It appears to me that the current state of Lemmy is similar to other platforms when they were smaller and more insular, and that insularity is somewhat protecting it.

I browse Lemmy, and it feels a bit like other platforms did back in 2009, before they became overwhelmed and enshitified.

If I understand it correctly, Lemmy has a similar “landed gentry” moderation scheme, where the first to create a community control it. This was easily exploited on other platforms, particularly in regards to astroturfing, censorship, and controlling a narrative.

If/when Lemmy starts to experience its own “eternal September”, what protections are in place to ensure we will not be overwhelmed and exploited?

  • Unruffled [they/them]@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    23 days ago

    It depends which instance you are on. Some instances are full of mods that censor everything that doesn’t fit their ideology. Other instances are more relaxed with their moderation approaches. It definitely pays to shop around a bit before you settle on an instance that is a good fit for you.

    On dbzero we have a governance community and instance users have the right to vote out mods/admins if they are unpopular. But most instances are run in a much more top-down BDFL (benevolent dictator for life) fashion.

  • Captain Aggravated@sh.itjust.works
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    23 days ago

    On Reddit, before it went full goose step, you’d have the problem where the top mod of r/linux would be this weird open source zealot who would delete any thread that had any practicality in it. So actual discussion of using Linux would happen in r/linuxmasterrace, which was nominally a meme sub but it’s where the actual community landed. You could use Reddit’s vast namespace to steer around an individual top mod.

    You couldn’t steer around Reddit’s admin though, they have root access to the servers, they can, have and increasingly do shut things down they don’t like. It’s double plus ungood.

    Lemmy, and indeed the entire Fediverse, offers every user the Bender gambit. You can make your own instance with blackjack and hookers. There is no mechanism to shut it down everywhere. Instances are hosted by multiple people on multiple hardware platforms on multiple power grids in multiple countries under multiple jurisdictions.

    The top mod of !linux@example.lol is being a shithead? You could make !actual_linux@example.lol, or you could start !linux@lemmy.world, or you could start your own instance and then YOU are in control of who gets to be a mod on at least one instance. No one person has the power to shut down everything everywhere; you start talking about severing undersea cables at that point.

    • Aequitas38472@lemm.ee
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      23 days ago

      Isn’t this still true of Reddit though? You could just make a new subreddit if you don’t like another.

      How is it different?

      • pleasestopasking@reddthat.com
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        23 days ago

        Because at the end of the day, they’re all on Reddit. So when reddit says “you’ll get banned for upvoting content that promotes violence [against the oligarchs],” you can’t just make another subreddit because they’ll shut that one down too.

        If the admin of lemmy.world says “you’ll get banned for upvoting content that promotes violence [against the oligarchs],” then you can say okay and make luigimangione@otherlemmyinstance.com. People on Lemmy.world can still access the new site, or even leave Lemmy.world entirely if they decide they’re not down with the admin. But they can still access all of the other federated communities they were subscribed to rather than having to quit Lemmy overall.