wowana.me
website source
commit 3c753970c2e276fe81ccabd2098f40b1d7892265 parent 4fa33879554a003905a9b6ae2230080a49357a88 Author: opal hart <opal@wowana.me> Date: Fri, 12 Jul 2019 07:27:55 +0000 fediverse blog post + page Diffstat:
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diff --git a/out/blog/federated-social-networking.xht b/out/blog/federated-social-networking.xht @@ -0,0 +1,204 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en-GB"> + <head> + <title>federated social networking – wowana.me</title> + <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/opal.css"/> + <link href="/blog/feed.atom" type="application/atom+xml" rel="alternate" title="Blog Atom feed" /> + </head> + <body> + <div class="sidebar-holder"> + <header class="sidebar"> + <img class="avatar" src="/gravatar" alt="Libravatar"/> + <h1><a class="nolink" href="/">opal</a></h1> + <p class="subheader">wowaname</p> + <nav class="topnav"> + <ul> + <li><a href="/about.xht">about</a></li> + <li><a href="/blog/">blog</a></li> + <li><a href="/contact.xht">contact</a></li> + <li><a href="/donate.xht">donate</a></li> + <li><a href="/pgp.xht">PGP</a></li> + <li><a href="/files/">files</a></li> + <li><a href="/permalink.xht">permalink</a></li> + <li>content is <a href="https://creativecommons.org/share-your-work/public-domain/cc0">public domain</a> unless otherwise noted</li> + </ul> + </nav> + </header> + </div> + +<article class='main' id='federated-social-networking'> +<h1>federated social networking</h1> + +<time datetime='2019-07-12T07:10:27+0000' title='2019-07-12T07:10:27+0000'>2019 Jul 12</time> + +<p>like it or not, social networks are part of the Internet's evolution to +serve our non-topical communication needs, focusing on people more than +content, unlike newsgroups and forums. alas, while myspace and facebook +and twitter took off, they have proven to eventually fail (in myspace's +case) or become too big to care for their users. facebook and twitter +regularly take it upon themselves to curate content in an effort to +appease their advertisers, and perhaps secondarily to appease the +political opinions of their own staff members. personally, I've never +been a huge player in the social networking game, but twitter did catch +my eye a while ago for being a place for me to discover people, follow +content that is interesting to me, and of course, participate in +discussions with a bit of shitposting here and there. a few years back, +in 2015, I have noticed the effect of the above issues I mentioned, with +accounts I follow gradually being picked off by twitter's moderation +team, until finally in 2016 I simply <em>retweeted</em> someone's post and +received an account termination for it. twitter goes far and hard for +its advertisers, and because my retweet directly affected the reputation +of such a business partner (well, I can only guess they were partnered +if it came to this extreme), the platform didn't mind at all to +sacrifice me and a few others to ensure their reputation. I will not go +into additional detail with my incident specifically, because it is no +longer terribly relevant, but just note that there's a reason for +accounts to pop out of existence all the time on twitter, and it isn't +always because people are spamming others' mentions or sharing illegal +pictures.</p> + +<p>if that's enough convincing for you that we need a better social +networking platform to offset twitter, instagram, and the like; good +news, because there exists a microblogging-style social network that +goes beyond just one domain, just one company, just one set of policies. +<strong>meet the fediverse</strong>: the result of years of collaboration to provide +an open protocol and several software implementations, to solve the +issues inherent in conventional social platforms. I've personally been +hosting an instance (at <a href="https://anime.website/">anime.website</a> for a +bit over a year now, and I can confidently say it is a suitable twitter +replacement for me. my timeline doesn't feel empty, I see many +interesting and unadulterated discussions because people feel welcome to +exchange their personal beliefs, and I myself don't have to worry about +being deplatformed or holding my content hostage to a corporation who +doesn't give a shit about me.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>as good as the fediverse is, many misconceptions have floated around, +especially since the introduction of the Mastodon implementation of +fediverse software. while I don't particularly like Mastodon itself +(it's resource-heavy and hard to install, according to many people, and +it restricts users' freedom to configure instances to their personal +liking), this has no bearing on my opinion toward the project lead +himself, Eugen Rochko. his motives have been clear for a long time that +his goal isn't necessarily to promote a free (as in freedom) social +experience, but instead to offset other platforms that he claims +harbours <q>nazis</q>. what this means to the rest of us, is that he (on +behalf of Mastodon) spreads his idealised view of what the fediverse +should be, which in turn confuses many new people trying out the +platform for themselves. essentially, he has taken something that was +not his original idea, slapped his name on it, and tries to +retroactively mould the fediverse to his liking. this fact alone should +not deter anyone from using the fediverse, but it should serve to +prepare you for the inevitable drama that incurs from this.</p> + +<p>I have my own idealisation of the platform, but I know that not everyone +shares my opinions. since I have a history on twitter, some of the +features introduced in fediverse software make little sense to me. for +example, I am a vocal opponent of the <q>federated timeline</q> which +essentially serves as a dumping ground for all posts an instance +receives, whether or not you directly follow those users. many claim +it's an important discovery mechanism, but given my time on twitter, +it's apparent to me that full-text search, potentially a tagging system, +and other discovery methods such as retweeting (<q>repeating</q> or +<q>boosting</q> in fediverse nomenclature) are just as effective to find +accounts that may interest me. from experience, I have seen the +federated timeline cause more issues by attracting spam and trolls to my +comments; which have a far less likely chance of happening had I only +kept my exposure to my followers and to any participants in my threads.</p> + +<p>I also hold a controversial belief that per-post privacy settings are +beneficial to the network. the way they are currently implemented leaves +a lot to be desired, but I have made my twitter account private out of +necessity before, and I understand the desire to limit a profile's +exposure and allow a curated list of people who can view my content. the +per-post privacy adds flexibility to twitter's feature, making it so I +can make some or none of my posts completely private. I mention this +because it's another topic you may see discussed soon after involving +yourself in the fediverse.</p> + +<p>with all that said, I encourage you to try the fediverse out for +yourself if you can't get the twitter impulse out of you, or if you just +want to see what the buzz is about. plenty of people, plenty of +interests, plenty of beliefs, all talking to one another on a robust +platform, a platform not controlled by any one party. like E-mail, if +you disagree with how one server operates itself, you can easily pack up +and move to another server. nobody can <q>ban you from the fediverse</q> +(but this is not an invitation for you to test anyone's patience). +intelligent discussion, shitposting, image sharing, news, politics, +personal issues – the firehose of content, the lack of curation has been +a big reason for me to stick around, because it's always something new +every day.</p> + +<p>if you're keen to try it but don't know where to start out, I have taken +the time to write <a href="/fediverse.xht">a page dedicated to the fediverse</a>, +complete with a table of instances that gladly take in new users and are +transparent about their own moderation and federation policies. sadly, +mainly due to how Mastodon gained its popularity, we see a lot of +<q>instance blocklists</q> akin to the account blocklists on twitter, +which serve to prevent federation between instances that disagree with +one another's policies. while I admit, this is a useful tool to be able +to separate oneself from spam instances, for example; it has become a +much-abused feature, effectively censoring a lot of legitimate users and +content, and making the fediverse more difficult to understand for new +users. indeed, this is enough of a barrier to entry that many people +leave simply for all the drama and controversy these decisions foster. </p> + +<hr /> + +<p>I'd also like to share my personal code of etiquette, a set of standards +I hold myself to and expect from others who interact with me, simply +because it makes the most sense to me from my experiences with +microblogging. I model anime.website's rules after my own standards +while still giving people the freedom to be wrong. ;)</p> + +<p>I believe that microblogging (and in extension, the fediverse) should +predominantly be a <q>pull</q> medium rather than a <q>push</q> one, +meaning I should be able to control what I see by following and +unfollowing people. thus, many issues should be solvable simply by +unfollowing anyone with whom I no longer want to interact. should +outliers exist, muting and blocking are suitable to get persistent +people out of my mentions. this <q>pull what I want</q> mentality +contributes to my opinion that the federated timeline is unnecessary. +but, others (for example on anime.website) find the federated timeline +useful, but I treat it as an unmoderated, uncurated feed, so if users +have any issues with what they see on the federated timeline, I will +simply tell them to steer clear of it to avoid further issues.</p> + +<p>the above attitude allows people to talk about what they want, and it +allows others to expose themselves to that content voluntarily. this +eliminates a need for most moderation and allows my rules to be +succinct: I do not allow spam or illegal content, or anything that could +jeopardise the service for the rest of my users and myself. users may +join my instance even if I disagree with them; I simply will not follow +their content. this makes my life <em>much</em> easier as I can be a user first +and a moderator second.</p> + +<p>while trigger warnings (dubbed <q>content warnings</q> by the Mastodon +crowd) have been introduced into the fediverse, I personally only see +them as a hinderance and an antifeature. again, on twitter I have never +had a problem as long as I follow the right people. I understand that I +may not agree with all content presented to me, but I'd like to think +I'm able to ignore what I don't like. content warnings operate far too +much on trust; I have to entrust that everyone will share my idea of +objectionable content, and that is simply an unrealistic goal. and while +some people find such warnings useful, they impact those who see them as +a distraction, as out of place, as an additional step to click through +someone's content. while much software (including Pleroma) allows these +warnings to be expanded by default, and people are working on new +potential solutions to the issue, I believe it will always be an +imperfect addition in fediverse software.</p> + +<p>and lastly, should you decide you want to follow me on the fediverse +once you've made your own account and gotten comfortable, be aware that +I post about a lot of things and publish all types of images and media. +if you find anything objectionable to the point you think less of me, I +ask that you simply do not follow me, rather than trying to suggest that +I change what I say. I made my own instance to <em>get away from</em> being +told what I can and cannot say; I understand my actions and words have +consequences but chances are I won't be receptive to any content +policing.</p> +</article> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/out/blog/feed.atom b/out/blog/feed.atom @@ -4,7 +4,80 @@ <link href="/blog/" rel="alternate"/> <link href="/blog/feed.atom" rel="self"/> <id>/blog/</id> - <updated>2019-06-05T04:16:55+0000</updated> + <updated>2019-07-12T07:10:43+0000</updated> + <entry> + <title>a musing on sharing and receiving opinions</title> + <link href="/blog/a-musing-on-sharing-and-receiving-opinions.xht" rel="alternate" type="application/xhtml+xml" /> + <id>/blog/a-musing-on-sharing-and-receiving-opinions.xht</id> + <published>2018-09-24T11:40:36+0000</published> + <updated>2018-09-24T11:40:36+0000</updated> + <author><name>opal hart</name></author> + <content type="xhtml"> + <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> +<p>from <a href="https://anime.website/notice/1098692">my fediverse post</a>:</p> + +<blockquote> + <p>am i perfect? no, far from it. i go out of my way to be an edgy fuck more than enough, i am quick to resort to namecalling, but overall i feel like i'm a reasonable person if you can look past that. while some people use edginess/insults to carry out their "race war now" politics, i simply use it because i'm used to it, i don't take offence to it when it's used against me, and i believe (to a fault) in "treat others how you want to be treated."</p> + +<p>except sometimes i put my edginess aside for a brief bit, and i try to discuss something maturely, without the intent to provoke. and that isn't even well-received as much as it should be, for whatever reason. people choose to be ignorant to differing opinions rather than to be openly sceptical, rather than to judge whether a new idea is acceptable, needs additional review/argument, or can be discarded safely (and ideally in an adultlike manner that doesn't end up accusing people of stuff simply because they believe in something).</p> + +<p>psychologists have a term for silencing opposition: it's a maladaptive coping response to stressors, meaning it is unhealthy in the long run and only causes more problems. the adage "you can run but you can't hide" is suitable here; you can temporarily silence dissenting opinions (or ruin your life trying to permanently silence all sources of it) instead of just taking those opinions as they are: opinions. nobody's forcing you to believe anything, and the people who do use force to spread their opinions are to be looked down upon. most of us are simply exposing others to new ideas based off our own experiences and knowledge; we're doing it in an attempt to help out but we don't always show our intent straight up, because we're naïve and believe that everyone is as open as us to new ideas and opinions.</p> + +<p>like i said, i'm flawed as fuck, but i don't believe my flaws and edginess has a profound impact on my ability to diffuse my opinions and knowledge to others out there</p> +</blockquote> + </div> + </content> + </entry> + <entry> + <title>a new era for Hidden Answers</title> + <link href="/blog/a-new-era-for-hidden-answers.xht" rel="alternate" type="application/xhtml+xml" /> + <id>/blog/a-new-era-for-hidden-answers.xht</id> + <published>2018-04-13T00:55:08+0000</published> + <updated>2019-05-11T03:38:03+0000</updated> + <author><name>opal hart</name></author> + <content type="xhtml"> + <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> +<p>this post is specifically for users of the Hidden Answers website. if you don't know what it is, this probably isn't worth reading. still, curious people who want to help out with the website are welcome to <a href="/contact.xht">contact me</a>; any help is appreciated.</p> + +<p>for those who aren't on Hidden Answers: it's a hidden service question-answer website using the <a href="http://question2answer.org/">Question2Answer</a> software, and in similar format to Stack Exchange. it's available <a href="http://answerstedhctbek.onion/">on tor</a> and <a href="http://hiddenanswers.i2p/">on i2p</a> and currently is multilingual for English, Spanish, Portuguese, and Russian speakers.</p> + +<p>at the time of writing, new user registration is closed for a multitude of reasons. I have hopes of re-enabling registration soon, after we have fixed some long-lasting issues with the site.</p> + +<p>as users have inevitably noticed by now, there are a few issues with the site, ranging from the community to the software. the past month, the MySQL database for Hidden Answers has experienced unexplained corruption, and last week the server's disk space was completely consumed by MySQL binary logs, causing the site to be totally inaccessible. (seriously MySQL/MariaDB, why keep all logs infinitely by default? and why did nobody tell me about this before I went into web hosting?)</p> + +<p>over the past year pinochet, the website founder, has come in and out of the scene for being responsible for the site. the grunt of the website's work has been handled by both me and the dedicated moderation team. but even we aren't enough to keep the website running optimally. not only that, but mods come and go, and some of them understandably become tired of dealing with the site. and we have no idea what's going on with the multilingual sites (Portuguese HA was overrun by scammers at some point, for example). communication between all the moderators is barely established, and this causes additional strain on relationships and on the state of the website.</p> + +<p>pinochet is now long gone and only the mods and I are left to run the site. I am officially taking over the site; this is effective at the time of writing this post. that means you should write down my PGP key and you should write down my contact information (it's best to contact me over E-mail and XMPP, and <em>please</em> tell me who you are and why you wish to contact me, or I'll likely ignore you. saying <q>hi</q> isn't enough to get my attention because I deal with a lot of people and things daily).</p> + +<p>I am going to make a few assertions. before, I have made these as suggestions, but they have clearly not been enough to cause any notable change in the site. from this point on:</p> + +<ul> +<li>I <em>need</em> moderators, editors, and anyone else with an official Hidden Answers role to post their E-mail and/or XMPP address on their profile, and I <em>need</em> them to have a copy-pastable PGP key or fingerprint. no exceptions. we need to improve communication, especially since the PM system has been disabled (and more on that in the next point).</li> +<li>PMs are <em>indefinitely</em> disabled. they're a venue of abuse. they're unencrypted. I have had to look into suspicious accounts per moderator request, and each suspicious account I looked into, I found shitloads of messages breaking the website's rules. if you need to contact someone, do it off-site. do it on their public wall. PMs are useless for a question-answer site such as ours.</li> +<li>I will make my source code changes to Question2Answer available on my git. I am aware this will make the website easier to clone, but I believe this isn't an issue, since people already try to set up scam sites targeting HA users anyway. the benefit of open software development outweighs the risks, in my view.</li> +<li>we <em>need</em> a defined process to choose official roles. we need more concise roles too: +<ul> +<li>super administrator: the website owner (me, now). I can add new admins and mods, change site settings, and be the <q>last say</q> of what goes on.</li> +<li>administrator: trusted people who represent Hidden Answers probably more than I do, lift a lot of the site's weight, and can maintain relations with mods and users. I'm appointing v0h20 and Fox to this role because they have done a shitload for this site and I trust their judgment for adding new mods.</li> +<li>global moderator. their main roles will be to oversee editors and to block rulebreaking users.</li> +<li>global editor. responsible for backtracking through the older questions (at least until they're all cleaned up eventually) and recategorising, editing, closing, and selecting answers as necessary. does this for new questions and answers as well.</li> +<li>category editors. responsible for cleaning up posts under their own category and can be seen as a category expert as well.</li> +<li>emeritus. just a status for ex-mods and -admins that have stepped down from their roles voluntarily (or were inactive).</li> +<li>technical contributor. I promised a role for anyone willing to help with the code. these people contribute to Q2A updates, debugging, and security penetration testing.</li> +</ul></li> +<li>we <em>need</em> administration transparecy. moderation decisions need to be made public so we're all on the same page, and so users can criticise us if we do something wrong.</li> +<li>we <em>need</em> concrete rules and ways to deal with offences. so far, it's just been play-by-ear.</li> +<li>additional focus needs to be placed on the other HA languages.</li> +<li>additional focus also needs to be placed on supplementary shit like a showcase of frequently-asked questions, to make it easier for newbies to search.</li> +<li>anything else needs to be discussed on HA, in front of everyone, making use of the poll system I installed recently. that way, we have a more democratic approach to the site.</li> +</ul> + +<p>I'm busy with IRL shit (school semester is wrapping up for instance, I have a lot of studying to do and projects to wrap up), so anything that's broken will stay broken until I get around to it or until someone is able to help me with it. be reminded that since this is a hidden service website, I have trust issues and if you contact me anonymously, asking to help, I'll probably assume you're a malicious entity. so <em>please</em> tell me anything that can help me establish who you are. I'm not all that anonymous so I don't think I'm being hypocritical for asking you for some additional information about yourself. if you disagree with my approach, don't contact me.</p> + +<p>any issues or questions or whatever you have about any of this, please <a href="/contact.xht">contact me directly</a> so I can respond to you sooner. I check E-mail and XMPP more often than I check Hidden Answers, and I prefer those methods of contact because they are much easier for me to keep track of shit. pinochet/oqypa are out of the picture; don't use those E-mail addresses because you won't get a response.</p> + </div> + </content> + </entry> <entry> <title>acme-client (letskencrypt) dns-01 how-to</title> <link href="/blog/acme-client-letskencrypt-dns-01-how-to.xht" rel="alternate" type="application/xhtml+xml" /> @@ -149,6 +222,255 @@ mechanism.</p> </content> </entry> <entry> + <title>Chen Hosting goals and difficulties</title> + <link href="/blog/chen-hosting-goals-and-difficulties.xht" rel="alternate" type="application/xhtml+xml" /> + <id>/blog/chen-hosting-goals-and-difficulties.xht</id> + <published>2018-03-05T04:29:31+0000</published> + <updated>2018-03-05T04:29:31+0000</updated> + <author><name>opal hart</name></author> + <content type="xhtml"> + <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> +<p>since late 2015, I have hosted the website Hidden Answers <a href="http://answerstedhctbek.onion/">accessible via tor</a> <a href="http://hiddenanswers.i2p/">and i2p</a>. the Hidden Answers administrator was upset by the constant downtime of Freedom Hosting 2 and was seeking another host. shortly after I decided to offer my hosting to anyone interested, thus starting <a href="http://chchchiasaeljqgs.onion/">Chen Hosting</a> (available on i2p as <a href="http://chen.i2p/">chen.i2p</a>). I wanted to do this both to learn more about web hosting, and to earn some cash while in college. two years in hidden service web hosting has given me plenty of time and experience that I can share with others.</p> + +<p>to start off with the upsides, I have definitely learned a fair share about shared web hosting, software, and configuring everything for security, performance, and ease of deployment. I have been able to perform unorthodox installs of popular web software such as WordPress, Question2Answer, and MediaWiki (one shared install for all users). I have partitioned off access between users and services as best I could without the use of fully-virtualised containers, by way of hardened chroots (thanks to grsecurity), process separation (a php-fpm pool per user), and proper file permissions. I have made sure that the real server IP address could not be leaked under any circumstance. on top of this, I have met a handful of people whom I would consider to be good friends by now.</p> + +<p>on the flip side, a lot of frustration has come out of web hosting, especially for the niche market in Tor and I2P. obviously, I have to deal with a lot of scammers, trolls, and difficult people. I cannot count with my fingers alone how many times someone has requested a website and never ended up paying for or using it; most people simply run out of patience, apparently. this makes it very difficult to find the motivation to improve my services for current and new customers; it seems like nobody cares enough. in fact, as of the time I am writing this blog post, I have this on the Chen Hosting website:</p> + +<blockquote> + <p>Chen Hosting is causing me more of a headache than I can handle right now. I'm busy with school and personal projects (and soon, hopefully a part- or full-time job in IT) and the requests for websites I get are rarely serious. People abandon their sites and I'm not making any real money off it.</p> +</blockquote> + +<p>other issues I have come across with hosting: the Tor network itself. most of the traffic I receive for Hidden Answers is automated, and some of the automated traffic is very malicious in nature, causing the server's load to spike and performance to drop, at times causing the whole server to be unavailable for legitimate users. on top of that, I have witnessed Tor become unresponsive or crash for unexplainable reasons; I can only assume these are other attacks on the network or on my onion sites. I have tried to find suitable log-monitoring solutions, but this is an exasperating process and I finally just hacked everything together enough that it would <q>just work,</q> not too concerned with whether it was at optimal performance. also, while I have always preferred I2P over Tor for its hidden service support, it doesn't come without its own share of issues: the main implementation is in Java, and the C++ implementation still has a way to go before it is feasible for a live production server.</p> + +<p>if I had an interested customer base, I would be able to find the motivation to improve my services to support all major CMSes and web softwares, to spawn a robust ticket and newsletter system, to expand to clearnet hosting, to build a real community and set a precedent for anonymous and secure hosting. sadly, my efforts are now going unnoticed, and it sort of disheartens me that something I spent this much time on has not proven itself to be too useful. I would love to continue putting effort into <q>the best</q> professional shared hosting setup, with proper log monitoring and statistics, tight engagement with customer base and surrounding Tor/I2P community, contribution to free software, and embodiment of free speech. maybe I could have placed effort into decentralised solutions as well, in order for people not to rely on a single entity -- such as myself -- for their web hosting. but apparently I will not end up doing this because there is no demand for it. people are perfectly content with half-assed solutions that we have now, and I cannot for the life of me understand why.</p> + </div> + </content> + </entry> + <entry> + <title>federated social networking</title> + <link href="/blog/federated-social-networking.xht" rel="alternate" type="application/xhtml+xml" /> + <id>/blog/federated-social-networking.xht</id> + <published>2019-07-12T07:10:27+0000</published> + <updated>2019-07-12T07:10:27+0000</updated> + <author><name>opal hart</name></author> + <content type="xhtml"> + <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> +<p>like it or not, social networks are part of the Internet's evolution to +serve our non-topical communication needs, focusing on people more than +content, unlike newsgroups and forums. alas, while myspace and facebook +and twitter took off, they have proven to eventually fail (in myspace's +case) or become too big to care for their users. facebook and twitter +regularly take it upon themselves to curate content in an effort to +appease their advertisers, and perhaps secondarily to appease the +political opinions of their own staff members. personally, I've never +been a huge player in the social networking game, but twitter did catch +my eye a while ago for being a place for me to discover people, follow +content that is interesting to me, and of course, participate in +discussions with a bit of shitposting here and there. a few years back, +in 2015, I have noticed the effect of the above issues I mentioned, with +accounts I follow gradually being picked off by twitter's moderation +team, until finally in 2016 I simply <em>retweeted</em> someone's post and +received an account termination for it. twitter goes far and hard for +its advertisers, and because my retweet directly affected the reputation +of such a business partner (well, I can only guess they were partnered +if it came to this extreme), the platform didn't mind at all to +sacrifice me and a few others to ensure their reputation. I will not go +into additional detail with my incident specifically, because it is no +longer terribly relevant, but just note that there's a reason for +accounts to pop out of existence all the time on twitter, and it isn't +always because people are spamming others' mentions or sharing illegal +pictures.</p> + +<p>if that's enough convincing for you that we need a better social +networking platform to offset twitter, instagram, and the like; good +news, because there exists a microblogging-style social network that +goes beyond just one domain, just one company, just one set of policies. +<strong>meet the fediverse</strong>: the result of years of collaboration to provide +an open protocol and several software implementations, to solve the +issues inherent in conventional social platforms. I've personally been +hosting an instance (at <a href="https://anime.website/">anime.website</a> for a +bit over a year now, and I can confidently say it is a suitable twitter +replacement for me. my timeline doesn't feel empty, I see many +interesting and unadulterated discussions because people feel welcome to +exchange their personal beliefs, and I myself don't have to worry about +being deplatformed or holding my content hostage to a corporation who +doesn't give a shit about me.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>as good as the fediverse is, many misconceptions have floated around, +especially since the introduction of the Mastodon implementation of +fediverse software. while I don't particularly like Mastodon itself +(it's resource-heavy and hard to install, according to many people, and +it restricts users' freedom to configure instances to their personal +liking), this has no bearing on my opinion toward the project lead +himself, Eugen Rochko. his motives have been clear for a long time that +his goal isn't necessarily to promote a free (as in freedom) social +experience, but instead to offset other platforms that he claims +harbours <q>nazis</q>. what this means to the rest of us, is that he (on +behalf of Mastodon) spreads his idealised view of what the fediverse +should be, which in turn confuses many new people trying out the +platform for themselves. essentially, he has taken something that was +not his original idea, slapped his name on it, and tries to +retroactively mould the fediverse to his liking. this fact alone should +not deter anyone from using the fediverse, but it should serve to +prepare you for the inevitable drama that incurs from this.</p> + +<p>I have my own idealisation of the platform, but I know that not everyone +shares my opinions. since I have a history on twitter, some of the +features introduced in fediverse software make little sense to me. for +example, I am a vocal opponent of the <q>federated timeline</q> which +essentially serves as a dumping ground for all posts an instance +receives, whether or not you directly follow those users. many claim +it's an important discovery mechanism, but given my time on twitter, +it's apparent to me that full-text search, potentially a tagging system, +and other discovery methods such as retweeting (<q>repeating</q> or +<q>boosting</q> in fediverse nomenclature) are just as effective to find +accounts that may interest me. from experience, I have seen the +federated timeline cause more issues by attracting spam and trolls to my +comments; which have a far less likely chance of happening had I only +kept my exposure to my followers and to any participants in my threads.</p> + +<p>I also hold a controversial belief that per-post privacy settings are +beneficial to the network. the way they are currently implemented leaves +a lot to be desired, but I have made my twitter account private out of +necessity before, and I understand the desire to limit a profile's +exposure and allow a curated list of people who can view my content. the +per-post privacy adds flexibility to twitter's feature, making it so I +can make some or none of my posts completely private. I mention this +because it's another topic you may see discussed soon after involving +yourself in the fediverse.</p> + +<p>with all that said, I encourage you to try the fediverse out for +yourself if you can't get the twitter impulse out of you, or if you just +want to see what the buzz is about. plenty of people, plenty of +interests, plenty of beliefs, all talking to one another on a robust +platform, a platform not controlled by any one party. like E-mail, if +you disagree with how one server operates itself, you can easily pack up +and move to another server. nobody can <q>ban you from the fediverse</q> +(but this is not an invitation for you to test anyone's patience). +intelligent discussion, shitposting, image sharing, news, politics, +personal issues – the firehose of content, the lack of curation has been +a big reason for me to stick around, because it's always something new +every day.</p> + +<p>if you're keen to try it but don't know where to start out, I have taken +the time to write <a href="/fediverse.xht">a page dedicated to the fediverse</a>, +complete with a table of instances that gladly take in new users and are +transparent about their own moderation and federation policies. sadly, +mainly due to how Mastodon gained its popularity, we see a lot of +<q>instance blocklists</q> akin to the account blocklists on twitter, +which serve to prevent federation between instances that disagree with +one another's policies. while I admit, this is a useful tool to be able +to separate oneself from spam instances, for example; it has become a +much-abused feature, effectively censoring a lot of legitimate users and +content, and making the fediverse more difficult to understand for new +users. indeed, this is enough of a barrier to entry that many people +leave simply for all the drama and controversy these decisions foster. </p> + +<hr /> + +<p>I'd also like to share my personal code of etiquette, a set of standards +I hold myself to and expect from others who interact with me, simply +because it makes the most sense to me from my experiences with +microblogging. I model anime.website's rules after my own standards +while still giving people the freedom to be wrong. ;)</p> + +<p>I believe that microblogging (and in extension, the fediverse) should +predominantly be a <q>pull</q> medium rather than a <q>push</q> one, +meaning I should be able to control what I see by following and +unfollowing people. thus, many issues should be solvable simply by +unfollowing anyone with whom I no longer want to interact. should +outliers exist, muting and blocking are suitable to get persistent +people out of my mentions. this <q>pull what I want</q> mentality +contributes to my opinion that the federated timeline is unnecessary. +but, others (for example on anime.website) find the federated timeline +useful, but I treat it as an unmoderated, uncurated feed, so if users +have any issues with what they see on the federated timeline, I will +simply tell them to steer clear of it to avoid further issues.</p> + +<p>the above attitude allows people to talk about what they want, and it +allows others to expose themselves to that content voluntarily. this +eliminates a need for most moderation and allows my rules to be +succinct: I do not allow spam or illegal content, or anything that could +jeopardise the service for the rest of my users and myself. users may +join my instance even if I disagree with them; I simply will not follow +their content. this makes my life <em>much</em> easier as I can be a user first +and a moderator second.</p> + +<p>while trigger warnings (dubbed <q>content warnings</q> by the Mastodon +crowd) have been introduced into the fediverse, I personally only see +them as a hinderance and an antifeature. again, on twitter I have never +had a problem as long as I follow the right people. I understand that I +may not agree with all content presented to me, but I'd like to think +I'm able to ignore what I don't like. content warnings operate far too +much on trust; I have to entrust that everyone will share my idea of +objectionable content, and that is simply an unrealistic goal. and while +some people find such warnings useful, they impact those who see them as +a distraction, as out of place, as an additional step to click through +someone's content. while much software (including Pleroma) allows these +warnings to be expanded by default, and people are working on new +potential solutions to the issue, I believe it will always be an +imperfect addition in fediverse software.</p> + +<p>and lastly, should you decide you want to follow me on the fediverse +once you've made your own account and gotten comfortable, be aware that +I post about a lot of things and publish all types of images and media. +if you find anything objectionable to the point you think less of me, I +ask that you simply do not follow me, rather than trying to suggest that +I change what I say. I made my own instance to <em>get away from</em> being +told what I can and cannot say; I understand my actions and words have +consequences but chances are I won't be receptive to any content +policing.</p> + </div> + </content> + </entry> + <entry> + <title>"Learning how to learn"</title> + <link href="/blog/learning-how-to-learn.xht" rel="alternate" type="application/xhtml+xml" /> + <id>/blog/learning-how-to-learn.xht</id> + <published>2018-01-23T18:42:19+0000</published> + <updated>2018-01-23T18:42:19+0000</updated> + <author><name>opal hart</name></author> + <content type="xhtml"> + <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> +<p>here's a verbatim essay I wrote in response to the common misconceptions held by many Tor users and <q>privacy freaks</q>:</p> + +<blockquote> + <p>You probably see advice published everywhere – guides and tutorials and lessons. People who claim to have your best interests at heart. Many people do, but at the same time many people don't. And even the people who do can make mistakes. If you don't do so already, you need to learn how to think like a scientist: always sceptical, but never driven by fear. Being able to think for yourself, weighing all information you come across for validity, is a necessary asset that people seem to overlook in their quest toward activism.</p> + +<h2>Know what you're using</h2> + +<p>You installed Tor because it's nice and secure. Do you know exactly how it works though? Do you know what happens if you use it wrong?</p> + +<p>I see these technologies get thrown around all the time in privacy-related conversation: Tor, VPN, PGP, Tails. And for the aspiring hackers, Kali comes up quite often. All these things are fine, but people discover them more out of haphazard curiosity than anything. They know what these things are, they know that others tell them to use these things, but they don't often know why people talk about them so much.</p> + +<p>Read up about these subjects. You don't have to do an entire research debacle on them, but you should be able to summarise to yourself what everything does and why it works. Wikipedia is a great resource; it's concise and you can always branch out to learn more if you're interested. Once you know exactly what these technologies were made for, you will be able to utilise them intelligently.</p> + +<p>I can summarise up a few common misconceptions: Tor's primary purpose is to provide a secure proxy to the Web, while I2P's is to provide an anonymous network that replaces the Web. A commercial VPN is for privacy, while Tor is for anonymity (this article explains their differences nicely).</p> + +<p>Tails and Kali are simply customised Linux distributions (these two happen to be Debian-based), meaning that I could take Arch Linux (or your favourite distro) and replicate the functionality of either, after I take the time to configure it to my liking. The reason people use Tails, Whonix, or Kali is because they trust the developers to make a system that meets their needs, and they are incapable or unwilling to configure their own system. Ultimately, the choice of operating system is up to you; there is no "best" operating system, so try various systems out until you find your match.</p> + +<h2>Be sceptical</h2> + +<p>Don't believe everything you see. Professionals make mistakes, amateurs make mistakes, you and I make mistakes. Even with these guides, you should use your own judgment and filter out what seems logical. I wrote this in hopes that I was making sense, in hopes that my logic was sound and worth reading. But, I can always miss important things, and I'm here to learn just as everyone else is. After reading anything, you should cross-reference with other information if you're unsure about certain points, and ultimately you should test the information against your own knowledge to see if it fits in with what you believe.</p> + +<p>Knowledge evolves; people go to sleep believing in one cause, only to wake up believing in something else. The best any of us can do is follow what our heart says, keep our wits about us, and hope that our current beliefs will lead us on a better path.</p> + +<h2>Lead effectively</h2> + +<p>A good leader shows power by being motivated and experienced, not by being deceptive and forceful. You gain followers by relating with them, by sharing common core values, and by educating them. People should follow you because it is their decision to do so, because they actually wish to listen to you. If someone leaves you, do not try to pull them back; it only means that they felt your group was not the best fit in terms of ideals, goals, or methods. If everyone leaves you, you may want to ask why and adjust your actions based on the response. Leaders are people too, and they're bound to make mistakes, but a good leader (and a well-formed group) can recover from these mistakes quickly and easily.</p> + +<p>With that said, leadership is bound to change. It's natural, it's seamless (in a mature group, people just know who's "in charge" simply by the way they present themselves in the group), and it fosters new ideas and a different way of approaching issues. When starting a group, don't worry about who's head; that will come naturally and by consensus. Just focus on what you, as a group, need to do, and take everyone's opinions and suggestions into account. There should be an equal level of trust placed on all group members, and if the group simply cannot trust someone then it should make a decision on whether removing the person from the group is the best move. Feelings may be hurt, but a good group is resilient to this sort of friction. The group will carry on its business and wait for the conflict to pass.</p> + +<p>Most importantly, never trust someone solely because they are a figurehead. There is a strong difference between a figurehead and a true leader, and more often than not, people will grow to oppose a figurehead once they begin learning the truth about him. A figurehead is usually defaulted into power – either by status or by money or heritage. In contrast, a leader starts out as an equal and is brought into high esteem by his peers. Both leaders and figureheads are influential, but figureheads will hardly have your best interests at heart. Figureheads will do what they need to retain power, and they will trick others into believing whatever they have to say. They rely on the power of emotion in order to convince others that certain views are correct. And once they have a following, they can dispatch whatever lies they wish, knowing that their followers will eagerly eat it up.</p> + +<p>If you think this part sounds a bit overreactionary, I apologise, but I have seen this cult-like pattern in quite a few groups, namely the social justice movement. Everyone in the movement is bound together by a common emotional appeal: they are all minorities (real or imagined) and they seek safety in their circle by rejecting outsiders and playing the role of a victim. This is a toxic, spiraling attitude that only strengthens the power of the group, and the worst part is, people who seek acceptance see this movement and think they are doing the "right thing" by promoting minorities. So, they join in, finally feeling a sense of acceptance, and they learn from others in the movement that the patriarchy is the cause of all suffering in the world. A logical person would dismiss this claim and assign the blame to real issues (sexism and racism are issues, but not in the ways that the social justice movement claims), but once you have given someone hope and reassurance, you can make them believe whatever you wish.</p> +</blockquote> + </div> + </content> + </entry> + <entry> <title>my (and your) PGP habits could be better</title> <link href="/blog/my-and-your-pgp-habits-could-be-better.xht" rel="alternate" type="application/xhtml+xml" /> <id>/blog/my-and-your-pgp-habits-could-be-better.xht</id> @@ -362,149 +684,6 @@ mechanism.</p> </content> </entry> <entry> - <title>a musing on sharing and receiving opinions</title> - <link href="/blog/a-musing-on-sharing-and-receiving-opinions.xht" rel="alternate" type="application/xhtml+xml" /> - <id>/blog/a-musing-on-sharing-and-receiving-opinions.xht</id> - <published>2018-09-24T11:40:36+0000</published> - <updated>2018-09-24T11:40:36+0000</updated> - <author><name>opal hart</name></author> - <content type="xhtml"> - <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> -<p>from <a href="https://anime.website/notice/1098692">my fediverse post</a>:</p> - -<blockquote> - <p>am i perfect? no, far from it. i go out of my way to be an edgy fuck more than enough, i am quick to resort to namecalling, but overall i feel like i'm a reasonable person if you can look past that. while some people use edginess/insults to carry out their "race war now" politics, i simply use it because i'm used to it, i don't take offence to it when it's used against me, and i believe (to a fault) in "treat others how you want to be treated."</p> - -<p>except sometimes i put my edginess aside for a brief bit, and i try to discuss something maturely, without the intent to provoke. and that isn't even well-received as much as it should be, for whatever reason. people choose to be ignorant to differing opinions rather than to be openly sceptical, rather than to judge whether a new idea is acceptable, needs additional review/argument, or can be discarded safely (and ideally in an adultlike manner that doesn't end up accusing people of stuff simply because they believe in something).</p> - -<p>psychologists have a term for silencing opposition: it's a maladaptive coping response to stressors, meaning it is unhealthy in the long run and only causes more problems. the adage "you can run but you can't hide" is suitable here; you can temporarily silence dissenting opinions (or ruin your life trying to permanently silence all sources of it) instead of just taking those opinions as they are: opinions. nobody's forcing you to believe anything, and the people who do use force to spread their opinions are to be looked down upon. most of us are simply exposing others to new ideas based off our own experiences and knowledge; we're doing it in an attempt to help out but we don't always show our intent straight up, because we're naïve and believe that everyone is as open as us to new ideas and opinions.</p> - -<p>like i said, i'm flawed as fuck, but i don't believe my flaws and edginess has a profound impact on my ability to diffuse my opinions and knowledge to others out there</p> -</blockquote> - </div> - </content> - </entry> - <entry> - <title>a new era for Hidden Answers</title> - <link href="/blog/a-new-era-for-hidden-answers.xht" rel="alternate" type="application/xhtml+xml" /> - <id>/blog/a-new-era-for-hidden-answers.xht</id> - <published>2018-04-13T00:55:08+0000</published> - <updated>2019-05-11T03:38:03+0000</updated> - <author><name>opal hart</name></author> - <content type="xhtml"> - <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> -<p>this post is specifically for users of the Hidden Answers website. if you don't know what it is, this probably isn't worth reading. still, curious people who want to help out with the website are welcome to <a href="/contact.xht">contact me</a>; any help is appreciated.</p> - -<p>for those who aren't on Hidden Answers: it's a hidden service question-answer website using the <a href="http://question2answer.org/">Question2Answer</a> software, and in similar format to Stack Exchange. it's available <a href="http://answerstedhctbek.onion/">on tor</a> and <a href="http://hiddenanswers.i2p/">on i2p</a> and currently is multilingual for English, Spanish, Portuguese, and Russian speakers.</p> - -<p>at the time of writing, new user registration is closed for a multitude of reasons. I have hopes of re-enabling registration soon, after we have fixed some long-lasting issues with the site.</p> - -<p>as users have inevitably noticed by now, there are a few issues with the site, ranging from the community to the software. the past month, the MySQL database for Hidden Answers has experienced unexplained corruption, and last week the server's disk space was completely consumed by MySQL binary logs, causing the site to be totally inaccessible. (seriously MySQL/MariaDB, why keep all logs infinitely by default? and why did nobody tell me about this before I went into web hosting?)</p> - -<p>over the past year pinochet, the website founder, has come in and out of the scene for being responsible for the site. the grunt of the website's work has been handled by both me and the dedicated moderation team. but even we aren't enough to keep the website running optimally. not only that, but mods come and go, and some of them understandably become tired of dealing with the site. and we have no idea what's going on with the multilingual sites (Portuguese HA was overrun by scammers at some point, for example). communication between all the moderators is barely established, and this causes additional strain on relationships and on the state of the website.</p> - -<p>pinochet is now long gone and only the mods and I are left to run the site. I am officially taking over the site; this is effective at the time of writing this post. that means you should write down my PGP key and you should write down my contact information (it's best to contact me over E-mail and XMPP, and <em>please</em> tell me who you are and why you wish to contact me, or I'll likely ignore you. saying <q>hi</q> isn't enough to get my attention because I deal with a lot of people and things daily).</p> - -<p>I am going to make a few assertions. before, I have made these as suggestions, but they have clearly not been enough to cause any notable change in the site. from this point on:</p> - -<ul> -<li>I <em>need</em> moderators, editors, and anyone else with an official Hidden Answers role to post their E-mail and/or XMPP address on their profile, and I <em>need</em> them to have a copy-pastable PGP key or fingerprint. no exceptions. we need to improve communication, especially since the PM system has been disabled (and more on that in the next point).</li> -<li>PMs are <em>indefinitely</em> disabled. they're a venue of abuse. they're unencrypted. I have had to look into suspicious accounts per moderator request, and each suspicious account I looked into, I found shitloads of messages breaking the website's rules. if you need to contact someone, do it off-site. do it on their public wall. PMs are useless for a question-answer site such as ours.</li> -<li>I will make my source code changes to Question2Answer available on my git. I am aware this will make the website easier to clone, but I believe this isn't an issue, since people already try to set up scam sites targeting HA users anyway. the benefit of open software development outweighs the risks, in my view.</li> -<li>we <em>need</em> a defined process to choose official roles. we need more concise roles too: -<ul> -<li>super administrator: the website owner (me, now). I can add new admins and mods, change site settings, and be the <q>last say</q> of what goes on.</li> -<li>administrator: trusted people who represent Hidden Answers probably more than I do, lift a lot of the site's weight, and can maintain relations with mods and users. I'm appointing v0h20 and Fox to this role because they have done a shitload for this site and I trust their judgment for adding new mods.</li> -<li>global moderator. their main roles will be to oversee editors and to block rulebreaking users.</li> -<li>global editor. responsible for backtracking through the older questions (at least until they're all cleaned up eventually) and recategorising, editing, closing, and selecting answers as necessary. does this for new questions and answers as well.</li> -<li>category editors. responsible for cleaning up posts under their own category and can be seen as a category expert as well.</li> -<li>emeritus. just a status for ex-mods and -admins that have stepped down from their roles voluntarily (or were inactive).</li> -<li>technical contributor. I promised a role for anyone willing to help with the code. these people contribute to Q2A updates, debugging, and security penetration testing.</li> -</ul></li> -<li>we <em>need</em> administration transparecy. moderation decisions need to be made public so we're all on the same page, and so users can criticise us if we do something wrong.</li> -<li>we <em>need</em> concrete rules and ways to deal with offences. so far, it's just been play-by-ear.</li> -<li>additional focus needs to be placed on the other HA languages.</li> -<li>additional focus also needs to be placed on supplementary shit like a showcase of frequently-asked questions, to make it easier for newbies to search.</li> -<li>anything else needs to be discussed on HA, in front of everyone, making use of the poll system I installed recently. that way, we have a more democratic approach to the site.</li> -</ul> - -<p>I'm busy with IRL shit (school semester is wrapping up for instance, I have a lot of studying to do and projects to wrap up), so anything that's broken will stay broken until I get around to it or until someone is able to help me with it. be reminded that since this is a hidden service website, I have trust issues and if you contact me anonymously, asking to help, I'll probably assume you're a malicious entity. so <em>please</em> tell me anything that can help me establish who you are. I'm not all that anonymous so I don't think I'm being hypocritical for asking you for some additional information about yourself. if you disagree with my approach, don't contact me.</p> - -<p>any issues or questions or whatever you have about any of this, please <a href="/contact.xht">contact me directly</a> so I can respond to you sooner. I check E-mail and XMPP more often than I check Hidden Answers, and I prefer those methods of contact because they are much easier for me to keep track of shit. pinochet/oqypa are out of the picture; don't use those E-mail addresses because you won't get a response.</p> - </div> - </content> - </entry> - <entry> - <title>Chen Hosting goals and difficulties</title> - <link href="/blog/chen-hosting-goals-and-difficulties.xht" rel="alternate" type="application/xhtml+xml" /> - <id>/blog/chen-hosting-goals-and-difficulties.xht</id> - <published>2018-03-05T04:29:31+0000</published> - <updated>2018-03-05T04:29:31+0000</updated> - <author><name>opal hart</name></author> - <content type="xhtml"> - <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> -<p>since late 2015, I have hosted the website Hidden Answers <a href="http://answerstedhctbek.onion/">accessible via tor</a> <a href="http://hiddenanswers.i2p/">and i2p</a>. the Hidden Answers administrator was upset by the constant downtime of Freedom Hosting 2 and was seeking another host. shortly after I decided to offer my hosting to anyone interested, thus starting <a href="http://chchchiasaeljqgs.onion/">Chen Hosting</a> (available on i2p as <a href="http://chen.i2p/">chen.i2p</a>). I wanted to do this both to learn more about web hosting, and to earn some cash while in college. two years in hidden service web hosting has given me plenty of time and experience that I can share with others.</p> - -<p>to start off with the upsides, I have definitely learned a fair share about shared web hosting, software, and configuring everything for security, performance, and ease of deployment. I have been able to perform unorthodox installs of popular web software such as WordPress, Question2Answer, and MediaWiki (one shared install for all users). I have partitioned off access between users and services as best I could without the use of fully-virtualised containers, by way of hardened chroots (thanks to grsecurity), process separation (a php-fpm pool per user), and proper file permissions. I have made sure that the real server IP address could not be leaked under any circumstance. on top of this, I have met a handful of people whom I would consider to be good friends by now.</p> - -<p>on the flip side, a lot of frustration has come out of web hosting, especially for the niche market in Tor and I2P. obviously, I have to deal with a lot of scammers, trolls, and difficult people. I cannot count with my fingers alone how many times someone has requested a website and never ended up paying for or using it; most people simply run out of patience, apparently. this makes it very difficult to find the motivation to improve my services for current and new customers; it seems like nobody cares enough. in fact, as of the time I am writing this blog post, I have this on the Chen Hosting website:</p> - -<blockquote> - <p>Chen Hosting is causing me more of a headache than I can handle right now. I'm busy with school and personal projects (and soon, hopefully a part- or full-time job in IT) and the requests for websites I get are rarely serious. People abandon their sites and I'm not making any real money off it.</p> -</blockquote> - -<p>other issues I have come across with hosting: the Tor network itself. most of the traffic I receive for Hidden Answers is automated, and some of the automated traffic is very malicious in nature, causing the server's load to spike and performance to drop, at times causing the whole server to be unavailable for legitimate users. on top of that, I have witnessed Tor become unresponsive or crash for unexplainable reasons; I can only assume these are other attacks on the network or on my onion sites. I have tried to find suitable log-monitoring solutions, but this is an exasperating process and I finally just hacked everything together enough that it would <q>just work,</q> not too concerned with whether it was at optimal performance. also, while I have always preferred I2P over Tor for its hidden service support, it doesn't come without its own share of issues: the main implementation is in Java, and the C++ implementation still has a way to go before it is feasible for a live production server.</p> - -<p>if I had an interested customer base, I would be able to find the motivation to improve my services to support all major CMSes and web softwares, to spawn a robust ticket and newsletter system, to expand to clearnet hosting, to build a real community and set a precedent for anonymous and secure hosting. sadly, my efforts are now going unnoticed, and it sort of disheartens me that something I spent this much time on has not proven itself to be too useful. I would love to continue putting effort into <q>the best</q> professional shared hosting setup, with proper log monitoring and statistics, tight engagement with customer base and surrounding Tor/I2P community, contribution to free software, and embodiment of free speech. maybe I could have placed effort into decentralised solutions as well, in order for people not to rely on a single entity -- such as myself -- for their web hosting. but apparently I will not end up doing this because there is no demand for it. people are perfectly content with half-assed solutions that we have now, and I cannot for the life of me understand why.</p> - </div> - </content> - </entry> - <entry> - <title>"Learning how to learn"</title> - <link href="/blog/learning-how-to-learn.xht" rel="alternate" type="application/xhtml+xml" /> - <id>/blog/learning-how-to-learn.xht</id> - <published>2018-01-23T18:42:19+0000</published> - <updated>2018-01-23T18:42:19+0000</updated> - <author><name>opal hart</name></author> - <content type="xhtml"> - <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> -<p>here's a verbatim essay I wrote in response to the common misconceptions held by many Tor users and <q>privacy freaks</q>:</p> - -<blockquote> - <p>You probably see advice published everywhere – guides and tutorials and lessons. People who claim to have your best interests at heart. Many people do, but at the same time many people don't. And even the people who do can make mistakes. If you don't do so already, you need to learn how to think like a scientist: always sceptical, but never driven by fear. Being able to think for yourself, weighing all information you come across for validity, is a necessary asset that people seem to overlook in their quest toward activism.</p> - -<h2>Know what you're using</h2> - -<p>You installed Tor because it's nice and secure. Do you know exactly how it works though? Do you know what happens if you use it wrong?</p> - -<p>I see these technologies get thrown around all the time in privacy-related conversation: Tor, VPN, PGP, Tails. And for the aspiring hackers, Kali comes up quite often. All these things are fine, but people discover them more out of haphazard curiosity than anything. They know what these things are, they know that others tell them to use these things, but they don't often know why people talk about them so much.</p> - -<p>Read up about these subjects. You don't have to do an entire research debacle on them, but you should be able to summarise to yourself what everything does and why it works. Wikipedia is a great resource; it's concise and you can always branch out to learn more if you're interested. Once you know exactly what these technologies were made for, you will be able to utilise them intelligently.</p> - -<p>I can summarise up a few common misconceptions: Tor's primary purpose is to provide a secure proxy to the Web, while I2P's is to provide an anonymous network that replaces the Web. A commercial VPN is for privacy, while Tor is for anonymity (this article explains their differences nicely).</p> - -<p>Tails and Kali are simply customised Linux distributions (these two happen to be Debian-based), meaning that I could take Arch Linux (or your favourite distro) and replicate the functionality of either, after I take the time to configure it to my liking. The reason people use Tails, Whonix, or Kali is because they trust the developers to make a system that meets their needs, and they are incapable or unwilling to configure their own system. Ultimately, the choice of operating system is up to you; there is no "best" operating system, so try various systems out until you find your match.</p> - -<h2>Be sceptical</h2> - -<p>Don't believe everything you see. Professionals make mistakes, amateurs make mistakes, you and I make mistakes. Even with these guides, you should use your own judgment and filter out what seems logical. I wrote this in hopes that I was making sense, in hopes that my logic was sound and worth reading. But, I can always miss important things, and I'm here to learn just as everyone else is. After reading anything, you should cross-reference with other information if you're unsure about certain points, and ultimately you should test the information against your own knowledge to see if it fits in with what you believe.</p> - -<p>Knowledge evolves; people go to sleep believing in one cause, only to wake up believing in something else. The best any of us can do is follow what our heart says, keep our wits about us, and hope that our current beliefs will lead us on a better path.</p> - -<h2>Lead effectively</h2> - -<p>A good leader shows power by being motivated and experienced, not by being deceptive and forceful. You gain followers by relating with them, by sharing common core values, and by educating them. People should follow you because it is their decision to do so, because they actually wish to listen to you. If someone leaves you, do not try to pull them back; it only means that they felt your group was not the best fit in terms of ideals, goals, or methods. If everyone leaves you, you may want to ask why and adjust your actions based on the response. Leaders are people too, and they're bound to make mistakes, but a good leader (and a well-formed group) can recover from these mistakes quickly and easily.</p> - -<p>With that said, leadership is bound to change. It's natural, it's seamless (in a mature group, people just know who's "in charge" simply by the way they present themselves in the group), and it fosters new ideas and a different way of approaching issues. When starting a group, don't worry about who's head; that will come naturally and by consensus. Just focus on what you, as a group, need to do, and take everyone's opinions and suggestions into account. There should be an equal level of trust placed on all group members, and if the group simply cannot trust someone then it should make a decision on whether removing the person from the group is the best move. Feelings may be hurt, but a good group is resilient to this sort of friction. The group will carry on its business and wait for the conflict to pass.</p> - -<p>Most importantly, never trust someone solely because they are a figurehead. There is a strong difference between a figurehead and a true leader, and more often than not, people will grow to oppose a figurehead once they begin learning the truth about him. A figurehead is usually defaulted into power – either by status or by money or heritage. In contrast, a leader starts out as an equal and is brought into high esteem by his peers. Both leaders and figureheads are influential, but figureheads will hardly have your best interests at heart. Figureheads will do what they need to retain power, and they will trick others into believing whatever they have to say. They rely on the power of emotion in order to convince others that certain views are correct. And once they have a following, they can dispatch whatever lies they wish, knowing that their followers will eagerly eat it up.</p> - -<p>If you think this part sounds a bit overreactionary, I apologise, but I have seen this cult-like pattern in quite a few groups, namely the social justice movement. Everyone in the movement is bound together by a common emotional appeal: they are all minorities (real or imagined) and they seek safety in their circle by rejecting outsiders and playing the role of a victim. This is a toxic, spiraling attitude that only strengthens the power of the group, and the worst part is, people who seek acceptance see this movement and think they are doing the "right thing" by promoting minorities. So, they join in, finally feeling a sense of acceptance, and they learn from others in the movement that the patriarchy is the cause of all suffering in the world. A logical person would dismiss this claim and assign the blame to real issues (sexism and racism are issues, but not in the ways that the social justice movement claims), but once you have given someone hope and reassurance, you can make them believe whatever you wish.</p> -</blockquote> - </div> - </content> - </entry> - <entry> <title>why program efficiency [and usability] matters</title> <link href="/blog/why-program-efficiency-and-usability-matters.xht" rel="alternate" type="application/xhtml+xml" /> <id>/blog/why-program-efficiency-and-usability-matters.xht</id> diff --git a/out/blog/index.xht b/out/blog/index.xht @@ -33,6 +33,7 @@ <p><a href="/blog/feed.atom">atom feed</a></p> <ul> +<li><a href="federated-social-networking.xht">federated social networking</a> <em>last updated <time datetime='2019-07-12T07:10:27+0000' title='2019-07-12T07:10:27+0000'>2019 Jul 12</time></em></li> <li><a href="why-program-efficiency-and-usability-matters.xht">why program efficiency [and usability] matters</a> <em>last updated <time datetime='2019-06-05T03:41:13+0000' title='2019-06-05T03:41:13+0000'>2019 Jun 05</time></em></li> <li><a href="wowaname-now-on-git-and-hosted-on-my-laptop.xht">wowana.me now on git (and hosted on my laptop)</a> <em>last updated <time datetime='2019-06-05T03:15:47+0000' title='2019-06-05T03:15:47+0000'>2019 Jun 05</time></em></li> <li><a href="a-new-era-for-hidden-answers.xht">a new era for Hidden Answers</a> <em>last updated <time datetime='2019-05-11T03:38:03+0000' title='2019-05-11T03:38:03+0000'>2019 May 11</time></em></li> diff --git a/out/fediverse.xht b/out/fediverse.xht @@ -0,0 +1,218 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en-GB"> + <head> + <title>the fediverse – wowana.me</title> + <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/opal.css"/> + <link href="/blog/feed.atom" type="application/atom+xml" rel="alternate" title="Blog Atom feed" /> + </head> + <body> + <div class="sidebar-holder"> + <header class="sidebar"> + <img class="avatar" src="/gravatar" alt="Libravatar"/> + <h1><a class="nolink" href="/">opal</a></h1> + <p class="subheader">wowaname</p> + <nav class="topnav"> + <ul> + <li><a href="/about.xht">about</a></li> + <li><a href="/blog/">blog</a></li> + <li><a href="/contact.xht">contact</a></li> + <li><a href="/donate.xht">donate</a></li> + <li><a href="/pgp.xht">PGP</a></li> + <li><a href="/files/">files</a></li> + <li><a href="/permalink.xht">permalink</a></li> + <li>content is <a href="https://creativecommons.org/share-your-work/public-domain/cc0">public domain</a> unless otherwise noted</li> + </ul> + </nav> + </header> + </div> + +<article class='main' id='fediverse'> +<h1>the fediverse</h1> + +<p>if you're tired of twitter (or you got banned from it like me) then +you're probably looking for a decent replacement to meet people and +discuss various topics of interest. the fediverse is currently the best +replacement, but when you first get into it, it may be difficult to +understand. the first thing that's different from twitter is the fact +that there are multiple instances – thousands of them. they're like +E-mail servers except for microblogging, in a nutshell, and they can run +different software. currently, the most popular servers use +<a href="https://joinmastodon.org/">Mastodon</a>, +<a href="https://pleroma.social/">Pleroma</a>, or +<a href="https://joinmisskey.github.io/en/">Misskey</a>. you can look at each and +see what feels best for you. Pleroma is the easiest to run, which is why +a lot of instances use it, and it supports both its own layout as well +as the Mastodon layout, so if you want an easy decision, you should +probably go with a server running Pleroma.</p> + +<p>with that out of the way, assuming you don't want to run your own +server, you're probably wondering which of the thousands of servers you +should use. well, if you're like me, you'll want a <q>hands-off</q> +instance that simulates how twitter was before 2015. somewhere you can +follow a few people and say what's on your mind, and not get banned for +it. if this sounds like you, you're in luck, because this is exactly +what this list of instances is for. I try to compile a list of instances +with <em>transparent moderation policies</em> where you can <em>follow almost +anyone, anywhere in the fediverse</em>.</p> + +<p>to be included in the list below, the instance must:</p> + +<ul> +<li>have a clear moderation policy</li> +<li>have clear federation policies with other servers</li> +<li>have a list of blocked servers, if the instance chooses to block other +servers</li> +</ul> + +<p><strong>before you choose an instance, please make sure you would make a good +fit. free speech / limited moderation does <em>not</em> invite spammy or +annoying behaviour to any of these instances.</strong> this list is simply a +starting point for you to narrow your choice. also be aware that every +instance has its own posting and media limits, so be sure to +double-check if you often write long posts or upload large files.</p> + +<p>if you are an instance administrator and would like your instance to be +listed, please talk to @wowaname@anime.website on fedi, or <a href="/contact.xht">contact +me</a> via E-mail.</p> + +<p>this page is currently in a rough state; I will try to improve it in my +free time, and I will take suggestions on how to better present the +information here.</p> + +<h2>Pleroma</h2> + +<table> +<tr> + <th>instance</th> + <th>limited moderation i.e. <q>free speech</q>?</th> + <th>nsfw allowed?</th> + <th>block policy</th> + <th>notes</th> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://accela.online/">accela.online</a></td> + <td><a href="https://accela.online/static/rules.html">yes, U.S. jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>if tagged</td> + <td><a href="https://accela.online/static/censorship.html">limits federation in exceptional circumstances</a></td> + <td></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://anime.website/">anime.website</a></td> + <td><a href="https://anime.website/static/terms-of-service.html">yes, U.S. jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>yes</td> + <td><a href="https://anime.website/static/censorship.html">limits federation in exceptional circumstances</a></td> + <td>registration requires invite via E-mail</td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://bsd.moe/">bsd.moe</a></td> + <td><a href="https://bsd.moe/about">yes, Moldova/U.K./U.S. jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>yes</td> + <td><a href="https://fediverse.network/bsd.moe/federation">blocks disclosed</a></td> + <td></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://cofe.rocks/">cofe.rocks</a></td> + <td><a href="https://glitch.sh/hosted/pleroma/src/branch/master/meta.d/rules.md">yes, Finnish/German jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>if tagged</td> + <td><a href="https://glitch.sh/hosted/pleroma/src/branch/master/meta.d/MRF.md">blocks disclosed</a></td> + <td></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://freespeechextremist.com/">freespeechextremist.com</a></td> + <td><a href="https://freespeechextremist.com/about">yes, U.S. jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>if tagged</td> + <td><a href="https://fediverse.network/freespeechextremist.com/federation">federates with all instances</a></td> + <td></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://neckbeard.xyz/">neckbeard.xyz</a></td> + <td><a href="https://neckbeard.xyz/about">yes, U.S. jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>if tagged</td> + <td><a href="https://fediverse.network/neckbeard.xyz/federation">federates with all instances</a></td> + <td></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://pl.smuglo.li/">pl.smuglo.li</a></td> + <td>yes, U.S. jurisdiction</td> + <td>yes</td> + <td><a href="https://fediverse.network/pl.smuglo.li/federation">federates with all instances</a></td> + <td>no explicitly-stated rules, but generally hands-off moderation</td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://pleroma.site/">pleroma.site</a></td> + <td><a href="https://info.pleroma.site/tos.html">no, U.S. jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>if tagged</td> + <td><a href="https://info.pleroma.site/federation.html">blocks disclosed</a></td> + <td></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://shitposter.club/">shitposter.club</a></td> + <td><a href="https://shitposter.club/about">yes, U.S. jurisdiction. no sharing personal information (e.g. doxing)</a></td> + <td>if tagged. no loli, shota, gore</td> + <td><a href="https://fediverse.network/shitposter.club/federation">federates with all instances</a></td> + <td></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://the.hedgehoghunter.club/">the.hedgehoghunter.club</a></td> + <td><a href="https://the.hedgehoghunter.club/instance/rules.html">yes, German jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>if tagged</td> + <td><a href="https://fediverse.network/the.hedgehoghunter.club/federation">blocks disclosed</a></td> + <td></td> +</tr> +</table> + +<h2>Mastodon</h2> + +<table> +<tr> + <th>instance</th> + <th>limited moderation i.e. <q>free speech</q>?</th> + <th>nsfw allowed?</th> + <th>block policy</th> + <th>notes</th> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://baraag.net/">baraag.net</a></td> + <td><a href="https://baraag.net/terms">yes, French jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>gore must be tagged, only fictional artistic work allowed</td> + <td>federates with all instances</td> + <td></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://gameliberty.club/">gameliberty.club</a></td> + <td>yes, U.S. jurisdiction</td> + <td>if tagged</td> + <td>federates with all instances</td> + <td></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://niu.moe/">niu.moe</a></td> + <td><a href="https://niu.moe/about/more">no, German/French jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>if tagged</td> + <td>silences certain instances from public timeline (you can still follow users directly)</td> + <td></td> +</tr> +</table> + +<h2>Misskey</h2> + +<table> +<tr> + <th>instance</th> + <th>limited moderation i.e. <q>free speech</q>?</th> + <th>nsfw allowed?</th> + <th>block policy</th> + <th>notes</th> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://catgirl.life/">catgirl.life</a></td> + <td>yes, U.S. jurisdiction</td> + <td>if tagged</td> + <td>federates with all instances</td> + <td></td> +</tr> +</table> +</article> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/src/blog/federated-social-networking.md b/src/blog/federated-social-networking.md @@ -0,0 +1,170 @@ +# federated social networking +<!--[time 201907120710.27]--> + +like it or not, social networks are part of the Internet's evolution to +serve our non-topical communication needs, focusing on people more than +content, unlike newsgroups and forums. alas, while myspace and facebook +and twitter took off, they have proven to eventually fail (in myspace's +case) or become too big to care for their users. facebook and twitter +regularly take it upon themselves to curate content in an effort to +appease their advertisers, and perhaps secondarily to appease the +political opinions of their own staff members. personally, I've never +been a huge player in the social networking game, but twitter did catch +my eye a while ago for being a place for me to discover people, follow +content that is interesting to me, and of course, participate in +discussions with a bit of shitposting here and there. a few years back, +in 2015, I have noticed the effect of the above issues I mentioned, with +accounts I follow gradually being picked off by twitter's moderation +team, until finally in 2016 I simply *retweeted* someone's post and +received an account termination for it. twitter goes far and hard for +its advertisers, and because my retweet directly affected the reputation +of such a business partner (well, I can only guess they were partnered +if it came to this extreme), the platform didn't mind at all to +sacrifice me and a few others to ensure their reputation. I will not go +into additional detail with my incident specifically, because it is no +longer terribly relevant, but just note that there's a reason for +accounts to pop out of existence all the time on twitter, and it isn't +always because people are spamming others' mentions or sharing illegal +pictures. + +if that's enough convincing for you that we need a better social +networking platform to offset twitter, instagram, and the like; good +news, because there exists a microblogging-style social network that +goes beyond just one domain, just one company, just one set of policies. +**meet the fediverse**: the result of years of collaboration to provide +an open protocol and several software implementations, to solve the +issues inherent in conventional social platforms. I've personally been +hosting an instance (at [anime.website](https://anime.website/) for a +bit over a year now, and I can confidently say it is a suitable twitter +replacement for me. my timeline doesn't feel empty, I see many +interesting and unadulterated discussions because people feel welcome to +exchange their personal beliefs, and I myself don't have to worry about +being deplatformed or holding my content hostage to a corporation who +doesn't give a shit about me. + +---- + +as good as the fediverse is, many misconceptions have floated around, +especially since the introduction of the Mastodon implementation of +fediverse software. while I don't particularly like Mastodon itself +(it's resource-heavy and hard to install, according to many people, and +it restricts users' freedom to configure instances to their personal +liking), this has no bearing on my opinion toward the project lead +himself, Eugen Rochko. his motives have been clear for a long time that +his goal isn't necessarily to promote a free (as in freedom) social +experience, but instead to offset other platforms that he claims +harbours <q>nazis</q>. what this means to the rest of us, is that he (on +behalf of Mastodon) spreads his idealised view of what the fediverse +should be, which in turn confuses many new people trying out the +platform for themselves. essentially, he has taken something that was +not his original idea, slapped his name on it, and tries to +retroactively mould the fediverse to his liking. this fact alone should +not deter anyone from using the fediverse, but it should serve to +prepare you for the inevitable drama that incurs from this. + +I have my own idealisation of the platform, but I know that not everyone +shares my opinions. since I have a history on twitter, some of the +features introduced in fediverse software make little sense to me. for +example, I am a vocal opponent of the <q>federated timeline</q> which +essentially serves as a dumping ground for all posts an instance +receives, whether or not you directly follow those users. many claim +it's an important discovery mechanism, but given my time on twitter, +it's apparent to me that full-text search, potentially a tagging system, +and other discovery methods such as retweeting (<q>repeating</q> or +<q>boosting</q> in fediverse nomenclature) are just as effective to find +accounts that may interest me. from experience, I have seen the +federated timeline cause more issues by attracting spam and trolls to my +comments; which have a far less likely chance of happening had I only +kept my exposure to my followers and to any participants in my threads. + +I also hold a controversial belief that per-post privacy settings are +beneficial to the network. the way they are currently implemented leaves +a lot to be desired, but I have made my twitter account private out of +necessity before, and I understand the desire to limit a profile's +exposure and allow a curated list of people who can view my content. the +per-post privacy adds flexibility to twitter's feature, making it so I +can make some or none of my posts completely private. I mention this +because it's another topic you may see discussed soon after involving +yourself in the fediverse. + +with all that said, I encourage you to try the fediverse out for +yourself if you can't get the twitter impulse out of you, or if you just +want to see what the buzz is about. plenty of people, plenty of +interests, plenty of beliefs, all talking to one another on a robust +platform, a platform not controlled by any one party. like E-mail, if +you disagree with how one server operates itself, you can easily pack up +and move to another server. nobody can <q>ban you from the fediverse</q> +(but this is not an invitation for you to test anyone's patience). +intelligent discussion, shitposting, image sharing, news, politics, +personal issues – the firehose of content, the lack of curation has been +a big reason for me to stick around, because it's always something new +every day. + +if you're keen to try it but don't know where to start out, I have taken +the time to write [a page dedicated to the fediverse](/fediverse.xht), +complete with a table of instances that gladly take in new users and are +transparent about their own moderation and federation policies. sadly, +mainly due to how Mastodon gained its popularity, we see a lot of +<q>instance blocklists</q> akin to the account blocklists on twitter, +which serve to prevent federation between instances that disagree with +one another's policies. while I admit, this is a useful tool to be able +to separate oneself from spam instances, for example; it has become a +much-abused feature, effectively censoring a lot of legitimate users and +content, and making the fediverse more difficult to understand for new +users. indeed, this is enough of a barrier to entry that many people +leave simply for all the drama and controversy these decisions foster. + +---- + +I'd also like to share my personal code of etiquette, a set of standards +I hold myself to and expect from others who interact with me, simply +because it makes the most sense to me from my experiences with +microblogging. I model anime.website's rules after my own standards +while still giving people the freedom to be wrong. ;) + +I believe that microblogging (and in extension, the fediverse) should +predominantly be a <q>pull</q> medium rather than a <q>push</q> one, +meaning I should be able to control what I see by following and +unfollowing people. thus, many issues should be solvable simply by +unfollowing anyone with whom I no longer want to interact. should +outliers exist, muting and blocking are suitable to get persistent +people out of my mentions. this <q>pull what I want</q> mentality +contributes to my opinion that the federated timeline is unnecessary. +but, others (for example on anime.website) find the federated timeline +useful, but I treat it as an unmoderated, uncurated feed, so if users +have any issues with what they see on the federated timeline, I will +simply tell them to steer clear of it to avoid further issues. + +the above attitude allows people to talk about what they want, and it +allows others to expose themselves to that content voluntarily. this +eliminates a need for most moderation and allows my rules to be +succinct: I do not allow spam or illegal content, or anything that could +jeopardise the service for the rest of my users and myself. users may +join my instance even if I disagree with them; I simply will not follow +their content. this makes my life *much* easier as I can be a user first +and a moderator second. + +while trigger warnings (dubbed <q>content warnings</q> by the Mastodon +crowd) have been introduced into the fediverse, I personally only see +them as a hinderance and an antifeature. again, on twitter I have never +had a problem as long as I follow the right people. I understand that I +may not agree with all content presented to me, but I'd like to think +I'm able to ignore what I don't like. content warnings operate far too +much on trust; I have to entrust that everyone will share my idea of +objectionable content, and that is simply an unrealistic goal. and while +some people find such warnings useful, they impact those who see them as +a distraction, as out of place, as an additional step to click through +someone's content. while much software (including Pleroma) allows these +warnings to be expanded by default, and people are working on new +potential solutions to the issue, I believe it will always be an +imperfect addition in fediverse software. + +and lastly, should you decide you want to follow me on the fediverse +once you've made your own account and gotten comfortable, be aware that +I post about a lot of things and publish all types of images and media. +if you find anything objectionable to the point you think less of me, I +ask that you simply do not follow me, rather than trying to suggest that +I change what I say. I made my own instance to *get away from* being +told what I can and cannot say; I understand my actions and words have +consequences but chances are I won't be receptive to any content +policing. diff --git a/src/fediverse.md b/src/fediverse.md @@ -0,0 +1,183 @@ +# the fediverse + +if you're tired of twitter (or you got banned from it like me) then +you're probably looking for a decent replacement to meet people and +discuss various topics of interest. the fediverse is currently the best +replacement, but when you first get into it, it may be difficult to +understand. the first thing that's different from twitter is the fact +that there are multiple instances – thousands of them. they're like +E-mail servers except for microblogging, in a nutshell, and they can run +different software. currently, the most popular servers use +[Mastodon](https://joinmastodon.org/), +[Pleroma](https://pleroma.social/), or +[Misskey](https://joinmisskey.github.io/en/). you can look at each and +see what feels best for you. Pleroma is the easiest to run, which is why +a lot of instances use it, and it supports both its own layout as well +as the Mastodon layout, so if you want an easy decision, you should +probably go with a server running Pleroma. + +with that out of the way, assuming you don't want to run your own +server, you're probably wondering which of the thousands of servers you +should use. well, if you're like me, you'll want a <q>hands-off</q> +instance that simulates how twitter was before 2015. somewhere you can +follow a few people and say what's on your mind, and not get banned for +it. if this sounds like you, you're in luck, because this is exactly +what this list of instances is for. I try to compile a list of instances +with *transparent moderation policies* where you can *follow almost +anyone, anywhere in the fediverse*. + +to be included in the list below, the instance must: + +* have a clear moderation policy +* have clear federation policies with other servers +* have a list of blocked servers, if the instance chooses to block other + servers + +**before you choose an instance, please make sure you would make a good +fit. free speech / limited moderation does *not* invite spammy or +annoying behaviour to any of these instances.** this list is simply a +starting point for you to narrow your choice. also be aware that every +instance has its own posting and media limits, so be sure to +double-check if you often write long posts or upload large files. + +if you are an instance administrator and would like your instance to be +listed, please talk to @wowaname@anime.website on fedi, or [contact +me](/contact.xht) via E-mail. + +this page is currently in a rough state; I will try to improve it in my +free time, and I will take suggestions on how to better present the +information here. + +## Pleroma + +<table> +<tr> + <th>instance</th> + <th>limited moderation i.e. <q>free speech</q>?</th> + <th>nsfw allowed?</th> + <th>block policy</th> + <th>notes</th> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://accela.online/">accela.online</a></td> + <td><a href="https://accela.online/static/rules.html">yes, U.S. jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>if tagged</td> + <td><a href="https://accela.online/static/censorship.html">limits federation in exceptional circumstances</a></td> + <td></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://anime.website/">anime.website</a></td> + <td><a href="https://anime.website/static/terms-of-service.html">yes, U.S. jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>yes</td> + <td><a href="https://anime.website/static/censorship.html">limits federation in exceptional circumstances</a></td> + <td>registration requires invite via E-mail</td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://bsd.moe/">bsd.moe</a></td> + <td><a href="https://bsd.moe/about">yes, Moldova/U.K./U.S. jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>yes</td> + <td><a href="https://fediverse.network/bsd.moe/federation">blocks disclosed</a></td> + <td></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://cofe.rocks/">cofe.rocks</a></td> + <td><a href="https://glitch.sh/hosted/pleroma/src/branch/master/meta.d/rules.md">yes, Finnish/German jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>if tagged</td> + <td><a href="https://glitch.sh/hosted/pleroma/src/branch/master/meta.d/MRF.md">blocks disclosed</a></td> + <td></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://freespeechextremist.com/">freespeechextremist.com</a></td> + <td><a href="https://freespeechextremist.com/about">yes, U.S. jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>if tagged</td> + <td><a href="https://fediverse.network/freespeechextremist.com/federation">federates with all instances</a></td> + <td></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://neckbeard.xyz/">neckbeard.xyz</a></td> + <td><a href="https://neckbeard.xyz/about">yes, U.S. jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>if tagged</td> + <td><a href="https://fediverse.network/neckbeard.xyz/federation">federates with all instances</a></td> + <td></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://pl.smuglo.li/">pl.smuglo.li</a></td> + <td>yes, U.S. jurisdiction</td> + <td>yes</td> + <td><a href="https://fediverse.network/pl.smuglo.li/federation">federates with all instances</a></td> + <td>no explicitly-stated rules, but generally hands-off moderation</td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://pleroma.site/">pleroma.site</a></td> + <td><a href="https://info.pleroma.site/tos.html">no, U.S. jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>if tagged</td> + <td><a href="https://info.pleroma.site/federation.html">blocks disclosed</a></td> + <td></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://shitposter.club/">shitposter.club</a></td> + <td><a href="https://shitposter.club/about">yes, U.S. jurisdiction. no sharing personal information (e.g. doxing)</a></td> + <td>if tagged. no loli, shota, gore</td> + <td><a href="https://fediverse.network/shitposter.club/federation">federates with all instances</a></td> + <td></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://the.hedgehoghunter.club/">the.hedgehoghunter.club</a></td> + <td><a href="https://the.hedgehoghunter.club/instance/rules.html">yes, German jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>if tagged</td> + <td><a href="https://fediverse.network/the.hedgehoghunter.club/federation">blocks disclosed</a></td> + <td></td> +</tr> +</table> + +## Mastodon + +<table> +<tr> + <th>instance</th> + <th>limited moderation i.e. <q>free speech</q>?</th> + <th>nsfw allowed?</th> + <th>block policy</th> + <th>notes</th> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://baraag.net/">baraag.net</a></td> + <td><a href="https://baraag.net/terms">yes, French jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>gore must be tagged, only fictional artistic work allowed</td> + <td>federates with all instances</td> + <td></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://gameliberty.club/">gameliberty.club</a></td> + <td>yes, U.S. jurisdiction</td> + <td>if tagged</td> + <td>federates with all instances</td> + <td></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://niu.moe/">niu.moe</a></td> + <td><a href="https://niu.moe/about/more">no, German/French jurisdiction</a></td> + <td>if tagged</td> + <td>silences certain instances from public timeline (you can still follow users directly)</td> + <td></td> +</tr> +</table> + +## Misskey + +<table> +<tr> + <th>instance</th> + <th>limited moderation i.e. <q>free speech</q>?</th> + <th>nsfw allowed?</th> + <th>block policy</th> + <th>notes</th> +</tr> +<tr> + <td><a href="https://catgirl.life/">catgirl.life</a></td> + <td>yes, U.S. jurisdiction</td> + <td>if tagged</td> + <td>federates with all instances</td> + <td></td> +</tr> +</table>