Against [[Meta]]§

The vote has started§

Please refer to the published vote here: https://www.loomio.com/d/u1OkUA6M/clarity-on-stance-with-regards-to-threads/30. The vote was based on a snapshot of this document as it was at the time of starting the decision poll.

If you have added content since then, you will need to make sure your position makes it to the thread by voting and expressing your opinion there :)

Proposal: Move threads.net from limit to suspend§

• A draft [[vote]] for [[social.coop]].
  • Note: a vote has started. If you want to express a different position, please add yours below and call a different decision check for it.
  • Written on [[2025-01-10]].
  • Started by @flancian after community discussion, authored by many in [[Social.coop]]; this document is world-editable currently. Press the edit button on the top right to join in!
  • Will be run later today or over the weekend of the 10th of January if the community wants to wait, but we can iterate over it further with discussion in Loomio.

Statement§

Defederate from threads.net immediately, meaning applying the SUSPEND policy in Mastodon, due to their updated policies regarding permissable hate speech impacting the LGBTQ+ community and immigrants. This policy endorsed by corporation [[Meta]] is considered in violation of the Mastodon Server Covenant rule 1, and thus in breach of widely agreed on Fediverse guidelines.

Comments§

• This vote will be run on Loomio starting on the weekend of January 10th, 2025.
  • Flancian: I wrote the first draft, what do you think? You can click the edit button and make changes which can then be incorporated into the vote. Thank you!
    • I have seen some links relevant to this issue and those will follow in some order; please feel free to link your own.
  • Most of these were shared by the social.coop community or otherwise came from the Fediverse:
    • https://social.coop/@cwebber/113788266953239523 for what [[cwebber]] had to say.
    • https://hachyderm.io/@hachyderm/113802419128509218 by our respected fellows at [[Hachyderm]].
    • https://social.coop/@flancian/113798114186063032 "archiving" something that was shared by @cwebber, the coverage by Wired:
      • #go https://archive.is/BAWx7
      • https://archive.is/BAWx7#selection-2023.0-2035.225 if you want to see what they are committing to still doing.
    • https://social.coop/@eb/113805990453206360 // https://boehs.org/node/meta-censorship
      • 404media downranked
      • Already censoring criticism
      • HUGE authoritarian turn, I fully support defederating
    • https://techhub.social/@Techmeme/113800685924068235 for 404media reports.
    • https://transparency.meta.com/policies/community-standards/hateful-conduct/ Meta’s policy statement

Proposal: Grant an exception to the Social.coop "Federation abuse policy" for threads.net§

Introduction§

This is a working document for an upcoming vote to grant an exception to Social.coop’s Federation abuse policy for Threads.net.

Since its launch, Meta has met the "origin of a pattern of hate speech" criterion for defederation ("suspend" in Mastodon terminology)

With recent changes to the Meta Community Guidelines, Threads explicitly allows hate speech, including specifically "allegations of mental illness .. when based on gender or sexual orientation". So, while there was previously disagreement about whether Meta "fails to enforce policies to deal with hate speech", it is now clear that Threads meets the "lacks policies [..] to deal with hate speech" criterion, and is an "obvious candidate for silencing or suspending under the below criteria".

This proposal requests an exemption to the "Federation abuse policy", based on the large number of users on Threads.net.

It is currently: a DRAFT or work in progress. If there is consensus we will use this text to start a vote on this key issue affecting the [[social.coop]] community.

For historical context about how we got here, please see https://wiki.social.coop/wiki/Federation_with_Threads pull in the Social.coop wiki.

Against [[Meta]]§

The vote has started§

Please refer to the published vote here: https://www.loomio.com/d/u1OkUA6M/clarity-on-stance-with-regards-to-threads/30. The vote was based on a snapshot of this document as it was at the time of starting the decision poll.

If you have added content since then, you will need to make sure your position makes it to the thread by voting and expressing your opinion there :)

Proposal: Move threads.net from limit to suspend§

• A draft [[vote]] for [[social.coop]].
  • Note: a vote has started. If you want to express a different position, please add yours below and call a different decision check for it.
  • Written on [[2025-01-10]].
  • Started by @flancian after community discussion, authored by many in [[Social.coop]]; this document is world-editable currently. Press the edit button on the top right to join in!
  • Will be run later today or over the weekend of the 10th of January if the community wants to wait, but we can iterate over it further with discussion in Loomio.

Statement§

Defederate from threads.net immediately, meaning applying the SUSPEND policy in Mastodon, due to their updated policies regarding permissable hate speech impacting the LGBTQ+ community and immigrants. This policy endorsed by corporation [[Meta]] is considered in violation of the Mastodon Server Covenant rule 1, and thus in breach of widely agreed on Fediverse guidelines.

Comments§

• This vote will be run on Loomio starting on the weekend of January 10th, 2025.
  • Flancian: I wrote the first draft, what do you think? You can click the edit button and make changes which can then be incorporated into the vote. Thank you!
    • I have seen some links relevant to this issue and those will follow in some order; please feel free to link your own.
  • Most of these were shared by the social.coop community or otherwise came from the Fediverse:
    • https://social.coop/@cwebber/113788266953239523 for what [[cwebber]] had to say.
    • https://hachyderm.io/@hachyderm/113802419128509218 by our respected fellows at [[Hachyderm]].
    • https://social.coop/@flancian/113798114186063032 "archiving" something that was shared by @cwebber, the coverage by Wired:
      • #go https://archive.is/BAWx7
      • https://archive.is/BAWx7#selection-2023.0-2035.225 if you want to see what they are committing to still doing.
    • https://social.coop/@eb/113805990453206360 // https://boehs.org/node/meta-censorship
      • 404media downranked
      • Already censoring criticism
      • HUGE authoritarian turn, I fully support defederating
    • https://techhub.social/@Techmeme/113800685924068235 for 404media reports.
    • https://transparency.meta.com/policies/community-standards/hateful-conduct/ Meta’s policy statement

Proposal: Grant an exception to the Social.coop "Federation abuse policy" for threads.net§

Introduction§

This is a working document for an upcoming vote to grant an exception to Social.coop’s Federation abuse policy for Threads.net.

Since its launch, Meta has met the "origin of a pattern of hate speech" criterion for defederation ("suspend" in Mastodon terminology)

With recent changes to the Meta Community Guidelines, Threads explicitly allows hate speech, including specifically "allegations of mental illness .. when based on gender or sexual orientation". So, while there was previously disagreement about whether Meta "fails to enforce policies to deal with hate speech", it is now clear that Threads meets the "lacks policies [..] to deal with hate speech" criterion, and is an "obvious candidate for silencing or suspending under the below criteria".

This proposal requests an exemption to the "Federation abuse policy", based on the large number of users on Threads.net.

It is currently: a DRAFT or work in progress. If there is consensus we will use this text to start a vote on this key issue affecting the [[social.coop]] community.

For historical context about how we got here, please see https://wiki.social.coop/wiki/Federation_with_Threads pull in the Social.coop wiki.

Against [[Meta]]§

The vote has started§

Please refer to the published vote here: https://www.loomio.com/d/u1OkUA6M/clarity-on-stance-with-regards-to-threads/30. The vote was based on a snapshot of this document as it was at the time of starting the decision poll.

If you have added content since then, you will need to make sure your position makes it to the thread by voting and expressing your opinion there :)

Proposal: Move threads.net from limit to suspend§

• A draft [[vote]] for [[social.coop]].
  • Note: a vote has started. If you want to express a different position, please add yours below and call a different decision check for it.
  • Written on [[2025-01-10]].
  • Started by @flancian after community discussion, authored by many in [[Social.coop]]; this document is world-editable currently. Press the edit button on the top right to join in!
  • Will be run later today or over the weekend of the 10th of January if the community wants to wait, but we can iterate over it further with discussion in Loomio.

Statement§

Defederate from threads.net immediately, meaning applying the SUSPEND policy in Mastodon, due to their updated policies regarding permissable hate speech impacting the LGBTQ+ community and immigrants. This policy endorsed by corporation [[Meta]] is considered in violation of the Mastodon Server Covenant rule 1, and thus in breach of widely agreed on Fediverse guidelines.

Comments§

• This vote will be run on Loomio starting on the weekend of January 10th, 2025.
  • Flancian: I wrote the first draft, what do you think? You can click the edit button and make changes which can then be incorporated into the vote. Thank you!
    • I have seen some links relevant to this issue and those will follow in some order; please feel free to link your own.
  • Most of these were shared by the social.coop community or otherwise came from the Fediverse:
    • https://social.coop/@cwebber/113788266953239523 for what [[cwebber]] had to say.
    • https://hachyderm.io/@hachyderm/113802419128509218 by our respected fellows at [[Hachyderm]].
    • https://social.coop/@flancian/113798114186063032 "archiving" something that was shared by @cwebber, the coverage by Wired:
      • #go https://archive.is/BAWx7
      • https://archive.is/BAWx7#selection-2023.0-2035.225 if you want to see what they are committing to still doing.
    • https://social.coop/@eb/113805990453206360 // https://boehs.org/node/meta-censorship
      • 404media downranked
      • Already censoring criticism
      • HUGE authoritarian turn, I fully support defederating
    • https://techhub.social/@Techmeme/113800685924068235 for 404media reports.
    • https://transparency.meta.com/policies/community-standards/hateful-conduct/ Meta’s policy statement

Proposal: Grant an exception to the Social.coop "Federation abuse policy" for threads.net§

Introduction§

This is a working document for an upcoming vote to grant an exception to Social.coop’s Federation abuse policy for Threads.net.

Since its launch, Meta has met the "origin of a pattern of hate speech" criterion for defederation ("suspend" in Mastodon terminology)

With recent changes to the Meta Community Guidelines, Threads explicitly allows hate speech, including specifically "allegations of mental illness .. when based on gender or sexual orientation". So, while there was previously disagreement about whether Meta "fails to enforce policies to deal with hate speech", it is now clear that Threads meets the "lacks policies [..] to deal with hate speech" criterion, and is an "obvious candidate for silencing or suspending under the below criteria".

This proposal requests an exemption to the "Federation abuse policy", based on the large number of users on Threads.net.

It is currently: a DRAFT or work in progress. If there is consensus we will use this text to start a vote on this key issue affecting the [[social.coop]] community.

For historical context about how we got here, please see https://wiki.social.coop/wiki/Federation_with_Threads pull in the Social.coop wiki.

Against [[Meta]]§

The vote has started§

Please refer to the published vote here: https://www.loomio.com/d/u1OkUA6M/clarity-on-stance-with-regards-to-threads/30. The vote was based on a snapshot of this document as it was at the time of starting the decision poll.

If you have added content since then, you will need to make sure your position makes it to the thread by voting and expressing your opinion there :)

Proposal: Move threads.net from limit to suspend§

• A draft [[vote]] for [[social.coop]].
  • Note: a vote has started. If you want to express a different position, please add yours below and call a different decision check for it.
  • Written on [[2025-01-10]].
  • Started by @flancian after community discussion, authored by many in [[Social.coop]]; this document is world-editable currently. Press the edit button on the top right to join in!
  • Will be run later today or over the weekend of the 10th of January if the community wants to wait, but we can iterate over it further with discussion in Loomio.

Statement§

Defederate from threads.net immediately, meaning applying the SUSPEND policy in Mastodon, due to their updated policies regarding permissable hate speech impacting the LGBTQ+ community and immigrants. This policy endorsed by corporation [[Meta]] is considered in violation of the Mastodon Server Covenant rule 1, and thus in breach of widely agreed on Fediverse guidelines.

Comments§

• This vote will be run on Loomio starting on the weekend of January 10th, 2025.
  • Flancian: I wrote the first draft, what do you think? You can click the edit button and make changes which can then be incorporated into the vote. Thank you!
    • I have seen some links relevant to this issue and those will follow in some order; please feel free to link your own.
  • Most of these were shared by the social.coop community or otherwise came from the Fediverse:
    • https://social.coop/@cwebber/113788266953239523 pull for what [[cwebber]] had to say.
    • https://hachyderm.io/@hachyderm/113802419128509218 pull by our respected fellows at [[Hachyderm]].
    • https://social.coop/@flancian/113798114186063032 pull "archiving" something that was shared by @cwebber, the coverage by Wired:
      • #go https://archive.is/BAWx7
      • https://archive.is/BAWx7#selection-2023.0-2035.225 if you want to see what they are committing to still doing.
    • https://social.coop/@eb/113805990453206360 pull // https://boehs.org/node/meta-censorship
      • 404media [downranked](https://infosec.exchange/@josephcox/113793118983543473 pull)
      • Already censoring criticism
      • HUGE authoritarian turn, I fully support defederating
    • https://techhub.social/@Techmeme/113800685924068235 pull for 404media reports.
    • https://transparency.meta.com/policies/community-standards/hateful-conduct/ Meta’s policy statement

Proposal: Grant an exception to the Social.coop "Federation abuse policy" for threads.net§

Introduction§

This is a working document for an upcoming vote to grant an exception to Social.coop’s Federation abuse policy for Threads.net.

Since its launch, Meta has met the "origin of a pattern of hate speech" criterion for defederation ("suspend" in Mastodon terminology)

With recent changes to the Meta Community Guidelines, Threads explicitly allows hate speech, including specifically "allegations of mental illness .. when based on gender or sexual orientation". So, while there was previously disagreement about whether Meta "fails to enforce policies to deal with hate speech", it is now clear that Threads meets the "lacks policies [..] to deal with hate speech" criterion, and is an "obvious candidate for silencing or suspending under the below criteria".

This proposal requests an exemption to the "Federation abuse policy", based on the large number of users on Threads.net.

It is currently: a DRAFT or work in progress. If there is consensus we will use this text to start a vote on this key issue affecting the [[social.coop]] community.

For historical context about how we got here, please see https://wiki.social.coop/wiki/Federation_with_Threads pull in the Social.coop wiki.

• [[2025-01-10 22:08:48]] [[@flancian:matrix.org]] (link):
  • yes; I will start a thread now about this vote and we can work on it/copy the content of [[against meta]] over

• [[rmdes@mstdn.social]] https://mstdn.social/@rmdes/110566998743309502 pull

• [[2023-01-07 22:15:00+00:00]] @[[metamitya]]: https://twitter.com/metamitya/status/1611848907818168321 pull

Pulling out useful information from Gravity Forms entry meta§

This is always painful.

Plonking a query here that helped me out when accessing info from Gravity Forms SQL.

select
  (select meta_value from wp_gf_entry_meta where meta_key = 1 and entry_id=wp_gf_entry.id) as email,
  (select meta_value from wp_gf_entry_meta where meta_key = 3 and entry_id=wp_gf_entry.id) as message,
  source_url, date_created
from wp_gf_entry inner join wp_gf_entry_meta on wp_gf_entry.id = wp_gf_entry_meta.entry_id
where wp_gf_entry.id in (select wp_gf_entry_meta.entry_id from wp_gf_entry_meta where form_id = 17 and wp_gf_entry_meta.meta_value like '%offers%')
 group by email, message, source_url, date_created
order by date_created asc

Reminder: abolish Meta.§

A : blog post

Date published : [2026-04-13 Mon]

It shouldn’t be news to anyone that Meta is a bad actor[^fn:1]. The recent ruling that Meta deliberately designs addictive products[^fn:2] is just the latest in a long litany of sins.

But it’s hard to escape Meta. Think about the Meta products around you for a second (Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, Messenger, Threads). Someone in your family probably uses Facebook to see what’s new; some of your friends probably use Instagram to share their lives; your community group probably uses Facebook and WhatsApp to organise itself; someone near you probably uses Facebook to advertise their events; and your neighbours probably use Facebook Marketplace to trade things locally. In fact, you probably use a Meta product yourself, reluctantly or not, given that somewhere around a third to a half of the world uses one of them monthly[^fn:3]. We’re all tangled up in Meta’s net one way or another.

So: Meta’s bad. It’s not a secret. But still everyone uses it. How come? First off, it’s a monopoly, with a network effort as strong as the gravitational pull of a black hole. Secondly, Meta has boundless resources with which to capture and control. And thirdly: the things that people use Meta products for are genuinely worthwhile[^fn:4].

Meta provides a tightly integrated stack of tools for communication, coordination, information discovery and market activity. All of this can be socially useful. Yet the harms will always outweigh the benefits when it’s mediated by a capitalist megacorp with a narrow, shallow, ulterior motive: growth, profit and return on investment[^fn:5].

Our goal should be to abolish Meta as an organisation, but not necessarily the functions that it provides. There’s plenty of scope for the rebuilding and recoding of those in a socially useful and environmentally stable way.

How to do so? We need to pursue the triad of digital transformation to resist, regulate and recode Meta[^fn:6]. This will involve tactics of digital rupture and resistance[^fn:7], digital regulation and reform[^fn:8], and digital alternative-building[^fn:9]. Systemic change needs all three: to abolish Meta, we’ll need to work within Meta, against Meta, and beyond Meta[^fn:10]^, [^fn:11].

It’ll be a big programme. There are plenty of existing alternatives to Meta products[^fn:12], but we’ll need things like adversarial interoperability and bridges to help people migrate. We’ll need municipal or state support to operate the alternatives[^fn:13]. We’ll need regulatory support to mandate interoperability and to take Meta to task when it takes its actions as a bad actor. In the meantime, we’ll need to resist a lot of its practises, making use of tools like ad-blockers and tracker-blockers. We should educate, agitate and organise against Meta to get the word out and spread the programme. We need to be ready with credible options for when the periodic ‘shocks’ arise that expose the rot at Meta’s core to the world[^fn:14].

For me, this is all part of a bigger picture of ‘reclaiming the stacks’ and working towards a transition from digital capitalism to digital ecosocialism. Find out more at my hub page: [[Reclaim the stacks]].

Footnotes§

¹ [[Meta is a bad actor]].

² [[Meta and YouTube deliberately designed addictive products]].

³ [[A lot of people use Meta products]].

⁴ [[The world uses Meta products for some positive functions]].

⁵ [[Facebook only cares about money]].

⁶ [[We should resist, regulate and recode Meta]].

⁷ [[Tactics of digital resistance]].

⁸ [[Tactics of digital reform]].

⁹ [[Tactics of digital prefiguration]].

¹⁰ [[Work within the system, against the system, and beyond the system]].

¹¹ [[Systemic change is a combination of reformist, alternative-building and revolutionary logics]].

¹² [[Libre software alternatives to Meta products]].

¹³ [[Public-civic collaboration, coop incubators and stewarding digital infrastructure as a commons]].

¹⁴ [[The left needs a shock doctrine]].

• #go https://www.loomio.com/d/u1OkUA6M/clarity-on-stance-with-regards-to-threads/30

We should resist, regulate and recode Meta§

We should [[resist, regulate, recode]] [[Meta]].

Why and how to move away from Meta§

A : [[structure note]]

Structure§

[[Meta is a bad actor]].

e.g. [[Meta and YouTube deliberately designed addictive products]]. e.g. [[Meta report shows the company causes far more emissions than it can cover with renewable energy]]

Unfortunately, [[A lot of people use Meta products]]. That said, [[The world uses Meta products for some positive functions]].

While the ultimate goal is to abolish Meta as an organisation, there’s plenty of scope in that for selective replacement of the services it offers. So it’s not just a case of getting rid of Meta and its products.

[[We should resist, regulate and recode Meta]].

A lot of it should be recoded. ([[Tactics of digital prefiguration]]) See [[Libre software alternatives to Meta products]] for some examples. State / municipal support via public funding for digital infrastructure and institutions, [[public-commons partnerships]]. State / municipal support for open standards.

There may need to be some intermediary regulation to break it down. ([[Tactics of digital reform]])

In the meantime, we’ll need to resist a lot of its practises. ([[Tactics of digital resistance]]) Digital resistance of Meta products.

Outputs§

• [[Reminder: abolish Meta]]

Your regular reminder: abolish Meta.§

A : blog post

Date published : [2026-04-13 Mon]

It shouldn’t be news to anyone that Meta is a bad actor[^fn:1]. The recent ruling that Meta deliberately designs addictive products[^fn:2] is just the latest in a long litany of sins.

But it’s hard to escape Meta. Think about the Meta products around you for a second (Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, Messenger, Threads). Someone in your family probably uses to see what’s new; your friends probably use one to share their lives; your community group probably uses one to organise itself; someone near you probalby uses one to advertise their events; your neighbours probably use one to buy and sell things locally. In fact, you probably use it yourself, for one of those things, given that somewhere around a third to a half of the world uses a Meta product monthly[^fn:3]. . We’re all tangled in Meta’s net one way or another.

So: Meta’s bad, but everyone uses it. How come? Well, first off it’s a monopoly, with a network effort as strong as the gravitational pull of a black hole. Secondly, they have boundless resources. And thirdly: the things that people use Meta products for are genuinely worthwhile[^fn:4].

Meta provides a tightly integrated stack of tools for communication, coordination, information discovery and economic activity. All of this can be socially useful. Yet the harms will always outweigh the benefits when it’s mediated through platforms owned by a capitalist megacorp with a narrow ulterior motive: growth, profit and return on investment[^fn:5].

Our goal should be to abolish Meta as an organisation, but not necessarily the functions that it provides. There’s plenty of scope for the rebuilding and recoding of those in a socially useful and environmentally stable way.

How to do so? We need to pursue the triad of digital transformation to resist, regulate and recode Meta[^fn:6]. This will involve tactics of digital rupture and resistance[^fn:7], digital regulation and reform[^fn:8], and digital alternative-building[^fn:9]. Systemic change needs all three[^fn:10]. To abolish Meta, we’ll need to work within Meta, against Meta, and beyond Meta[^fn:11].

It’ll be a big programme. There are plenty of existing alternatives to Meta products[^fn:12]. But we’ll need things like adversarial interoperability and bridges to help people migrate. We’ll need municipal or state support to operate the alternatives[^fn:13]. We’ll need regulatory support to mandate interoperability and to take Meta to task when it takes its actions as a bad actor. In the meantime, we’ll need to resist a lot of its practises, making use of tools like ad-blockers and tracker-blockers. We should educate, agitate and organise against Meta to get the word out and spread the programme. We need to be ready with credible options for when the periodic ‘shocks’ arise that expose the rot at Meta’s core to the world[^fn:14].

For me, this is all part of a bigger picture of ‘reclaiming the stacks’ and working towards a transition from digital capitalism to digital ecosocialism[^fn:15]. Find out more at my hub page: [[Reclaim the stacks]].

Footnotes§

¹ [[Meta is a bad actor]].

² [[Meta and YouTube deliberately designed addictive products]].

³ [[A lot of people use Meta products]].

⁴ [[The world uses Meta products for some positive functions]].

⁵ [[Facebook only cares about money]].

⁶ [[We should resist, regulate and recode Meta]].

⁷ [[Tactics of digital resistance]].

⁸ [[Tactics of digital reform]].

⁹ [[Tactics of digital prefiguration]].

¹⁰ [[Systemic change is a combination of reformist, alternative-building and revolutionary logics]].

¹¹ [[Work within the system, against the system, and beyond the system]].

¹² [[Libre software alternatives to Meta products]].

¹³ [[Public-civic collaboration, coop incubators and stewarding digital infrastructure as a commons]].

¹⁴ [[The left needs a shock doctrine]].

¹⁵ [[Reclaim the stacks]].