@jdp23 @laurenshof

Hmm, it goes both ways again. What does it mean to communicate on a microblogged global public square? It represents people standing on soapboxes talking through megaphones to their follower base, and then things may spread randomly across the social graph.

For SocialHub we had the discussion about fragmentation of AP-related discussion. I linked as this is SH related. You want SocialHub to focus on fedi diversity improvement as a theme. That's great! But SH needs to know.

@jdp23

You say you don't want people to come crashing, but how can you expect that talking from a soapbox to unknown audience?

The subject of this thread was SocialHub. How should people know your preference not to spread? How is the discussion still open then as we want it to be for SH. Focused on finding solutions and fedi improvement?

Specifically the topic was "substrate formation" which @laurenshof and I brought the discussion back to in several replies.

@jdp23 @laurenshof

If we want to design a better more inclusive fediverse then we need to deeply understand the problem space and able to discuss matters that may be sensitive and controversial, in a creative environment where solutions can be brainstormed. Does a global public square where people jump in with context collapse support that?

In different social context different language is used. Were you communicating in activism / raising awareness style to an audience, or in brainstorm mode?

@jdp23 @laurenshof

That's really hard to tell, even for us directly involved, let alone for the casual passer-by seeing a toot.

It might be that in awareness raising comms style you use strong words to help get insights through people's thick skulls, and get the discussion going.

But then after when they are aware and listening, a design discussion should follow where people don't wonder in every reply "are they implying I'm racist?". Different language use helps the solution finding process.

@jdp23 @laurenshof

Different social contexts are crossed. Raise awareness, reach an audience, convey an insight. Now get together all of us to make things better.

The strong wording of e.g. "anti-Black" I see as activism language. It conveys like ppl are doing on purpose. If on SocialHub someone addresses OCaps and there's no response because no one is working on that, SH isn't "anti-OCaps". OCaps may be found highly important.

It'd be great if SH got a 'design for diversity' track going.

"What does it mean to communicate on a microblogged global public square? It represents people standing on soapboxes talking through megaphones to their follower base, and then things may spread randomly across the social graph."

This isn't a microblogging account. I make long posts and includeformatting -- and for that matter Glitch is better thought of as a community platform. And if after all these years on social networks you still think of things spreading "randomly" I don't know what to tell you.

"You say you don't want people to come crashing, but how can you expect that talking from a soapbox to unknown audience?"

I certainly can't guarantee it; when people boost posts it happens from time to time, and oh well such is life. But it's not random, there are some things that increase the likelihood, and crossposting to SocialHub on a thread where I'm talking about race is one.

"The subject of this thread was SocialHub. How should people know your preference not to spread?"

You could have noticed that I was making posts about this issue on SocialHub and had made an intentional choice to make this post here instead. More importantly though, the point I was trying to highlight was that the you sharing the link to SocialHub resulted in somebody showing up in the thread and saying racist stuff. That's a predictable potential outcome looping SocialHub into the discussion, so something that I take into account before linking to posts here from SocialHub (just as I do on Bluesky or my blog), or looping SocialHub in if and when that ever starts working.

"If we want to design a better more inclusive fediverse then we need to deeply understand the problem space and able to discuss matters that may be sensitive and controversial, in a creative environment where solutions can be brainstormed. Does a global public square where people jump in with context collapse support that?"

Yes, actually, I have good discussions about that on Bluesky too, although context collapse can be a challenge. And my discussions here (which isn't a global public square) are generally a lot better than on SocialHub.

"Were you communicating in activism / raising awareness style to an audience, or in brainstorm mode?"

I was calling you in on advocating for approvingly amplifying a view of decentrlization advocated by a fan of Curtis Yarvin who has the Peter Thiel / Marc Andreessen seal of approval.

We then proceeded to discuss the view itself, that decentralization "requires a centralized substrate".

"That's really hard to tell, even for us directly involved, let alone for the casual passer-by seeing a toot."

There's no way for you to know my intent, but it was very very easy for you to tell that I was choosing not to include SocialHub in the audience for this thread.

@smallcircles @laurenshof

"Anti-Black" doesn't imply intent. 5 things white people can do to start making the fediverse less toxic for Black people has a definition and links to a bunch of references.

"Anti-Blackness – beliefs, attitudes, actions, practices, and behaviors of individuals, institutions, software, and systems that devalue, minimize, and marginalize the full participation of Black people across the world"

But impact > intent. Active participants on #SocialHub have created an environment where Black people almost never participate. Similarly whether or not the guy who showed up in this thread intended the things he was saying to be anti-Black, they are.

It's frustrating because Hellekin clearly intended SocialHub to be an anti-racist space -- and devoted some real effort to it, working with Rhiaro and the community in a grassroots process to refine and get adoption of a very strong Values statement even though some people left as a result. And Hellekin continues to take real and concrete actions in aid of it -- kicking out Alex Gleason, actively supporting my intervention last fall in the How to make progress on the almost complete absence of Black people in SocialHub and SWICG discussions? thread.

But, alas, alnosst none of the white active participants on SocialHub make a similar effort. There were plenty of good recommendations in that about concrete straightforward things people could do as individuals and collectively to improve the situation ... but they chose not to.

And tying it back to the "centralized substrate" conversation, my guess is that you didn't intend to adopt the perspective of somebody who's advocating for universal adoption of a system grounded in stealing Native Americans property and ignoring treaties, chattel slavery and white supremacy. It's quite possible that you didn't realize the implications of him being a big fan of the white supremacist Curtis Yarvin, or realize that white surpemacists Peter Thiel and Marc Andreessen are big fans of the guy whose views you're advocating for and amplifying.

But, impact > intent. You're aligning with Thiel and Andreessen to amplifying and advocating these views, without disclosing the politics behind them. You've let these white supremacist-friendly views shape your thinknig about decentralization, and probably other issues in general. Like I said in an earlier post

"fascist tech oligarchs and their minions aren't all just stopped clocks, some are quite good at using apparently politically neutral "insights" to warp people's thinking by disguising their pro-fascist framing -- and at getting people who don't agree with their politics to amplify their propaganda. "

@smallcircles @laurenshof

@jdp23 @laurenshof

> This isn't a microblogging account

Maybe not on your end, but on mine I receive this on 100% microblog channel with unknowable (random) audience based on how things are boosted across the social graph.

Guess that make the discussion relate to the "what does it mean to be federated?" question.

> very easy for you to tell that I was choosing not to include SocialHub

No, it wasn't. You replied to a public, federated newsletter about fedi dev news, on the topic SocialHub.

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