ou might have seen that we’ve been defederated from beehaw.org. I think there’s some necessary context to understand what this means to the users on this instance.

How federation works

The way federation works is that the community on beehaw.org is an organization of posts, and you’re subscribed to it despite your account being on lemmy.world. Now someone posts on that community (created on beehaw.org), on which server is that post hosted?

It’s hosted on both! It’s hosted on any instance that has a subscriber. It’s also hosted on lemmy.ml, lemmygrad.ml, etc. Every instance that has a subscriber is going to have a copy of this post. That’s why if you host your own instance, you’ll often get a ton of text data just in your own server.

And the copies all stay in sync with each other using ActivityPub. So you’re reading the post that’s host on lemmy.world, and someone with an account on beehaw.org is reading the same post on beehaw.org, and the posts are kept in sync via ActivityPub. Whenever someone posts to that community or comments on a post, that data is shared to all the versions across the fediverse, and these versions are kept in sync. So up until 5 hours ago, they were the same post!

“True”-ness

A key concept that will matter in the next section is the idea of a “true” version. Effectively, one version of these posts is the “true” version, that every other community reflects. The “true” version is the one hosted on the instance that hosts the community. So the “true” version of a beehaw.org community post is the one actually hosted on beehaw.org. We have a copy, but ours is only a copy. If you post to our copy, it updates the “true” version on beehaw.org, and then all the other instances look to the “true” version on beehaw to update themselves.

The same goes for communities hosted on lemmy.world or lemmy.ml. Defederation affects how information is shared between instances. If you keep track of where the “true” version is hosted, it becomes a lot easier to understand what is going on.

How defederation works

Now take that example post from earlier, the one on beehaw.org. The “true” version of the post is on beehaw.org but the post is still hosted on both instances (again, it has a copy hosted on all instances). Let’s say someone with an account on beehaw.org comments on that post. That comment is going to be sent to every version of that post via ActivityPub, as the “true” version has been updated. That is, every version EXCEPT lemmy.world and sh.itjust.works. So users on lemmy.world and sh.itjust.works won’t get that comment, because we’ve been defederated from beehaw.org. If we write a comment, it will only be visible from accounts on lemmy.world, because we posted to a copy, but our copy is now out of sync with the “true” version. So we can appear to interact with the post, but those interactions are ONLY visible by other lemmy.world accounts, since our comments aren’t send to other versions. As the “true” version is hosted on beehaw, and we no longer get beehaw updates due to defederation, we will not see comments from ANY other community on those posts (including from other defederated instances like sh.itjust.works).

The same goes for posting to beehaw communities. We can still do that. However, the “true” version of those communities are the ones on beehaw, so our posts will not be shared to other instances via ActivityPub. And all of this is true for Beehaw users with our communities. Beehaw users can continue to see and interact with Lemmy.world communities, but those interactions are only visible to other Beehaw users, since the “true” versions of the Lemmy.world communities (the ones sent to/synced with every other instance) is the Lemmy.world one.

Communities on other instances, for example lemmy.ml, are unaffected by this. Lemmy.world and beehaw.org users will still be able to interact with those communities, but posts/comments from lemmy.world users won’t be visible to beehaw.org users, as defederation prevents our posts/comments from being sent to the version of these posts hosted on beehaw.org. However, as the “true” version is the one on the third instance, we can still see everything from beehaw.org users. So we see a more filled in version than the beehaw users.

Why can I still see posts/comments from beehaw users?

Until they defederated us, posts/comments were being sent to lemmy.world, so we can see everything from before defederation. After defederation, we are no longer receiving or sending updates. So there are now multiple versions of those posts.

Why can I still interact with beehaw communities?

This won’t ever stop. You’ll notice that all posts after defederation are only from lemmy.world users. You won’t see posts/comments from ANY other instance (including instances that ) on beehaw.org communities.

Those communities will quickly suck for us, as we’re only talking to other lemmy.world users. Your posts/comments are not being sent to any other lemmy. I highly recommend just unsubscribing from those communities, since they’re pretty pointless for us to be in right now.

Why do I still see comments from beehaw users on lemmy.world communities?

Again, comments from before defederation were still sent to us. After defederation, it will no longer be possible for beehaw users to interact with the “true” version of lemmy.world communities. Their posts/comments are not being sent to any other lemmy. They also aren’t getting updates from any other lemmy, as the “true” version of those communities is on our instance.

Why do I see posts/comments from beehaw users on communities outside lemmy.world and beehaw.org?

That’s because the “true” version of those posts is outside beehaw. So we get updates from those posts. And lemmy.world didn’t defederate beehaw, so posts/comments from beehaw users can still come to versions hosted on lemmy.world.

The reverse is not true. Because beehaw defederate lemmy.world, any post/comment from a lemmy.world users will NOT be sent to the beehaw version of the post.

This seems like it’s worse for beehaw users than for us?

Yes. In my opinion, this is an extraordinarily dumb act by the beehaw instance owners. It’s worse for beehaw users than for us, and will likely result in many beehaw users leaving that instance. They said in their post that this is a nuke, but I don’t think they fully assessed the blast area. Based on their post, I don’t think they fully understand what defederation does.

  • Pspspspspsps@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Amazing post with great info, thank you! There literally nothing in UI to let people know this is how it works tho and relies on words of mouth sharing. Communities essentially look exactly the same but like there’s been no activity unless lemmy.world users post in it so you have to be able to guess posts are on a defederated instance or be hypervigilant in checking usernames if you haven’t seen any posts about it, or are a new user in a week when this is t discussed as frequently. This is a huge oversight tbh and leaves me feeling a little uneasy. With more questions.

    For example the LGBTQ community hosted on beehaw. Hypothetically say all of us genuine users who are aware of this unsubscribe because we find other communities that allow us to participate with a wider community. The shell community is still there, using beehaw branding, looks like a legit LGBTQ space but is now exclusively populated by trolls and unfortunate users who have missed announcements that this has happened. Nothing in the UI informs anyone posting or commenting there that it is not the true instance, and therefore no longer moderated by the owners.

    Unaware user who already subscribed before the defederation posts a topic they want to discuss in a few weeks time, and suddenly they’re flooded with highly upvoted troll responses That post ends up on the lemmy.world local/all page and is broadcast to other users who may not be aware, and a lot of new users who have no idea this ever happened. Now Beehaw is known as a hub for homophobic trolls that allows queer users to be trolled, and the trolls know they can get away with it in that community. Sure, eventually someone will come in to let that user know what’s up and where to go, but by that time the damage is already done.

    That also leads me to question how reporting works for this type of thing. If I report a user for breaking sub rules on the false version, who does that report go to? Is it a random lemmy.world mod/admin because we are both lemmy.world users in a community without beehaws mods or is it lost to the ether because there’s no longer a connection to beehaw mods? If it goes to world mods, what if someone violates the subs rules that are still shown on the false instance, but not lemmy.world rules? My understanding was that moderation happened in communities by the host instance so does that mean these shell communities are completely unmoderated? That makes me feel very uncomfortable that these shell communities are even still available to world users, if it is the case, and should be cause for a mutual defederation until it’s addressed but I’d like to have my reasoning corrected here if I’m off base. I’m still learning but this has me a little concerned so would appreciate being corrected if I’m wrong.

    Edit: people are misunderstanding what I’m saying in the comments.

    Who is moderating posts made by lemmy.world users in ‘false’ beehaw communities since the official beehaw moderators can no longer see these posts?

    https://lemmy.world/post/172609

    https://lemmy.world/post/167045

    https://lemmy.world/post/158352

    https://lemmy.world/post/185750

    https://lemmy.world/post/162320

    • Claidheamh@slrpnk.net
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      1 year ago

      You can click the little colourful fediverse icon, and it will always bring you to the “true” version of the post.

      • Pspspspspsps@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        So who moderates those posta? Is that shown before making a post or comment or does a user have to mistakenly post and then see the ‘true’ post doesn’t exist to work it out?

        I use jerboa app so that icon doesn’t exist at all, which is more an issue for jerboa developers but from a phone/app user perspective, there is absolutely no way to identify a sub has been defederated without switching accounts to a federated account.

        • Claidheamh@slrpnk.net
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          1 year ago

          The “true” posts that show when you click the fediverse icon? They’re moderated by the instance they’re hosted in.

              • Pspspspspsps@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                Lemmy.world users can post a d comment in the local version of beehaw communities.

                I joined the LGBTQ community, and there has been posts made by other lemmy.world since the defederation that are only visible to other lemmy.world users.

                Who moderates those posts now, because the lgbt@beehaw community was previously moderated by beehaw mods. Now those mods do not see those posts and they are not on beehaw servers, only Lemmy.world servers. But Lemmy.world never had moderators for that community because it was a beehaw community

                Edit: example

                • goat@sh.itjust.works
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                  1 year ago

                  From my understanding the comments from other instances, like lemmyworld, won’t even actually appear. You can still see your own, but no one elses.