Ancestors

Written by Erik Moeller on 2025-01-14 at 05:01

On one hand, I think it's incredibly important to read about what Meta did in Myanmar (please see @kissane's excellent series: https://erinkissane.com/meta-in-myanmar-full-series). It's a history people should know.

On the other hand, a lot of people have heard at least the tl;dr version, yet choose to remain on platforms that enable hate-bait loops.

I think that's because it's a history many people have difficulty relating to their own comparatively mundane daily online experience. But it is deeply related.

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Written by Erik Moeller on 2025-01-14 at 05:03

Hate is a continuum of horrible things. Once a group of people is dehumanized, perpetrators of hate will do things that range from "well, that person just doesn't belong here" to the most horrible crimes imaginable.

Platforms that foster hate-bait loops will lead to such dehumanization not only taking place, but being amplified and shared and reposted. (Musk is also organizing his own hate campaigns every day.)

That has real-world consequences, whether anyone observes them or not.

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Written by Erik Moeller on 2025-01-14 at 05:07

When Meta explicitly adds stuff like "We do allow allegations of mental illness or abnormality" to its hateful conduct policy (yep, that's in there now), they're opening a door to hate-bait loops that will get people killed.

People may read about Myanmar and think "that couldn't happen here". I think that's bullshit (there is no exceptionalism), but it's also not the only question. The question we should be asking, wherever we are, is: what could happen here, as a result of this? What will?

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Written by Evan Prodromou on 2025-01-14 at 15:59

@eloquence We have multiple ongoing genocides in the world, and they most certainly are being perpetuated by misinformation and disinformation on major social platforms, whipped up by engagement algorithms. I'm in agreement on this.

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Written by Evan Prodromou on 2025-01-14 at 16:01

@eloquence One benefit of the social web is that, theoretically, we can stay connected to friends and family, as well as publishers, on the platforms with bad content policies and bad algorithms, without directly suffering the consequences of those bad policies. Practically, it's a lot of work for moderators, maybe an insuperable level for some. I wrote about this on our blog: https://socialwebfoundation.org/2025/01/12/content-policy-on-the-social-web/

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Written by Erik Moeller on 2025-01-14 at 22:23

@evan

To be clear, I wasn't making an argument for or against interop - I think that's rightly an instance-specific decision, and I appreciate the technical efforts for interop in principle (esp. with Bluesky!).

But personally, I want to prioritize anything I can do to support the movement off the most harmful platforms (e.g., X, Meta, TikTok, with X still leading the pack by a wide margin) by making clear the harm that they enable.

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Written by Erik Moeller on 2025-01-14 at 22:26

@evan

This movement off hate-enabling platform feels especially important to me for nonprofits, governments, academia, and public figures who seek to act with moral integrity.

This helps create the kind of network effects that can enable civil society to take shape here on the fediverse and, yes, on Bluesky.

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Written by Evan Prodromou on 2025-01-15 at 00:05

@eloquence I am with you on that. I think dealing with the negative consequences is important; I think there is also an opportunity to use our social networks to have healthier, richer relationships.

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Written by Erik Moeller on 2025-01-15 at 01:20

@evan

That was the original hope indeed. I feel at this point it's empirically very clear that the major corporate platforms (with the exception of Bluesky, if one wants to call it that) do far more harm than good in the world. :/

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Written by Evan Prodromou on 2025-01-15 at 02:25

@eloquence it's nice of you to except Bluesky! I am not as sure as you.

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Written by Evan Prodromou on 2025-01-15 at 02:30

@eloquence I guess one question I have is if Morozov's idea that the origin of our current crisis is in the utopian cyber-libertarianism of the 1990s and early 2000s, and if so, how we avoid repeating the whole cycle in the Fediverse.

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Toot

Written by Erik Moeller on 2025-01-15 at 05:39

@evan

Oh, I'm not optimistic about Bluesky long-term, given the panopticon (global index) model, centralized control structures, drive towards virality, and increasing capital demands.

I think our best bet for fedi's resilience is to use slowness as an advantage - nurture tech, governance, cooperative funding models, healthy culture, while new capital-fueled "alternatives" come and go.

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Descendants