I don’t really agree that it’s an attempt to centralize the fediverse but I do think that the push and praise for it feels extremely unnatural, especially how people are bragging about liking and wanting the reputational features of it, and being able to hide the modlog. Like dude those are the biggest reasons people left Reddit, and now suddenly “people” are just going gaga for those same anti-features. That seems more than fishy to me…
Comment on Just started a community for those who wish to move away from Lemmy
WatDabney@piefed.social 4 weeks ago
My thought is that Piefed is too eager to curate my experience and too heavily promoted of late to be believably organic
It reeks of an organized, astroturfed attempt to effectively centralize the fediverse.
Draconic_NEO@lemmy.world 4 weeks ago
WatDabney@piefed.social 4 weeks ago
The reputational anti-features are part of what makes me suspicious. I agree entirely with your impression of it.
And the unnatural and extremely sudden increase in mentions - over just the last week or so, it's gone from Piefed almost never being mentioned anywhere to it being mentioned in hundreds if not thousands of threads a day. That also makes me suspicious.
The other thing though is Piefed's automated subscription feature, which, if it gains enough clout, will allow it to effectively promote or undermine, as the devs prefer, communities or even entire instances, and to erect a barrier to entry for new communities and new instances, simply by granting or withholding inclusion on its subscription lists. That's the primary thing that triggers my suspicion.
Well - that and the fact that aside from anti-features like reputation and automated subscriptions, I don't see anything notable about the software, and to the degree that it differs from lemmy or mbin, it seems if anything to be inferior, which makes the sudden flood of praise just that much more suspicious.
Skavau@piefed.social 4 weeks ago
And the unnatural and extremely sudden increase in mentions - over just the last week or so, it's gone from Piefed almost never being mentioned anywhere to it being mentioned in hundreds if not thousands of threads a day. That also makes me suspicious.
It was gaining momentum anyway, but the big reason was the collapse of lemm.ee - which held many medium-sized communities having to find a new home. A lot chose piefed.
Blaze@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 weeks ago
, I don’t see anything notable about the software, and to the degree that it differs from lemmy or mbin,
- consolidated comment view for all crossposts
- actual instance blocking
- multicommunities
irelephant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 weeks ago
- being able to move communities.
Blaze@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 weeks ago
Beehaw has been asking for better moderation tools for two years, it’s nothing new.
Also the lemm.ee admins burnout made people question how to deal with toxic users
Skavau@piefed.social 4 weeks ago
Piefed isn't a centralised system itself. There isn't just one Piefed instance.
Blaze@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 weeks ago
Following the lemm.ee announcement, moderators were looking for a way to migrate communities
Piefed had such feature: lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/45876492?scrollToComments=t…
No need to think of an organized campaign when one platform has a feature that people are looking for
MoreZombies@lemm.ee 4 weeks ago
I thought anyone could create a Piefed instance, and it can be interacted with by both mbin and Lemmy?
WatDabney@piefed.social 4 weeks ago
i presume you're questioning the assertion that it seems like an attempt to effectively centralize the fediverse?
Yes - anyone is free to start an instance.
However, a new instance is not going to get any communities on Piefed's preset list of subscrptions, nor is any community which the Piefed devs, for whatever reason, disapprove of or oppose or simply dislike. And that means that if Piefed can gain enough users (by, for instance, astroturfing the appearance of greater popularity than it in fact currently enjoys), then it will be able to effectively gatekeep the fediverse - to undermine or advance existing instances and create an insurmountable barrier to entry for new instances, by granting or withholding positions on its list of communities to which users are automatically subscribed.
Additionally, it seeks to do essentially the same thing to individual users, by instituting a karma system (something that the rest of the fediverse has not coincidentally avoided, since it was and is so easily and often abused on Reddit) and by automatically collapsing responses with 10 or more downvotes (it would be child's play to use bots to deal pit ten doenvotes to whoever one pleased). Again, if it can attract enough users, it will then have enough clout to effectively control the narrative not just in its own communities, but throughout the fediverse.
And those potentialities, in combination with the fact that Piefed has gone from being rarely if ever even mentioned at all to, in just the last few days, being mentioned hundreds if not thousands of times a day in threads on virtually any topic, makes me highly suspicious.
cm0002@lemmy.world 4 weeks ago
Piefed has gone from being rarely if ever even mentioned at all to, in just the last few days, being mentioned hundreds if not thousands of times a day in threads on virtually any topic, makes me highly suspicious.
You make interesting points, but for this specific thing, it almost certainly has to do with the .ee shutdown which was announced just a few days ago, apparently PieFed has fantastic comm transfer tooling so that’s why it’s probably been exploding in discussions since .ee has a number of large comms that are trying to figure out their next steps
WatDabney@piefed.social 4 weeks ago
That undoubtedly had some effect.
But then, look at this thread for a particularly egregious counterexample.
MoreZombies@lemm.ee 4 weeks ago
So I understand, if I created my own instance of Piefed, the original developers have backdoor access to manage my communities?
Blaze@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 weeks ago
That’s incorrect, I don’t know why the person you’re replying too is thinking this
mesitoispro@ttrpg.network 4 weeks ago
I agree.
irelephant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 weeks ago
No. Its promoted because of its fast development and extra features.
Piefed is decentralised itself.
mesitoispro@ttrpg.network 4 weeks ago
Oh goodie, they’re moving fast and breaking things…
Just what we need more of.
/s
irelephant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 weeks ago
They’re not breaking things, they just have development that doesn’t move at the speed of molasses.
mesitoispro@ttrpg.network 4 weeks ago
Maybe that’s part of what makes Lemmy so great.
They don’t change or add new features just for the heck of it to please people like you.