EvaDec 22, 2022

If you're thinking of running your own Mastodon instance, EFF's Legal Director Corynne McSherry breaks down some of the common legal issues and practical considerations here:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/12/user-generated-content-and-fediverse-legal-primer

User Generated Content and the Fediverse: A Legal Primer

A growing number of people are experimenting with federated alternatives to social media like Mastodon, either by joining an “instance” hosted by someone else or creating their own instance by running the free, open-source software on a server they control. (See more about this movement and joining...

Electronic Frontier Foundation
Show threadZx

@evacide

When do you think eff runs its own instance?

Dec 22, 2022 at 10:15pmWeb
Show threadEvaDec 22, 2022
@zx As soon as you can convince @starchy to add more work for techops to do.
Show threadClaudestrophobicDec 22, 2022
@evacide @zx Ha! I’m curious, what do you think the added benefit would be? Are you picturing an open instance or one just for our use?
Show threadZxDec 23, 2022

@starchy @evacide

I just find it weird to have EFF giving people advice on how to use Mastodon and how to run their instances without even having one.

I don't think it needs to be a big public instance.

Show threadClaudestrophobicDec 23, 2022

@zx @evacide Well, it's not technical advice for admins. You won't catch me giving any of that until I've been through it firsthand.

On the legal end, we often try to keep ourselves in a position to be the lawyer and not the client, if that makes sense. We generally don't run "platforms" but we've worked with tons of them over the years.

Show threadZxDec 23, 2022

@starchy

That's very fair. Another argument for having an instance, even if one that only exists for sharing articles, is many instances block the big instances since they are poorly moderated. Having a dedicated instance would increase reach.