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Comment by ollien | Hacker News Reader

Even if you don't use Threads, when they eventually add ActivityPub support, Mastodon users' data will inevitably be harvested. Instance admins have been signing a pact[1] to defederate with Meta for this reason, in addition to the fact that they don't trust Meta to moderate their instance well enough for it to be safe to federate with.

[1] https://fedipact.online/

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> when they eventually add ActivityPub support

What does that have to do with anything? Mastodon is explicitly setup to allow all user data to be harvested. What Threads supports or doesn't support in the end has no bearing on Mastodon having all user data public.

Just like digital entertainment is set up to allow all movies and music to be downloaded for free!

If you don't like it, just don't make movies or music.

This, but unironically. If you are uncomfortable with the idea of a zero-marginal-utility medium distributing your content without your consent, you probably shouldn't make and share digital copies of your work.

I think you would agree that harvesting that information is far easier if it's being literally POST'd to your servers (which ActivityPub does) than if you're going out to scrape them, no? It's the same principle with defederation; either they're going to scrape all the data, or the data is going to be literally sent to their platform.

The point is, the idea that "don't use threads" solves the problem being presented (your data being harvested), is wrong.

I find it hard to believe they are really going to join the Fedi. With 100 million users on Threads and maybe 2 million on the Fedi, how could Meta possibly benefit? Federating could bring them trouble but no benefit.

The EU digital markets act will require "gatekeepers" like meta to provide some form of interoperability or open access. Supporting activitypub would be a way to satisfy that requirement.

But Mastodon can't possibly comply with GDPR the way it is organized. I mean Heavens you can use it without clicking on a cookie popup, they probably owe $70 billion dollars just for all the people who haven't seen a cookie popup already.

I'm assuming this is the point. Facebook can get around things like requests for deletion under the GDPR by sending that data out to the fediverse, and then reading it back in from the fediverse after they've deleted it.

and when the EU complains, they get to throw their hands in the air and say "yeah, you made us do it"

It doesn’t need a cookie popup because they aren’t using cookies for non-essential reasons, similar to how it complies with GDPR because they aren’t collecting any data beyond what is necessary for the service’s stated purpose.

I could definitely see a benefit for them from a legislative perspective. By federating with other networks, they're able to signal to lawmakers that they're not _really_ a monopoly, they're willing to pay-ball with others.

Also, isn't the 100M user figure disputed, because it's counting existing Instagram users or some such?

It is real sign ups but it is very easy to sign up. Just because you signed up doesn't mean you're going to use it regularly.

Thanks. I was going to point out that this was an existing problem in the Fediverse (there are instances that are 'unsafe' because they are either explicitly _for_ hate speech or just don't do enough to moderate it) and that the standard approach is to not federate with those instances, nor with any instance that chooses to federate with them. It's not universally popular (some people don't like the idea of 'guilt by federation') but it's necessary if your goal is to prevent your users from coming into contact with nazis.

What stops them from harvesting Mastodon users' data after they're defederated?

I mean, I guess nothing, they could absolutely still scrape data, but that's much more likely to be noticed (rather than sucking in data as part of product functionality), and is a higher barrier to entry.

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