostly men, act like their very lives are at stake in finding themselves expected to share responsibility for norms and upkeep and impacts
THIS. 1000%.
In 2020, I found myself isolated in a small rural town. I asked a town official if we had a listserv for community conversations. He thought it was a great idea & asked me to create one.
So I did. Every post is moderated. Because I've see what happens when communities become free-for-all. Voices get silenced. People leave. The only ones left are the aggressors.
A tech bro tried to convince me the *only* way to get full participation was to have it unmoderated.
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THIS. 1000%.
In 2020, I found myself isolated in a small rural town. I asked a town official if we had a listserv for community conversations. He thought it was a great idea & asked me to create one.
So I did. Every post is moderated. Because I've see what happens when communities become free-for-all. Voices get silenced. People leave. The only ones left are the aggressors.
A tech bro tried to convince me the *only* way to get full participation was to have it unmoderated.
1/I was a part of online communities he had created (where I used to live) & watched that winnowing away happen in real time. I was one of the participants who walked away when this tech bro wouldn't act to reign in hate speech.
If that is full participation, I'll eat my laptop.
2/2
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"Is Mastodon becoming an echo chamber?"
I dunno. What even is 'Mastodon' in this conversation?
I'm on dice.camp because I like their moderation & federation decisions. If you're on a different instance, how "echo-y" your "echo chamber" is may vary.
But if you don't like it when people are picky about who they associate with & how, just go hang out on mastodon.social or whatever.
@artemis@dice.camp I keep seeing people react to this but not seeing the origin, who's saying that 'mastodon is an echo chamber'? I guessing its a bot campaign, exactly the kind of thing that isn't tolerated here, and that's why they're mad
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"Is Mastodon becoming an echo chamber?"
I dunno. What even is 'Mastodon' in this conversation?
I'm on dice.camp because I like their moderation & federation decisions. If you're on a different instance, how "echo-y" your "echo chamber" is may vary.
But if you don't like it when people are picky about who they associate with & how, just go hang out on mastodon.social or whatever.
@artemis I wonder how much is smoke and mirrors. Do other social networks love AI? Or is that just the owner's algorithms and the ease of faking popularity with bots and sock puppet accounts when you have billions of dollars behind you?
Because yeah, I also see ai boosters, but it seems more like no one cares to boost their posts so few people see them.
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@mook
If you are curious, I (and I assume at least some of the other people you are seeing) am reacting to a social.coop user Scott Jenson. Looks like he's a largish account, but unsurprisingly in the Fedi circles I am in, most people are pretty damned unimpressed with his take.@mook
It seems to be pretty standard white tech bro nonsense. It's just kind of funny to me because it seems like he's literally not understanding what Fedi is at a pretty fundamental level. We get to choose what "Fedi" is in our own experience. That's how it is built. -
@artemis@dice.camp I keep seeing people react to this but not seeing the origin, who's saying that 'mastodon is an echo chamber'? I guessing its a bot campaign, exactly the kind of thing that isn't tolerated here, and that's why they're mad
@mook
If you are curious, I (and I assume at least some of the other people you are seeing) am reacting to a social.coop user Scott Jenson. Looks like he's a largish account, but unsurprisingly in the Fedi circles I am in, most people are pretty damned unimpressed with his take. -
Calling us bigots for not welcoming enemy propagandists is fucking rich.
Call me old school, but IMO *nobody* is obliged to interact with someone, or has to justify if they don't. It's an individual's *free* choice.
(And I for one block anyone who's spreading AI propaganda.)
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R relay@relay.infosec.exchange shared this topic
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Calling us bigots for not welcoming enemy propagandists is fucking rich.
But seriously, I am pretty sure there are corners of Fedi where AI boosters are totally welcome.
That's the thing about Fedi.
But it's possible instances where AI boosting is welcome & encouraged may find themselves defederated from instances that don't promote AI slop & blocked by users who don't want to see that shit in their timeline.
And that's what they are complaining about. They are complaining that they don't get to insist on being in your timeline & in your mentions.
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@mook
It seems to be pretty standard white tech bro nonsense. It's just kind of funny to me because it seems like he's literally not understanding what Fedi is at a pretty fundamental level. We get to choose what "Fedi" is in our own experience. That's how it is built.@artemis@dice.camp ah, and social.coop itself is an explicitly left wing instance with a pretty strict blocklist, like you have to fill out an application to join, at least you did when i tried to join, so idk dude if you want a place more tolerant of slop there are plenty
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But seriously, I am pretty sure there are corners of Fedi where AI boosters are totally welcome.
That's the thing about Fedi.
But it's possible instances where AI boosting is welcome & encouraged may find themselves defederated from instances that don't promote AI slop & blocked by users who don't want to see that shit in their timeline.
And that's what they are complaining about. They are complaining that they don't get to insist on being in your timeline & in your mentions.
If you're complaining that the kind of behavior that is widely seen as extremely antisocial is unwelcome in many people's "social media" experience, maybe Fedi isn't for you.
I don't think you want a social media platform that is constructed around choice, because I see you out here really upset that people are making the choice that they don't want AI in their lives.
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I was a part of online communities he had created (where I used to live) & watched that winnowing away happen in real time. I was one of the participants who walked away when this tech bro wouldn't act to reign in hate speech.
If that is full participation, I'll eat my laptop.
2/2
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"Is Mastodon becoming an echo chamber?"
I dunno. What even is 'Mastodon' in this conversation?
I'm on dice.camp because I like their moderation & federation decisions. If you're on a different instance, how "echo-y" your "echo chamber" is may vary.
But if you don't like it when people are picky about who they associate with & how, just go hang out on mastodon.social or whatever.
@artemis
"Is Mastodon becoming an echo chamber?"Maybe^^ But so what if it is? I like pubs full of working class guys, squatters, artists & lefties because the people there are more likely to share my opinions. I tend not to go to pubs I find full of racists & fascists. I'm happy to talk to racists & fascists but not when they're backed by their chosen tribe on their own ground. If they want to share their opinions with me they'll have to be polite but they rarely do & they rarely are. It's the same with social media; I don't beat myself up because I'm not giving racists & fascists special privileges.
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They have to frame it as a diversity issue because they want to distract from the fact that it is a *consent* issue!
Not wanting to associate with Black people is bigotry, but not wanting to associate with AI-shills is just protecting your peace. These are not the goddamn same, & it's really sinister asking people to pretend they are.
It is weird to insist people should HAVE to interact with you, regardless of your behavior. It shows a lack of respect for people's agency & choice.
@artemis It's telling, to me, that these people view someone not wanting to interact with them as a consequence of their behaviour the same as not wanting to interact with someone due to skin tone.
To my cynical and generally people-hating brain it strikes me as the mindset of someone who thinks skin tone is somehow related to morality/rightness.
(idk maybe I'm reaching, and I'm not explaining it well, but my brain sees the line from AI-shills bitching about tolerance to white supremacy)
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Bad actors will always try to hijack "diversity" to force us to accept actual enemies into our camp.
"AI", as it exists now, is a tool of our enemies: they use it to enshrine bias into employment processes so it no longer requires a bigoted human in the loop. They use AI to devalue the work of writers, researchers, coders, artists & more. They use AI to automate decisions of who should be bombed, who should starve, & who should be erased/ignored/& excluded.
@artemis@dice.camp Diversity and "tolerance" are not principles in themselves, but a consequence of intellectual honesty as well as respecting people's basic dignity and rights.
And if diversity and tolerance conflict with the actual principles, the principles take priority.
We want a fair community and society, it being diverse and tolerant is more of a side effect of being fair to people than it is a strict goal in and of itself. -
They have to frame it as a diversity issue because they want to distract from the fact that it is a *consent* issue!
Not wanting to associate with Black people is bigotry, but not wanting to associate with AI-shills is just protecting your peace. These are not the goddamn same, & it's really sinister asking people to pretend they are.
It is weird to insist people should HAVE to interact with you, regardless of your behavior. It shows a lack of respect for people's agency & choice.
@artemis it's funny, i never saw the original posts by the slop peddlers in question because i blocked them, long ago because they are well known bad faith actors in slop boosterism
i blocked them the same way i blocked simonw for the same behavior, but this time it's different somehow
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Bad actors will always try to hijack "diversity" to force us to accept actual enemies into our camp.
"AI", as it exists now, is a tool of our enemies: they use it to enshrine bias into employment processes so it no longer requires a bigoted human in the loop. They use AI to devalue the work of writers, researchers, coders, artists & more. They use AI to automate decisions of who should be bombed, who should starve, & who should be erased/ignored/& excluded.
@artemis This has nothing to do with what you're actually saying, but my stupid brain chose Tommy Wiseau as a stand-in for a "bad actor", and just thinking of how poorly he'd try to do what you're saying made me chuckle.
