Just an occasional reminder that disabling replies is the #1 requested feature from Mastodon.
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@julian @stefan A reply isn't really pushed into the fediverse exactly, it's just delivered to the followers of the person replying. And most of those will ignore it unless they also follow the OP.
If it's not okay for you from a trust and safety perspective, you can always just not do it and leave the feature only for those for whom its fine or preferable.
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@stefan right so the feature is actually "ignore replies to this post"
@shironeko Ignoring them still keeps them visible to others though.
I mean look, not much more here to add, we're discussing the top most upvoted feature request. I think we can trust that people need this.
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@mina Yes, exactly.
But even with the best moderation in the world, having to wait for someone to come to your rescue while the abuse piles on, I can imagine that being off-putting enough.
Have you come across this explanation of the "Sucker-punch Problem"? It's illustrating a bit different point, but I think also explains really well why people having tools to defend themselves is important.
🅰🅻🅸🅲🅴 (🌈🦄) (@alice@lgbtqia.space)
Why reactive moderation isn't going to cut it, aka, "The Sucker-punch Problem". Imagine you invite your friend—let's call him Mark—to a club with you. It's open-door, which is cool, because you like when a lot of folx show up. Sure, it might get a little rowdy, but they have a bouncer, and you've never seen things getting out of hand. So, you're busy dancing when a new guy walks in wearing a "I Hate Mark" shirt and promptly sucker-punches Mark. You didn't see it happen, but Mark is upset and tells the bouncer, who kicks the guy out. A few minutes later, the same guy walks back in and sucker-punches Mark again. Same result. Some people in the club say they'll tell the bouncer if they see him come in again. Mark wants to leave, but you tell him it's not that bad—after all, you've never been punched, and you didn't see Mark get punched, so maybe he's just being sensitive. A different guy walks in wearing a "I Plan On Punching Mark" shirt. No one tells the bouncer, because they've never seen *this* guy punch Mark. He sucker-punches Mark. At this point, Mark is pissed and yelling about being punched. The club members talk about putting up a "No Punching Mark" sign, but the owner is worried it'll hurt his club's growth. Another Mark in the club proposes they turn away anyone wearing an anti-Mark shirt or espousing anti-Mark rhetoric at the door, but this gets shot down for the same reason as the sign idea—then someone sucker-punches him. By the end of the night, your friend Mark is beat to fuck and says he'll never come to this club again. In fact, he's going to tell anyone named Mark to stay clear of this place. The next time you go to the club, half the folx there are wearing "I Kill Marks" shirts, but there aren't any Marks there, so it doesn't come up. I've been sucker-punched every day, for the last three days in a row by some of the most vile hate-speech and imagery. The accounts are using open registration servers and signing up with variations on the username "heilhitler1488". I fully expect it'll continue as long as we have open registration servers. And no, username pattern blocking alone won't fix this, it'll help a little, but mostly it'll just make them wear a different shirt while they sucker-punch us. #OpenRegistrationHurts
LGBTQIA.Space (lgbtqia.space)
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@stefan I'll take limiting who can reply over denying replies outright, just feels a bit like you want a shortform blog with comments turned off in that case. Could work with some stuff but then it's basically an RSS feed so maybe not much use for a read-only experience on something that encourages read-write like Mastodon.
@nini Yes, this is a common argument against reply controls, but I honestly don't get the issue. If this is how some people want to use social media, so be it. I don't feel the need to reply to everything I read online. If I see something that bothers me, I can always report it.
Plus, maybe some people don't want replies, but will allow quote-boosting? Maybe that works better for some, this is really more about giving people the freedom to decide.
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Really takes the whole social thing out of social.
@renwillis Well, if you think of Mastodon as a "micro blog", and blogs can have their comments disabled, or approved individually, or only allowed for people with privileges, it does kind of make sense?
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wrong comparison, I guess...
I'd consider a blog being similar to a newspaper and comments being like readers letters... unsuitable for discussion between blogger and different readers to each other...
bloggers writing crap are simply ignored, tooters writing crap are spread through federal and local timelines to hundreds of thousands like on Twitter.
Such crappy tooters will block replies requiring hundreds of thousand to take action by blocking/reporting... happy times for mods
@manankanchu I think it's a good comparison. Just like I don't owe anyone space on my blog, I also don't owe anyone my time or my audience in my replies here. Or if I print my own newspaper, I don't have to publish every letter to the editor that I receive.
"requiring hundreds of thousand to take action"
As opposed to hundreds of thousands posting the same condescending responses?
You see something that's breaking your server's rules, you report it and move on. You see something you don't like or agree with? You can just move on. Not everything posted online requires a response.
I think this just comes down to people wanting to set their boundaries, and we should all learn to respect that.
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@nini Yes, this is a common argument against reply controls, but I honestly don't get the issue. If this is how some people want to use social media, so be it. I don't feel the need to reply to everything I read online. If I see something that bothers me, I can always report it.
Plus, maybe some people don't want replies, but will allow quote-boosting? Maybe that works better for some, this is really more about giving people the freedom to decide.
@stefan Choice is not bad, just seems a very blunt instrument.
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@stefan Choice is not bad, just seems a very blunt instrument.
@nini I hear you, but I have seen far too many people leave because of issues that would've been solved if they had more control over their replies.
And then they tell their friends and those will never give the fediverse a fair chance.
I think people are willing to put up with a lot. Bluesky doesn't let you edit your messages. There is a higher character limit. Translation features are just a link to Google Translate.
But people feel safe there.
I don't even care about the fediverse "growing". I just want people who are already here to feel safe and welcome.
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@nini I hear you, but I have seen far too many people leave because of issues that would've been solved if they had more control over their replies.
And then they tell their friends and those will never give the fediverse a fair chance.
I think people are willing to put up with a lot. Bluesky doesn't let you edit your messages. There is a higher character limit. Translation features are just a link to Google Translate.
But people feel safe there.
I don't even care about the fediverse "growing". I just want people who are already here to feel safe and welcome.
@stefan My objection isn't towards implementing it's a big issue for those who want it and people have their reasons for having the option to control who can interact with their toots besides harassment like just not wanting a reply to a recent toot they made or limiting it to their mutuals. I just feel like it could work in tandem with stronger moderation as read-only toots make me feel despondent, like people don't feel safe but it is just one tool after all.
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Just an occasional reminder that disabling replies is the #1 requested feature from Mastodon.
https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/issues?q=is%3Aissue%20state%3Aopen%20sort%3Areactions-%2B1-desc
Limiting who can reply is also worth giving a thumbs-up to, currently at #10.
Enable Twitter-style Reply Controls on a Per-Toot Basis · Issue #14762 · mastodon/mastodon
Pitch Twitter's reply model has been extended with some LJ-like features. Replies to a tweet can now be restricted to: Replies only from accounts @-mentioned in the tweet Replies only from accounts followed by the sender of the tweet and...
GitHub (github.com)
#mastodon #fediverse #ReplyControls #SocialMedia #TrustAndSafety
I would love that.
Also, Mastodon is (somewhat) behind the times on this one. GoToSocial already has similar settings, and one might even argue that they're more powerful than simply turning replies on or off from the compose box, depending on what "powerful" is supposed to mean. I actually don't really care, though; there's no reason why you shouldn't be able to have this, and the "toggle switch" at the same time; it's not like they're mutually exclusive (or should be).
I'd rather have both.
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@stefan My objection isn't towards implementing it's a big issue for those who want it and people have their reasons for having the option to control who can interact with their toots besides harassment like just not wanting a reply to a recent toot they made or limiting it to their mutuals. I just feel like it could work in tandem with stronger moderation as read-only toots make me feel despondent, like people don't feel safe but it is just one tool after all.
@nini Oh absolutely, I think we need both tools for "self-defense", and better tools for moderators as well.
Have you seen the latest Mastodon roadmap by any chance?
> Moderation tools
> Looking at ways to make moderation easier, e.g. shared block lists.Sounds promising!
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@mina Yes, exactly.
But even with the best moderation in the world, having to wait for someone to come to your rescue while the abuse piles on, I can imagine that being off-putting enough.
Have you come across this explanation of the "Sucker-punch Problem"? It's illustrating a bit different point, but I think also explains really well why people having tools to defend themselves is important.
🅰🅻🅸🅲🅴 (🌈🦄) (@alice@lgbtqia.space)
Why reactive moderation isn't going to cut it, aka, "The Sucker-punch Problem". Imagine you invite your friend—let's call him Mark—to a club with you. It's open-door, which is cool, because you like when a lot of folx show up. Sure, it might get a little rowdy, but they have a bouncer, and you've never seen things getting out of hand. So, you're busy dancing when a new guy walks in wearing a "I Hate Mark" shirt and promptly sucker-punches Mark. You didn't see it happen, but Mark is upset and tells the bouncer, who kicks the guy out. A few minutes later, the same guy walks back in and sucker-punches Mark again. Same result. Some people in the club say they'll tell the bouncer if they see him come in again. Mark wants to leave, but you tell him it's not that bad—after all, you've never been punched, and you didn't see Mark get punched, so maybe he's just being sensitive. A different guy walks in wearing a "I Plan On Punching Mark" shirt. No one tells the bouncer, because they've never seen *this* guy punch Mark. He sucker-punches Mark. At this point, Mark is pissed and yelling about being punched. The club members talk about putting up a "No Punching Mark" sign, but the owner is worried it'll hurt his club's growth. Another Mark in the club proposes they turn away anyone wearing an anti-Mark shirt or espousing anti-Mark rhetoric at the door, but this gets shot down for the same reason as the sign idea—then someone sucker-punches him. By the end of the night, your friend Mark is beat to fuck and says he'll never come to this club again. In fact, he's going to tell anyone named Mark to stay clear of this place. The next time you go to the club, half the folx there are wearing "I Kill Marks" shirts, but there aren't any Marks there, so it doesn't come up. I've been sucker-punched every day, for the last three days in a row by some of the most vile hate-speech and imagery. The accounts are using open registration servers and signing up with variations on the username "heilhitler1488". I fully expect it'll continue as long as we have open registration servers. And no, username pattern blocking alone won't fix this, it'll help a little, but mostly it'll just make them wear a different shirt while they sucker-punch us. #OpenRegistrationHurts
LGBTQIA.Space (lgbtqia.space)
This is an excellent text.
As I understand it, it emphasizes the current problem we're facing in the Fediverse.
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I would love that.
Also, Mastodon is (somewhat) behind the times on this one. GoToSocial already has similar settings, and one might even argue that they're more powerful than simply turning replies on or off from the compose box, depending on what "powerful" is supposed to mean. I actually don't really care, though; there's no reason why you shouldn't be able to have this, and the "toggle switch" at the same time; it's not like they're mutually exclusive (or should be).
I'd rather have both.
@the Yeah, it's been a bit frustrating seeing Mastodon, being the far more popular platform, lag behind GTS in this.
It's unfortunate GTS hasn't gained more traction, maybe we'd be in a different position and not have so many people flee to Bluesky, or even back to Twitter/X.
Hopefully not too late to get things right.
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@mina Absolutely! The metaphor is so visceral, I think people wo don't deal with abuse daily can really understand the issue better.
My go-to response now when people appear confused why anyone would want better self-defense tools.
(But yes, as the story mainly highlights, good moderation is a must as well.)
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@shironeko Ignoring them still keeps them visible to others though.
I mean look, not much more here to add, we're discussing the top most upvoted feature request. I think we can trust that people need this.
@stefan ignoring is what you are describing yeah? again, replies are distributed by the replier's server, you have no control over it. -
@stefan ignoring is what you are describing yeah? again, replies are distributed by the replier's server, you have no control over it.
@shironeko I see what you mean. I guess you can put it that way. So all the servers that respect reply controls will "ignore" the reply and not display it, making it basically invisible to the original poster and pretty much all their followers.
Outdated servers and servers set up to purposefully ignore reply controls can be blocked.
Seems like a pretty good solution.
