Post · BT Free Social

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Dear open registration servers, each day so far this week, I've opened my Mastodon client, only to see slurs, swastikas, and death threat videos of "me" being hanged.

This is the Nazi bar problem. They're standing on the curb and your doors are wide open. Sure, you're kicking them out after they walk in and punch a few customers, but is that really how you want your bar to be known? As the place that apologizes *after* the Nazi assaults you?

With the current US election results rolling in, it looks like we're in for another predictable wave of butthurt GravySeals aching to own the libs in a sad attempt to bring meaning to their poor little wannabe white power lives.

It's time to close registrations and step up moderation to protect the communities you helped grow.

Racism is chasing Black folx off Fedi.
Queerphobia is chasing LGBTQ+ folx off Fedi.
Sexism is chasing women off Fedi.

Do you want another incel white boys club like Twitter? Because inaction is how you get there.

#FediAdmin, #FediMods, don't be a #NaziBar.

rainynight65

@rainynight65@aus.social · 2 days ago

@alice As a mod, I completely agree.

One of the issues with the fediverse is that for every bigger instance with admins and mods that try to stay on the ball, there are dozens (if not more) of single-user and small instances that get spun up with suboptimal settings (like open registration), and the 'admin' is either disinterested or out of their depth when the trolls roll in.

I recently blocked an instance that, in among 9 total users, had three accounts belonging to well-known far right fediverse trolls. The accounts were reported to the instance admin, but after several weeks they are still around. Which makes the admin complicit in every sense of the word.

And then there's instances that get spun up specifically to enable trolls to federate in - they pop up with different subdomains of the same domain name, spew hate and bile for a while, get fediblocked here and there, disappear - rinse and repeat ad nauseam.

🅰🅻🅸🅲🅴 (🌈🦄)

@alice@lgbtqia.space · 2 days ago

@rainynight65 yeah. I think there are a couple things that would help that. Make moderated registration the default setting for new instances, and make a way to bubble up recommendations for instances to block by doing a "trending blocks" tab for mods and admins (if servers you have good relations with block another instance, then it would become "eligible" for trending on that tab, and you could see who had blocked/limited it and decide if you wanted to as well).

Spycrab

@spycrab@kolektiva.social · 3 days ago

@alice haven't really seen any of the things you are talking about. (Well I haven't seen a delta in them) But I also have no reason to think you would lie about it.

I think closed registration would drastically decrease the number of 'legit' users that would sign up to fedi (I probably wouldn't have joined if I couldn't find an open reg instance)

It also seems, to me, that closed registration would just side load the problem: it won't stop human Nazis, sexist, homophobes, etc b/c they will just look like all the other users during registration. And it would stop bots at first (by stop I mean make it other instances' problem) but once enough instances have closed registration the bots will find some way to automate that process.
It just seems that closed registration servers only to make it a bit more annoying for legitimate users to sign up.

🅰🅻🅸🅲🅴 (🌈🦄)

@alice@lgbtqia.space · 3 days ago

@spycrab I hate to say I've addressed all those points before, but I've addressed all those points before.

You're arguing against a different problem.

And I'll reiterate that if writing a sentence is too high a signup price for a dramatically healthier minority community here (and I *really* don't think it is), then perhaps a different social network would be better suited.

Fedi doesn't have to grow at all costs, that's what X, Facebook, Reddit, Discord, and all the others are for.

Spycrab

@spycrab@kolektiva.social · 2 days ago

@alice ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯ can't take into account what I can't see.

And while I admire your faith in people/community I don't share it.

Edit: I guess I should clarify it's not the writing a sentence I think is the problem, it's the time that it takes to get approved

🅰🅻🅸🅲🅴 (🌈🦄)

@alice@lgbtqia.space · 2 days ago

@spycrab the issue is that open registration will *always* be plagued by the sucker-punch problem.

Which will *always* result in women, queer folx, and racial minorities being run off the platform.

Which will *always* leave you with a Nazi boys' bar, eventually.

Also, the time it takes to get approved is *exactly* the speed bump that pushes the math in favor of legit users.

Trolls/Nazis/bigots/etc. are largely reactionary. They look for an open server that they can quickly spin up an account on, they assault someone, then they get suspended, and then they do it all over again. It takes them seconds to do each loop.

A 'legit' user only has to pay the signup waiting tax once (maybe a few times if they want accounts on multiple servers). Once that tax is paid, they can post for ever more.

As an admin (of multiple instances which all use moderated registration), it takes me seconds to review an application. But it can take me hours to clean up when a Nazi/troll/scammer/spammer/etc. gets through the doors. I would *much* rather pay a few seconds up front (and just the fact of *having* moderated registration means *most* bad actors move on to easier targets).

If all of Fedi used moderated registration (or more), then we'd still have a troll here and there, but they'd have to put in *more* work to attack folx here than on Twitter, and the payout would be smaller, so they wouldn't be inclined to put in the effort.

Could we stop all of them? No. Does that mean it's not the best solution to stopping most of them? No.

(Credentials: I did this sort of work for numerous corporate platforms, have a psychology background, and have run A/B testing on similar things in my years working in fraud prevention and customer safety)

@stark@mastodon.mit.edu · 2 days ago

@alice @spycrab absolutely no argument that this is a problem that needs to be solved.

But I'm absolutely mystified how screening registrations universally would solve anything. Nazis are capable of writing a sentence. And moderators do not have any magic Nazi detection abilities.

It only works now because there's lower hanging instances. If all instances required signups to write a sentence then spammers and nazis would just do that.

We need an actual solution.

🅰🅻🅸🅲🅴 (🌈🦄)

@alice@lgbtqia.space · 2 days ago

@stark I proposed an actual solution. It's moderated registration.

You might be surprised just how bad Nazis are at acting human.

But again, this is the wrong argument. It's not that Nazis *can't* pass for human, it's that it's not in their interest to. Doing that takes work.

In all my research and work in tech-enabled abuse, there are a few things that have been pretty universal:

- you can't stop *all* motivated attackers
- the vast majority of attackers *aren't* motivated
- it's a matter of effort vs reward (for all users)
- whoever spends less energy, on average, to get their reward wins over time

@spycrab

Spycrab

@spycrab@kolektiva.social · 2 days ago

@alice huh, that's a fair argument.

I stand corrected: We should have closed registration for most if not all mastodon instances.

Thanks for taking the time to convince me!

🅰🅻🅸🅲🅴 (🌈🦄)

@alice@lgbtqia.space · 2 days ago

@spycrab amazing! I'm so glad 💕

And fully closed registration, or even invite-only, is overkill. As are a lot of other proposals for AI or quarquarantine servers, etc. The low-hanging fruit really is to just sacrifice *some* growth speed and potential new users in order to make it a dramatically safer and more welcoming platform for everyone else in the communities here, or who is willing to put in a small amount of up-front effort.

The "but think of the hypothetical new user who would never have become a top poster here if there was moderated registration" argument is just the "life begins at conception" argument applied to social media. There are already folx here who should have the right to a Nazi-free experience.

LisPi

@lispi314@udongein.xyz · 3 days ago

@alice > It's time to close registrations and step up moderation to protect the communities you helped grow.

Please don't do this by adding email requirements, it sucks and email providers actively try to dox oneself if one uses means of anonymizing oneself or otherwise protecting one's privacy.

🅰🅻🅸🅲🅴 (🌈🦄)

@alice@lgbtqia.space · 3 days ago

@lispi314 no, just move to moderated registration and spend 5 seconds reviewing applicants.

BT Free Social

BT Free is a non-profit organization founded by @ozoned@btfree.social . It's goal is for digital privacy rights, advocacy and consulting. This goal will be attained by hosting open platforms to allow others to seamlessly join the Fediverse on moderated instances or by helping others join the Fediverse.

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