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Why decentralization doesn't work for forums (nightash.net)
submitted 1 day ago* (last edited 1 hour ago) by to c/fediverse@lemmy.world
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I think federation and decentralization work well for email and text-messaging platforms like XMPP and Matrix because those platforms inherently benefit from being decentralized. They work almost seamlessly with federation.

Forums, on the other hand, don’t really need a federated system. Just look at Lemmy and how many communities defederate from one another because of ideological disagreements. When there’s that much defederation, the entire concept starts to feel pointless. Suddenly, you can’t use your account across “Lemmy” because several instances have decided they don’t like each other anymore.

If this much fragmentation is going to happen naturally, how is federation supposed to be the sustainable future of forums?

I think this is a fair criticism of federated forums. You don’t see this same level of fragmentation with email or text messaging.

Centralized but well-moderated forums are what really matter. Federation doesn’t protect good or useful speech, quality moderation does. And by its nature, Lemmy lacks that.

EDIT: There may have been a misunderstanding on my part on what defederation exactly means in the context of Lemmy

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[–] 6 points 1 day ago (4 children)

In case the OP isn't a troll...

Do you know why aquariums need to keep oxygenated? That's because the type of life that is put there usually needs the oxygen dilluted in the water to be able to breath. If oxygen is lacking, what's effectively swamp water starts forming, water where few life forms can thrive.

Multiple forums I've seen become a metaphorical swamp water because there was barely any renewal in userbase, all the while the original userbase grew tired.

Moderation's also a hit or a miss, and when a forum's slowing to a halt, even a good moderation can make things worse.

OP's discourse also makes it seem like defederation is being used rampantly and without care across the fediverse. But from my experience at least, usually it's a last measure act, even when communities are ideological opposites.

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  • [–] 7 points 1 day ago (1 child)

    I've come to the conclusion that @parallelminds@lemmy.world assumes a defedation splits the network into two islands completely isolated from each other. They don't seem ti understand that a defederation only affects the two instances themselves, nothing else.

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  • [–] [S] -2 points 1 day ago (1 child)

    I am not a troll, I have put my money where my mouth is and hosted my own forum nightash.net, of which I crossposted the article here.

    You’re treating federation like it creates fresh users, but it doesn’t. It lets existing users move between communities; it doesn’t guarantee new people will find or join them. Centralized forums can have user turnover too, through visibility and a larger audience.

    And the aquarium analogy cuts both ways: if defederation closes the flow between communities, then the ‘oxygen’ isn’t reaching everyone anyway. Calling it a last resort doesn’t change that users on either side can lose access to each other, or that they can’t take their account with them. That’s still fragmentation, just with a nicer plumbing metaphor

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  • [–] 6 points 1 day ago

    Defederation would be more akin to a country cutting ties with another in international relationships, when this other country keeps causing trouble, or when making concessions for its problems makes the problems spill over or the bureaucratic cost to become too high. There's still, in this analogy, another 200-ish countries to have relationships with.

    In the oxygenating analogy, instead of just one waterwheel, oxygen-blowing tube, small waterfall, or the sort, it's multiple ones. And if one source starts pumping CO2, motor oil, sucking up liquid instead of giving oxygen/oxygenated air to the aquarium, or whatever, this source can be cut without stopping the oxygenating.

    And the nature of the protocol and the services that use it also allow people to come over from elsewhere. What I meant, far from "creating users", is to open venues which people can find the platforms of the network, and for the people already in the network to have access to places otherwise barren, and that by interacting with, they can bump into relevance.

    On linking externally, from my experience, it's not uncommon for example in places like Pixiv for creators to link their socials, fediverse ones like Mastodon and Misskey included. You can also connect to other protocols such as Bluesky through bridges. Commercial projects such as Threads and Wordpress also have optional ActivityPub integration which would allow more people to join in or at least be aware of. And the services using the protocol are also niche-based but rarely alienating their userbases regarding other places in the network.

    And on bigger forums having a larger audience, they usually do so by being so big they cannibalize competition (even if potentially not intentionally) while keeping their userbases in a walled garden. But when alternatives die out, and what's left enshittify, people have nowhere to run. But when Reddit started going from bad to worse, a lot of people found here as an alternative. Similarly, Twitter's at least kinda shitty since always, and very few altenatives stuck around, Mastodon being one of them.

    And from what I can notice, the centralizing platforms, even the bigger ones, are either shrinking (e.g. Reddit), already shrunk (e.g. Facebook), or show indications that they may be shrinking (e.g. Discord allowing search engine indexing, and Meta allowing to sign up on Threads with their other services). And places that stay strong despite being centralizing usually offer more than just the forum experience or adjacents.

    But once more, unless I've missed it, defederation is very sporadic. And when used, it is usually done so to keep the instance healthy within their culture.

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