Ryan always has some interesting thoughts around the ethics of online communities, and this is no exception. There's a lot of great questions and thoughts in here around whether or not we should be striving for interconnectedness – with strong moderation tools – or looking to fundamentally wall off some areas of the web from other parts. I dislike that thought; I want the web to be open, and feel that it should be up to the individual to moderate their explorations, just like it works offline. But (arguably just like offline) that is easier for me to say from a position of privilege, so it's always good to read through some more nuanced takes. It helps that I also agree with Ryan's central call to "moderate people, not code" and agree that bridging services is a net positive, though 😅
On one of the core questions being discussed, but phrased in a way that I feel is accurate and also often overlooked:
Should there be one internet? Or multiple, sometimes separate internets?
On the core argument, e.g. "moderate people, not code":
Here’s one possible conclusion: Moderate people, not code. When you choose who to federate with or block or mute, don’t look at protocols, or networks, or software. Look at users, and communities, and their behavior. At the end of the day, those are probably what you really care about anyway.
On whether the ActivityPub plugin for WordPress causes context collapse:
Is [seeing a Mastodon comment appear on a WordPress blog] surprising? Is it a problematic instance of context collapse? Maybe! But why? The exact same thing happens between true, “native” fediverse servers. In both cases, the post and reply are public, and can be seen by anyone on the internet.
On protocols versus people:
Whether ActivityPub or ATProto or webmention, the underlying technical protocol a community uses to interact online is a poor way to judge who they are and whether you might like them.
Make those judgments for your communities, instance by instance, not by network or software. Those sledgehammers are too big and unweildy.
