Skip Navigation
New to Lemmy @lemmy.ca
arakhis_ @feddit.org

What permissions do instances have over the communities on it?

If there would "hypothetically" be an instance owner(like what even is that, just a guy or group having servers somewhere?) that censores in bad faith, could it do that to the communities on there too? Could they just take out certain communities or delete content on it, affect the responsive moderators, etc?

Like how do I know I'm not on a community dependent on u/spez filtering out everything about insurance for his corpo bros?

I hope my questins make sense

11 comments

  • Pretty much total, if the admin or admins want to exercise it.

    It's on their hardware (literally or figuratively), and they're responsible for what happens on their instance (up to a point).

    However, that's not all instances, at least not in a practical sense. I can't remember which ones are which, but some of them are set up where no single person can engage in fuckery without being checked. Yeah, at some point someone could pull a literal plug, or otherwise flip the table on that, but it isn't going to be easy.

    The good thing is that it doesn't matter. I'm on sh.itjust.works. If it folds today, with no warning, all I lose is my user history. Even that, it's really only the ones thaw are only on this instance. The stuff on other ones is still there, I just can't do anything with it.

    But I could, if I hadn't already, just sign up on another one, and by way of being a prolific bastard, not skip a beat. Since I regularly export my info, subscriptions and blocks and such (I can't recall what all does and doesn't get transferred), I can just import that to wherever, and it really isn't noticeable on my end.

    However, it's on me if in not backing up my comments that I feel have value. Same as on any platform, there's no guarantee of tomorrow. You always back up anything you want to keep that isn't already on your own hardware. My two accounts under my pen name, I copy/paste everything I write into a notepad and back up those files.

    Of equal import is that once a given instance goes too crazy, it's likely to get defederated. So one that goes deep into censorship won't be a major problem for long, and that's been the case a few times.

    • Good explanation. On top of that, there's !yepowertrippinbastards@lemmy.dbzer0.com to call out power tripping admins

    • I wish instances would focus more on being transparent about their hosting.

      And also I dream about governments to finance some to be independent and give the best security for data storage

      Another question: do the initial developers have even more permission to engage in questionable behavior? For example I could think of global admin rights or instance control or data control over global metrics to use them in shady ways for example politically

      • Honestly, most of them are pretty transparent. It isn't necessarily stickied and at the top of every page, but all of the bigger ones have some degree of public disclosure of the basics. Sh.itjust.works in particular had a primary admin that's very open about pretty much everything.

        .ml, despite having other issues, is fairly open about their hosting.

        Which, since the lemmy developers run that specific instance, leads into your new question.

        The developers have no more control or influence on what instances do than any random instance does on another. The worst they could do is stop developing the project. At that point, it would be likely that someone would fork it and lemmy as a whole would move on. I know that there's a handful of people that have a plan in place for that should the devs give up, or take the project in a direction that would be harmful to the rest of lemmy.

        That's a big benefit of the fediverse in general, it's open source. Even if the devs wanted to play silly buggers, it would get spotted pretty quick by the folks that have skill in that area, and lemmy in specific runs high to the kind of folks that do review code.

        And, tbh, while I've had the occasional political disagreement with the devs (the main one, really), they've always given solid indication of practicing what they preach regarding lemmy. I've never seen them try anything to use their position as developers to muscle any instances at all, nor users on other instances.

        Hell, I've had strong disagreements with dessalines on .ml, and never gotten a permanent ban. The only ban I ever got there was temporary, from a single community, and was deserved as I did break community rules. So, I don't necessarily like the devs, and I definitely don't agree with aspects of their political views, but they really haven't shown any desire or intent to use lemmy shadily.

      • I wish instances would focus more on being transparent about their hosting.

        What would like more than this kind of transparency? https://lemmy.zip/post/35411310

        For example I could think of global admin rights or instance control or data control over global metrics to use them in shady ways for example politically

        There are no global admins.

        Lemmy.ml admins are known for ban-site bans over political stances: https://feddit.nl/post/16246531

        Their decisions are limited to their instance and have no impact on the other instances and communities.

      • I bang on about this too often, but I really wish the distributed (as opposed to decentralized) web would take off. Everyone using it also contributing to its storage; no need for funds for hosting, or any "hosts" at all.

        ZeroNet was great for this. Click one button: now you have your own site! No hosting contracts / fees etc. Mirrored for free by visitors.

        But ZeroNet's been in terminal decline since its developer disappeared.

11 comments