Instance policy update: Votes are in and Xitter links are now banned on this instance
Instance policy update: Votes are in and Xitter links are now banned on this instance
Ahoy mateys!
We are closing the voting on this topic a couple of days early as the result is already conclusive., Our threshold for passing the motion was for 2/3 of voting members in favor. We have far exceeded that threshold (see below) and have a good number of overall responses, so the proposed policy change has now been approved and takes effect immediately.
Our new policy on Xitter links
- No Xitter links are to be posted on this instance from the date of this announcement.
- Workarounds such as link shorteners and alternative front-ends that resolve to Xitter posts are also banned.
- Screenshots will still be permitted as per the overwhelming number of comments in support of this option.
- Exception: In rare cases there may be a need to verify the veracity of a Xitter post. If this need arises, then you may post a https://xcancel.com/ or https://archive.is/ version of the link. Please note this option should only be used sparingly and exclusively for fact-checking purposes.
We will begin communicating this instance policy change to all our users today.
Please try to be helpful to anyone who accidentally posts a Xitter link who may not yet be aware of the policy change, and/or feel free to report in the usual way.
N.B.: For the loopholers - by "Xitter links" we mean any links to content hosted on X (formerly Twitter). Alternative Xitter front-ends are also banned under this policy, unless exception #4 applies. Edit: The ban also applies to other Xitter-owned domains such as their photo blobstore (pbs) domain at pbd.twimg.com
Thanks to everyone involved for participating in the vote!
**The final tally is as follows: **
- For:
(2), 
(7), 
(5), 
(3), 
(2), 
(1) - Against:
- Local Community: +2.6
- Outsider sentiment: Very Positive
- Total: +22.6
- Percentage: 100.00%
To break this down a little differently:
- Home instance users voted 93% in favor of the proposal (284/307)
- External instance users voted 97% in favor of the proposal (70/72 note: these are not counted, but good to know)
- Donating and vouched for users voted 100% in favor of the proposal (20/20 votes).
So alternative front ends include something like nitter?
What about posting archive links of tweets like archive.is link for a tweet?
I think either https://xcancel.com/ or https://archive.is/ is fine, but only where necessary as detailed in the original post.
I've asked this question before because I feel it's best to clarify: does this also include URLs to content hosted on related but separate services, like the image hosting CDN at
pbs.twimg.com?Thanks for the question. The ban also applies to other Xitter-owned domains such as their photo blobstore (pbs) domain.
Awesome, thanks.
now this is how you do a rule change!
- community poll
- exception for the huge perceived benefit of allowing screenshots
- workarounds and tools for when needed
- overall very well written and communicated
others (ahem) should follow the example you provided here!
Home instance users voted 93% in favor of the proposal (284/307)
Donating and vouched for users voted 100% in favor of the proposal (20/20 votes).
At least we know in this poll it is 3.07 instance users votes (1/100 non-supporting, non-vouched and non-mvp users, cannot exceed +/- 10) vs 20 donated/vouched users votes. This is definitely a fair way to poll.
right! the math is crazy rigorous and i wouldn’t expect just any random admin to be able to do all that, but it’s certaintly something to aspire towards
I've never seen such a one-sided poll. I'm very impressed.
It reaffirms my decision both to migrate here for my home instance and to start donating when I did.
Beautiful.
anarchy brother. we self select pretty hard.
This is the best place to be.
Ahem... Gestures vaguely at the nsfw handle. Aside from the obvious upsides, not federating downvotes has been pretty good. I think my reader, connect, can turn them off. Just looked, maybe it doesn't, there a "show upvotes and downvotes" button. Regardless, this is not the place for that.
It would probably be good to get a general user off lemmynsfw though. "All" is cluttered with all sorts of nonsense.
About time. Good riddance. I hope other instances follow suit. Xitter is a damn plague.
Get 'em King.
We lost nothing of value!
Here here!
Let's fucking go
As an external instance user, I would have supported this. Notable tweets can be reported on without giving any clicks to Xitter.
Out of curiosity, what was the sentiment for those who voted against? Or did they not comment?
I think they could be summarized as:
- Opposition to any form of censorship and/or concerns about "slippery slope" of banning Xitter links - i.e., what about Meta links?
- It's important to be able to post newsworthy tweets in order to hold them to account and have a record.
- Concerns about fact-checking - i.e., how can we check veracity of Twitter links if all we have is screenshots?
- Some folks wanted to ban all Xitter links, including screen shots and xcancel links, for a complete blackout.
We've tried our best to address those concerns in the policy above, which is a bit of a compromise position that tries to take as many of these concerns into account as we reasonably could. But of course some are mutually exclusive positions, so it's not going to satisfy 100% of users.
Thanks for the summary. I think the rules you listed above capture all but the first.
I mean, the first is a whataboutism so I wouldn't even consider it. I would have said, "Fine... we'll discuss meta next but we're discussing Twitter NOW. If you are objecting because we aren't including Meta, then you're not debating in good faith."
The only people I saw saying no seemed to be saying it because "you should always link to the source so people can find it", which was rightfully called out for being incredibly silly given we're talking about tweets here
So I'm going to put on my "devil's advocate" hat on for a sec, because there is a nuance here that's worth addressing.
I absolutely hate how politicians and governments use a third party, commercial social media platform to discuss and even announce policies. But it's where we are. So if shit for brains Madam President Trump makes some sort of shitty announcement on Twitter, I would agree a source is needed and, I would go so far as to say an actual twitter URL source, only because a third, third party (even xcancel.com as currently allowed) could manipulate or even change a tweet. I'm not saying they would, but having the direct unimpeachable source would be necessary.
Given the fact that tweets can't be viewed without an account, xcancel is a good compromise that can then be drilled down to its original source if needed.
Now, putting my devil's advocate hat off, it's a silly argument to vote against. I presume that the rules would allow you to post the URL in a comment or a post body, and only prohibits using a twitter URL as the source.
I was against it because I wanted to do screenshots or alternative front ends for any twitter links. You should also be able to provide an original source for a tweet, like an archive link. I didn't comment because I knew my opinion/vote on this didn't matter. Not only do the majority hate twitter (with little interest in fact-checking tweets), but I also don't donate and saw that my 1 non-donation vote equates to nothing in the comments of that thread. Now the only thing users can do is screenshots, which is pretty disappointing. This and another big mod reason is making me so disillusioned with this instance.
Seems like a great call!
Hey, there are only 20 paying users anyway, right? So were no vouchers used this time? And does a person vouching apply per vote or to the person (like is it a proxy vote or a renewable vote coupon?)
We had a total of 7 "vouched" for users (you can see this by hovering over the icons). Once a user has been vouched for, then they can participate in all votes unless that privilege is subsequently withdrawn.
Thanks for the clarification!
(I'll have to check the icons on my computer. I mainly use voyager on android and inline custom emoji support needs some work still.)
Those graphics are sick! :D
So archive links count as “alternative frontends”?
I think our preference would be to stick to xcancel.com links if you need to link for factchecking. I hadn't given much consideration to archive links though, to be honest. I'd be interested to know your thoughts on those, and I'll review the comments again on that topic. We can always tweak the policy if need be.
For clarification, is there a reason you would prefer xcancel links in particular over other frontends? I'm entirely uninformed on the matter, outside of seeing this service used relatively often and recently, compared to other Nitter instances.
I'm not the person you asked, but in my opinion, archiving services are more reliable than simple frontends, since they will continue to work even if the tweet in question is from an account that deletes or protects the tweets later, or if the account is suspended by Twitter. Considering the tumultuous relationship Twitter has with both reality and its users, this might be worth consideration too.
Congratulations
Threativore report filter has been setup for post url/body and comments. This filter will only apply to local communities. After a brief period of validating, we'll switch it to autoremove (which will provide a built-in appeal option)
Oh noooo...oh right, already had them blacklisted.
It would be nice if Lemmy had a plugin or something like that to change xitter links to xcancel.
It would be nicer if everything had that plugin.
On the server instance level, or the user application level?
On the server instance level, I can see if being an issue if it extends to other redirects, and lead to malicious abuse by the instance.
On the user application level, would be valuable. I use Lemmy Sync and it'll be a nice feature to suggest.
You can probably find an browser extension or violentmonkey script that will do it for you.
Heck yeah!
extreme W
Pronounced Zitter but like if a nazi was saying the Z
How will this be enforced?
If you post a link to twitter.com will the comment just instantly be removed? Or would it be changed to an xcancel link?
Hi fuckwit_mcbumble lol,
We are still configuring the threativore automod settings. Initially we will set it to autoreport any suspected violations for human review. Once we have confirmed it is working as expected then it will auto-remove the post or comment with a specific modlog reason to explain the policy.
I'm interested in seeing the end of this slope.