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Fragmentation has long been an issue for Android
Nice.
Ha!
Having had more time to read over the arguments in the other thread, I do think that the community c/android here on lemmy.world should be reclaimed. Maybe after a little while, so the redirect has the intended effect - it was their community, and I think it's fair to give them a little time to try and get people to consolidate to where they wish, but after that let someone else have the name.
What I do not agree with is your framing of the situation. You have instantly escalated things by insisting this was bullying when that has been confirmed to not be the case, and are trying to pin the mods who decided to do this as intentional bad / rogue actors without actually giving them a chance to resolve the situation in a manner you find acceptable. Did you even message these mods first?
Why do we need to carry over this intense hatred and assuming the worst of others from Reddit? Can't we leave this bad habit behind and try to actually solve problems reasonably before resorting to inflammatory posts?
bullying
We can disagree on the term but it was, and I still insist, essentially soft-bullying when they push bogus arguments like their instance "being better because of custom patches" and highlight that they are r/Android mods. It doesn't have to be openly malicious, in fact they were doing it while being cordial. That's still intimidation.
Crossposting my comment here, as I just noticed the conversation has moved to this thread.
I think you're mistaken on a few things here:
- The offer was not made behind closed doors, nor was there intimidation. You can see the offer here. Ultimately, moderating depends on a lot of effort by many volunteers. Lemmy moderation tools aren't quite there yet and we need each others' help to keep these communities safe and informative.
- It's a good thing to share the burden. Ruud and team are making outstanding efforts to keep lemmy.world operational, but this is very costly and arduous work. It's a good thing to distribute that load across multiple servers.
- We're working to encourage more communities transition from Reddit to Lemmy. For those of us around for the Digg to Reddit migrations (both the 2007 and 2010 waves), we're hopeful about helping solidify Lemmy's place going forward while challenging the current Reddit administrator's overbearing approach to communities for the sake of business interests. We have nothing to gain from volunteering. We just like to help foster the types of communities we ourselves like to be part of.
- Lemmy works differently from Reddit. This is perhaps the most important point that I think some folks migrating from Reddit might misunderstand. You do not need to be on the same instance as the community you're accessing! In fact, !android@lemdro.id exists within Lemmy.world. Nobody needs to make a new account, and nobody is leaving. That's the beauty of the Fediverse!
Look, this all leaves a bad look on your new instance while all of this could have been handled much more smoothly without the need for astroturfing a few days ago (I know you claim the user isn't affiliated with you, but it still felt weird that literally after that you answer with another ad for your instance "it's not us we're sorry, anyway here's why you should join us") and then coordinate this shameless closure of !android@lemmy.world over your private chat. It could have been handled in a friendly way just like many c/Technology communities coexist across instances without the need for one to feel the need to extinguish all the other "Technology"s.
Would you have a problem with the current Android community re-opening under new owners?
That will be a decision for lemmy.world admin to decide. However, I think it’s important that mergers be considered distinct from closures/abandonment. Previously on Reddit, moderators would sometimes merge their teams to keep up with workloads. This would mean locking one subreddit. If such a community were to be requested on r/redditrequest, it would be denied because it wasn’t abandoned, but instead repurposed as a way to redirect members.
Opting to fulfill such requests would be more in line with the current Reddit admin approach of overriding existing moderators. It’s a valid path to take, but one that I would be very hesitant to support. I think a community could be opened up if truly abandoned (i.e., the place it redirects has been retired and the moderators are no longer logging into the Fediverse).
It's definitely a complex issue - and totally agree, mergers are not the same.
It does feel disingenuous for you to dodge a yes or no question.
I'm not trying to be rude, but setting up a new instance without clear (edit - server level) policies and rules and no GDPR compliance and then expecting people to move over rather than choose to move doesn't look great.
If you want everyone over to your instance because of whatever reasons you should be very transparent why and have it set up appropriately before that move starts - and be plain that you don't want competing communities.
If you are happy to have multiple communities, it's easy just to say you support that.
Sorry if it sounded like a dodge (it's also 5 AM here so I'm half asleep). Certainly wasn't my intent. My opinion is that admin shouldn't be taking away communities from moderators unless they've truly abandoned, not merged. But I also recognize this will be something for each instance's admin to decide.
But the question of multiple communities in terms of starting a different one or supporting another alternative? That's great and an integral part of the Fediverse - each community will be a reflection of their particular rulesets and approaches to moderation.
Folks are absolutely welcome to access the community from other instances. There's no need to switch your login. One my fellow mods actually runs his own instance that he logs in through.
Some other options: https://lemmy.ml/c/android (probably the oldest on Lemmy) kbin.social/m/android squabbles.io/s/android
I shared some more insights about rationale for the instance in my earlier posts if you don't mind checking my history. I'd get you the links but I'm about to pass out! I didn't manage the Mike and Devgard's transition but I'd be happy to answer any questions you might have. Just leave them here and I'll respond tomorrow.
Definitely time for a sleep!
I have seen your other comments, and I think my issue is (hopefully obviously!) not at all with you, but it is the principle - the choice of multiple communities is being taken away.
For what it is worth (not much) I think you wanting to take load off .world is great, and you patiently answer people's questions and are polite and helpful. As I said, I don't mean to be rude, but if this was happening to a community I was invested in I would be angry and rightly so I think (but to be clear I have never posted on Android, and really it is the principle).
You are doing what seems to be a good job handling a tricky situation, although I think your server needs some clear policies and goals and server-level rules, clear information about funding and GDPR compliance etc. to help build trust. My personal opinion based on seeing one post is that Mike, on the other hand, is not handing this well at all - and comes across as very rude and really condescending and I have replied to his post saying this. Responses you have made compared to his are miles apart. That's just my impression, and not meant as a personal attack. I would hope he can look at how you post and learn from it. Good luck with the moderation if recent responses are how he speaks to people!
No rudeness felt here! I really do appreciate you taking the time to share your thoughts. These conversations are important. A few thoughts:
- I think we were all taken aback by some of the accusatory tone and misrepresentations in the Snoo's posts and comments here and on the first submission. Mike and Devgard are quite reasonable and considerate folks, as you can see from their approach to this thread when they thought we had been trying to promote the new community in theirs.
- In terms of instances, there's no real difference when it comes to where the community is hosted. Users still login through their home instance and content is still propagated across the Fediverse (every single federated instance hosts a cached copy of that content). This is why there's no effective difference to the end-user if an instance is relocated other than the URL becoming slightly longer (from lemmy.world/c/android to lemmy.world/c/android@lemdro.id).
- Ultimately, both teams needed help (moderation is currently significantly more tedious on Lemmy than Reddit) and using a specialized instance makes a lot of sense for the Fediverse. The alternative of leaving the older one open but less moderated would be worse considering the spam and scams already appearing (including those trying to recommend random apk files that are most assuredly malicious).
- On the GDPR, I appreciate you raising this. There are some questions and challenges that remain for all of Lemmy itself considering how content is cached across instances by default. My understanding is that this hasn't quite been settled for Mastodon either. A number of us are big fans of the GDPR, even those of us to whom it doesn't directly apply (but we often still benefit when companies implement mechanisms to come into compliance). I personally intend to investigate how Lemmy handles purged content but we should have some basic language filled out soon.
- On the instance operations, a lot of work has been done and continues toward scaling. That includes vertically (e.g., server resource specifications automatically increase and decrease as needed) and horizontally (e.g., automatically spin up separate server instances to share loads). Some of this is already in place, which has kept costs very reasonable. More is underway that should bring them down even more drastically and set it up well for higher traffic. It's currently funded by Cole who has committed to us his willingness to do so - but there are many others among us willing to chip in funding and server resources. The plan is for everything about lemdro.id to be open source - including any to have any custom code and cost-saving techniques to be published on Github, as well as to have closed administrator chats be publicly visible. The aim is for long-term longevity that could outlive anyone currently involved.
Hope you managed to get a decent sleep!
On GDPR, this is a thread from today: https://lemmy.world/post/1131665 - there is a helpful post to some other discussions. Just linking it as there are a few good observations made. Totally agree, there are seemingly a lot of challenges but I am not sure there is an appreciation of how easy it is for anyone to raise non-compliance and the consequences. I'm sure some people have a really good understanding, but I suspect some do not - especially given how vastly complex it is and the lack of urgency some people seem to treat it with.
I feel like there is a lot to learn about how to manage community transitions / mergers / transfers etc as Lemmy grows.
Not much sleep, but thanks for this! I might reach out to pick your brain on a few things GDPR related at some point, if that's alright with you.
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And !android@lemmy.world exists within lemdro.id, that's also the beauty of the Fediverse. I don't trust your instance (and I don't have to even think about it, no offense) and I, and I'm sure many too but they weren't even given a voice and you see nothing wrong with it, were already happy with our community here. You have no right to expect us to close it for you to grow your 3 days old one.
I'm sure more folks will chime in when they're awake due to time zones, but the majority who are voting on their announcement seem to be supportive thus far?
I absolutely support you setting up a new community, but absolutely don't support closing down the original one here on this instance - people should be able to decide which community they prefer. One will naturally grow to be the dominant one.
.world are transparent about funding and approach, have clear policies in place. I can't currently see any of that on .id, and the only thing I have to go off is posts you have made and the conversation around it.
To me, it feels very disingenuous and currently your instance is not at all transparent and more importantly not GDPR compliant from what I can see - therefore, how can I trust it?
Hello, I've built software to be GDPR compliant before.. so far as I can tell, NO Lemmy instance is GDPR compliant yet due to no way for the original server to delete user content from remote servers. Is this wrong?
I think you're right. Some instances do what they can to be compliant, e.g. .world have various notices and wording in place but no cookie information and consent etc.
The data and how it is transferred and processed and stored, along with deletion requests I have no idea how that is going to be compliant!
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Yea like are you fucking kidding. Why should a community of 18k people shut down on the whim of 2 people and move to a place with a fraction of the members and far less history. If they are just planning to park the community name then the admins should step in and either remove it so a new community could be made or allow someone willing to take over. Lets not skip over the fact the lemdro.id is a newer instance with no real track record either.
What they did is and should be allowed, simply because nobody has or should have the authority to prohibit them from doing it.
But it should also be the case that by abandoning the original community, they lost all claim to it, so anyone else who wants to should be free to claim it. I wouldn't be surprised if that's already the case, and if not, it should be.
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I think if the mods don’t want to have a community open they can decide to close it, fine. But parking the name so no one else can use it isn’t great. It should just be deleted and if someone wants to start one on that instance again they can. But giving people the ability to make ghost communities on any other instance to reduce competition is probably not good overall
This sounds like it could potentially turn into something like Meta getting the upper hand over some community, by making sure a link to their instance's version of the community is posted on many of these kind of parked communites. And they realistically have the time, money, influence and people to make it happen, which worries me even more. They really could just bribe people if need be.
As long as we stay open about these kinds of approaches from large tech companies, we should be okay. But it will definitely come down to the strength of each individual community mod team.
I have submitted a support ticket asking about the policy for squatting or if there is no policy noted it is best practice to introduce one. Also queried time frame to take over or set up a new community with the name. Ticket#692599.
Completely respect people who have set up a community deciding to move away from it, but then to not allow others to take it over or set up a new one is questionable I think, and has a bunch of potential issues.
Edit - to illustrate a point, I made Thrifty as it is a large Reddit community, and locked it. Someone has already contacted me to ask about it, within hours. It would not be fair or right of me to squat on it - I have obviously offered it to whoever wants it and linked to another similar sub in the meantime.
Someone should be able to claim inactive or deliberately withheld communities.
Part of the beauty of Lemmy is that you can just start a new community on a new instance. I don't like people referring to things as c/Something, because that community often exists on multiple instances. Sometimes very active on both/all. You can create a new community on another instance, with whatever rules you deem appropriate, and convince people to join you - which is what happened with !android@lemdro.id
Their logic seems pretty solid, though. The old Reddit mods didn't just claim ownership - they reached out to the !android@lemmy.world mods and made their case. The mods at !android@lemmy.world were completely free to tell them to piss off, or welcome them in, or whatever else. They chose this path, and laid out their reasons (although they weren't required to). You may not like it, or agree, but that's generally how mods are handled.
In fact, I see giving you the mod permissions as a hostile takeover by you. You were not a mod, they made their decision, and now you want to takeover all of their work.
Personally speaking, I don't agree with hostile takeovers. but honestly I feel something should be done about it. it sets a potential precedent where communities in other instances can make ghost communities and just park the name. In a perfect world, the new mods should be someone who was active in the community and not some random person who requested it but, honestly that is a lot of work, and if the moderation team didn't bother to want to do that work, I wouldn't see it unfit to have the admin team make the decision, be it nuke the community, or reassign another mod or something. Honestly though it's their instance, if they see it fit they could just choose to do nothing but, I feel it would be best for the instance to not have parked communities, especially big name communities such as Android that people would want to have as a community, it hinders growth of the instance (not that this instance is in dire need of more growth but long term)
I would be all for an addition of some sort of "Dead Community" policy(if there isn't one already, but I have not seen it). It could be as simple as communities that are intending to park have so many days before the community gets purged, or it could have a similar system that Facebook, Discord, Reddit(although they abused this policy) and other sites have where it's handled on a case by case basis upon a request being brought up.
I appreciate you taking the time to share your thoughts on this. I'd just like to clarify there was no hostile takeover! I posted a comment above with some more context, as I feel this is being somewhat misrepresented. Of course, Id welcome any reactions you have to it.
It's also worth noting that subreddit mergers weren't uncommon on reddit. Oftentimes two similar subreddits would merge as a way of combining moderation efforts (it's a lot easier to keep things in check with a larger team to cover more time zones). Despite all our gripes with how Reddit admin have been behaving as of late, even they didn't intervene on subreddit mergers by forcing one back open through redditrequest.
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Their work and the work of 18k other people that now have no say in the matter.
A valid point, but non-mods don't usually have a lot of say unless the mods choose to solicit input. It's a sign of bad mods to be sure, but one that happens all of the time. And of course, some mods will ask but just not listen.
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I really don’t see a problem with this. The mods of the new community decided they would be better off working with another instance to create a larger, central community.
Nobody was forcing the mods of the Lemmy.world group to close, nobody is forcing them to yield to Reddit mods. Communities are at the whim of the creator, not users. It’s always been the same on Reddit or any forum really.
Ok, with your logic we should also roll over for Meta when Threads takes off since they have a larger community.
I see meta/threads as a completely separate platform.
And I expect that that’s going to happen no matter what
I volunteer to take over to reopen c/android and find other volunteers from that community to moderate it.
Me too, fuck it not like I'm doing anything else tbh lol
@AlmightySnoo @Vamp thank you for your willingness to mod. Also, both of you should contact @ruud, I believe he's the admin here.
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this post was submitted on 07 Jul 2023
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