This view is technically correct, but I think very narrow because it takes no account of the external costs to the rest of the fediverse. Admins of major instances that host a double-digit percentage of the lemmyverse userbase SHOULD be expected to conduct themselves in a way that promotes the overall health of the ecosystem in addition to the health of their local instance. Jumping straight to defederating other major instances imposes massive costs for folks outside Beehaw, as described in my comment further down this thread.
There is an aphorism often deployed against free-speech absolutists, and I think paraphrasing it is applicable here… They have the right to use defederation carelessly and to the detriment of the rest of the fediverse if they choose to, but they don’t have the right to be free of the consequences of doing so. If the rest of the fediverse abandons Beehaw communities as risky and poorly moderated (and cutting off more than 30% of the active fediverse without cause IS poor moderation), that’s a reasonable consequence. If admins of other instances decide they don’t want to deal with this nonsense and band together to permanently defederate Beehaw from the majority of the lemmyverse, that’s also a reasonable consequence. No one else owes them a megaphone either, though so far other admins have shown more care for the health of the lemmyverse than the Beehaw admins have and have left the door open for them to rejoin the lemmyverse on normal terms, in spite of the high cost in confusion and user-unfriendlyness to everyone outside of Beehaw in the interim.
Another way to look at it is that they suffered a DOS attack (in the form of more trolling than they could handle with their current staff), so they blocked the source. It sucks that some of it was coming from our instance.
Not everyone has the same level of resources available to deal with the same problems.
Another way to look at it is that they suffered a DOS attack
Extending this analogy to a global scale, their response would be similar to Google shutting off search in the southern hemisphere because they were getting ddos’ed by a few thousand hosts in South America. The response is not effective because attackers can move to other geographies or proportional because many users unrelated to the attack impacted.
These properties, lack of efficacy and lack of proportionality make their response a poor one, even if they think it’s the best they’re capable of. I also do not believe it’s the best response they’re capable of. The favor this particular response because in a world of tradeoffs they greatly value the culture within their instance, and care very little for the health of the fediverse beyond its walls. This is a choice, not a hard constraint.
Not everyone has the same level of resources available to deal with the same problems.
That’s certainly true. Also not everyone has to host an instance with double-digit percentage of the lemmyverse active userbase and communities. If one DOES choose to do that, doing it badly can negatively impact others, and they can speak out about those impacts.
This view is technically correct, but I think very narrow because it takes no account of the external costs to the rest of the fediverse. Admins of major instances that host a double-digit percentage of the lemmyverse userbase SHOULD be expected to conduct themselves in a way that promotes the overall health of the ecosystem in addition to the health of their local instance. Jumping straight to defederating other major instances imposes massive costs for folks outside Beehaw, as described in my comment further down this thread.
There is an aphorism often deployed against free-speech absolutists, and I think paraphrasing it is applicable here… They have the right to use defederation carelessly and to the detriment of the rest of the fediverse if they choose to, but they don’t have the right to be free of the consequences of doing so. If the rest of the fediverse abandons Beehaw communities as risky and poorly moderated (and cutting off more than 30% of the active fediverse without cause IS poor moderation), that’s a reasonable consequence. If admins of other instances decide they don’t want to deal with this nonsense and band together to permanently defederate Beehaw from the majority of the lemmyverse, that’s also a reasonable consequence. No one else owes them a megaphone either, though so far other admins have shown more care for the health of the lemmyverse than the Beehaw admins have and have left the door open for them to rejoin the lemmyverse on normal terms, in spite of the high cost in confusion and user-unfriendlyness to everyone outside of Beehaw in the interim.
Another way to look at it is that they suffered a DOS attack (in the form of more trolling than they could handle with their current staff), so they blocked the source. It sucks that some of it was coming from our instance.
Not everyone has the same level of resources available to deal with the same problems.
Extending this analogy to a global scale, their response would be similar to Google shutting off search in the southern hemisphere because they were getting ddos’ed by a few thousand hosts in South America. The response is not effective because attackers can move to other geographies or proportional because many users unrelated to the attack impacted.
These properties, lack of efficacy and lack of proportionality make their response a poor one, even if they think it’s the best they’re capable of. I also do not believe it’s the best response they’re capable of. The favor this particular response because in a world of tradeoffs they greatly value the culture within their instance, and care very little for the health of the fediverse beyond its walls. This is a choice, not a hard constraint.
That’s certainly true. Also not everyone has to host an instance with double-digit percentage of the lemmyverse active userbase and communities. If one DOES choose to do that, doing it badly can negatively impact others, and they can speak out about those impacts.